Brattleboro Selectboard Special Virtual Meeting Agenda – RTM

by Not Signed In | Town News

The Brattleboro Selectboard will hold a special meeting on Tuesday, July 28, 2020, via GoToMeeting.   It is anticipated that the Board will enter into executive session at 5:30pm to discuss contracts and confidential attorney-client communications made for the purpose of providing professional legal services to the body.  The Board will reconvene the business meeting at 6:15pm.   In keeping with Governor Scott’s “Stay Home – Stay Safe” order, this meeting will be held with no physical location using GoToMeeting.  The attached agenda contains information about how to access the meeting remotely.  ASL interpreters will be available for deaf and hard-of-hearing community members.

Brattleboro Citizen Police Communications Committee Virtual Meeting Agenda

by Not Signed In | Town News

The Brattleboro Citizen Police Communications Committee (CPCC) will meet on Monday, July 27, 2020, at 5:30pm via GoToMeeting.  In keeping with Governor Scott’s “Stay Home – Stay Safe” order, this meeting will be held with no physical location using GoToMeeting.  The attached agenda contains information about how to access the meeting remotely.

Collaborative Community Statement  Regarding the Brattleboro Policing/Community Safety Review Process

by cgrotke | Town News

Here’s the full text of the document discussed at the July 21, 2020 meeting of the Brattleboro Selectboard:

…..

July, 21, 2020

Collaborative Community Statement  Regarding the Brattleboro Policing/Community Safety Review Process

Summary Statement

We are seeking a review process focused on a comprehensive examination of community safety and policing in Brattleboro to determine whether the police force effectively meets the communities’ needs, and to determine how to best fund and support community safety. 

Affordable Housing in Brattleboro

by spoon | Op/Ed

It is very revealing that in all the comments of sympathy and advice about one family’s difficulties in finding affordable housing, a post and thread appearing very recently on fbook, not one asks if it is possible for us, as a community, to house ourselves.

The population of Brattleboro has decreased slightly from what it was in 1960. Although there is a relatively small number of new units built every year there is a very large number over that span. As far as I know not one Selectboard in all these years has tried to deal with affordable housing other than approving federally funded projects when one happened to be brought before them. Most of that money dried up long ago. Sixty years have passed and we have more people struggling with housing than ever before.

COVID 19 Update

by RDavis | Health

It is clear that the United States is doing a deadly poor job of controlling the pandemic. There are too many people who think that having a beer and mingling in crowds is more important than saving lives. And there are too many people in power who have turned the pandemic into a political battle.

As of July 20, 3,834,208 Americans have been infected with COVID 19 and 142,601 have died. The U.S. has had 24% of the 606,173 deaths worldwide.

Most other countries have slowed disease spread because they have had organized government efforts to provide citizens with the tools to stay safe. There is no national effort in this country and that means the numbers will continue to rise and more people will die, despite the best efforts of individual states.

The Evolution of the Brattleboro Colonel

by cgrotke | History
Colonels 1958

The Brattleboro Colonels’ mascot is again being questioned. As it currently exists, it is a cartoonish characterization of a southern colonel, along the lines of something you’d see at a fried chicken franchise. It should be retired and replaced.

That said, the current version is not quite what was originally intended.

Joe Rivers, local history teacher and a president of the Brattleboro Historical Society, explained that for the first half of the high school’s existence there was no sports team name or mascot. “When the school was located in what is now the municipal center the sports teams were just known as Brattleboro. The sports editors assigned nicknames, often associated with the last name of their coach, but there was not an official name until 1950.”

BCTV Schedules – Week of July 20, 2020

by BCTVProg | Media

BCTV Channel 8 / 1075 schedule for the week of 7/20/20

Monday, July 20, 2020

4:15 am Somerville Museum – Reading Frederick Douglass Together
5:00 am Slow Living Summit – Sandra Steingarner 6/5/20
6:32 am Heartline Ministries – Adoption Part 2
7:30 am The News Project – Press Pass – 7/1/20
8:00 am Democracy Now! – Democracy Now! Daily Broadcast

FOMAG Cancels Guilford Labor Day Music Festival

by BusyMom | Music

Friends of Music at Guilford regretfully announces the cancellation of its annual Labor Day Weekend Festival due to the COVID pandemic.

Traditionally, the two-concert event includes a Saturday evening organ program, and a Sunday afternoon lawn concert at the Organ Barn in Guilford, featuring the Guilford Festival Orchestra. The organ concert highlights Friends of Music’s 1897 “tracker-action” pipe organ, which was installed in the barn in 1964 by late organist A. Graham Down, founder of the annual event.

In making the announcement, Friends of Music president Jenifer Ambler noted that this is the first time the event has been cancelled in its 55-year history. “The organ program, being indoors, has always gone ahead, no matter the weather,” Ambler said. “The barn is too small, however, for our 45-piece orchestra and the several hundred folks in our audience, so on a handful of occasions the orchestral program has been moved by rain to either Guilford Central School or Broad Brook Community Center. But this is our first-ever cancellation.”

The Business of America

by tomaidh | History

President Calvin Coolidge once said “The business of America is business”. He really meant it. Everything else is window dressing.

There’s an elite class of business people who control things (and have forever). Their interests dominate all others. They can’t be voted out. (Most of them work behind the scenes and hold no office at all). Money is speech. All we can do is roll with the punches.

Town of Brattleboro COVID-19 Status Report

by Not Signed In | Town News

WHAT IS NEW TODAY 

• Here are links to 3 important COVID-19 financial relief programs offered by the State of Vermont for renters, landlords, and sole proprietor businesses: 

o Emergency Mortgage Assistance- https://www.vhfa.org/documents/images/vt_map_flyer.pdf 

o Rental Housing Stabilization Fund – https://www.vsha.org/rental-housing-stabilization-program/ 

o Vermont Sole Proprietor Stabilization Fund – https://www.vermont-cdbg-cv.com/ 

Brattleboro Selectboard Meeting Agenda – July 21, 2020

by cgrotke | Town News

The next regular meeting of the Brattleboro Selectboard will be devoted to a single topic – the continued discussion of a potential police review process. 

The previous conversation left off with two competing proposals – one from the board and one from community groups working with these issues – and a request that the selectboard’s proposal be withdrawn. The board wanted time to consider merging the two proposals.

You can bring up other items not on the agenda during public participation.

VFW $7 Lunch Specials Open to the Public 7-20 to 7-24

by LisaL | Food

VFW $7 Lunch Specials July 20th – July 24th

Mon – Salisbury steak, mashed potato, veg, gravy & roll
Tues – spaghetti in meat sauce w/ salad & garlic bread
Wed – chicken bacon ranch salad
Thur – TURKEY DINNER (call in to go’s ASAP)
Fri – pork bites in gravy over noodles w/ veg & biscuit

Now! Back To The Land!

by melevav | Home & Garden

In that all things, even the virus, work together for the good we increased in our farming efforts during our time of “Shelter in Place”. Love gave us the faith to plant three gardens here in Oak Hill! We discovered seed that had been left behind by others and did germination tests. Some of these seeds were 12 years old but they were viable and sprouted. Quickly this Spring we had an improvised little greenhouse! Our children love small beginnings that is if we do. Faith and enthusiasm is always contagious just like good leaven!