VPR News

Romaine Tenney killed himself in 1964, when the federal government was seizing his farm to build Interstate 91. A single maple tree was left on the land to remember Tenney, but the tree was removed last week because it was dying.

In the last few weeks, Vermont has started offering COVID-19 vaccines to K-12 public and private school teachers and staff, early educators and child care workers, as the state pushes to get kids back into classrooms full time this spring. At one recent vaccination clinic for educators, teachers expressed excitement and relief as they received their shots.

The COVID-19 pandemic made the state's broadband inequities glaringly clear . Despite a big push by the state last year, thousands of people, especially those in Vermont's most rural areas, could not get online to go to school , work or access health care. The recently passed American Rescue Plan Act could change that.

Jessie Diggins was crowned the International Ski Federation's World Cup winner over the weekend. The 29-year-old cross-country skier is a Minnesota native who trains at her adopted home in Stratton, Vt. But simply noting that Diggins won the World Cup just scratches the surface of her accomplishments in a record-setting season.

In the last year of the pandemic, Vermont has lost more than 200 people to COVID-19 . Those people were our family members, our friends, and our neighbors.

At a time when more than 40 states are considering bills to limit access to voting, the Vermont Legislature is moving in the opposite direction. This hour, we look at a bill that would make mail-in voting permanent for Vermont's general elections.

More than 200 people in Vermont have died of COVID-19 over the past year. About a quarter of those deaths occurred in the first two months of the pandemic.

The pandemic forced Vermonters to rethink town meeting this year. As a result, many towns moved their meetings online and allowed for voting by mail. One survey shows that those changes may have led to a big increase in voter participation.

It was nearly one year ago, on Friday, March 13, 2020, when Gov. Phil Scott declared a state of emergency in Vermont in response to COVID-19. Much has changed since then for Vermont, the nation and the world. This hour, we talk about the many ways life has changed amid the pandemic and consider the outlook for the future.

If you don't live in Vergennes, you could be forgiven for not following the local mayor's race or who's running for city council. But a lot has happened in the small city over a tumultuous last few months. Newly-elected mayor Mathew Chabot says he wants to get Vergennes back on track.

An environmental court judge last Friday ordered Slate Ridge owner Daniel Banyai to permanently shut down his military style training facility in Pawlet and pay more than $46,000 in fines.

As the pandemic grew more severe last Spring, animal shelters in Vermont were restricted from transporting pets from out of state by travel restrictions set by Gov. Phil Scott. This segment, we check in with the Humane Society of Chittenden County, now that they are able to transport pets safely from states like Texas and Georgia.

Dartmouth researchers just published a report showing that early humans and woolly mammoths may have shared the New England landscape at the same time. Before this rib fragment from a Vermont mammoth was carbon dated, it wasn't known if humans and woolly mammoths overlapped in this region. This segment, we talk with one of the researchers about this discovery.

Getting back into a packed sports stadium to watch their favorite team compete is likely near the top of the list of what sports fans are looking forward to once the coronavirus pandemic ends. Vermont author Larry Olmsted argues in his new book that sports fandom thrills and entertains as much as it fosters our mental health and sense of belonging.

Burlington Mayor Miro Weinberger will be sworn in for his fourth term leading Vermont's largest city next month, after an exceedingly narrow victory on Town Meeting Day.