The Deeper Dig

For the past few years, Vermont has had the second highest per-capita rate of homelessness in the country. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the number of people counted as homeless more than doubled, and the numbers keep going up. Lots of people are trying to grasp: Why is this happening? Why have we seen this huge, dramatic spike in the number of people experiencing homelessness here? Carly Berlin w...

For decades, Vermont Yankee, a nuclear power plant in Vernon, was the largest producer of electricity for the state. The plant has been shut down since 2014, and the company that now owns it is in the process of deconstructing it. That company, NorthStar, has recently submitted a plan that describes in detail the final steps of decommissioning, which is projected to be completed ahead of schedule,...

Edi Abeneto is food shelf supervisor at Feeding Chittenden, a Burlington-based nonprofit that focuses on hunger relief and serves more than 12,000 people every year.  Abeneto has worked at the organization for more than 17 years. He speaks six languages, and among other duties, he facilitates communication and provides interpretation for visitors from a wide range of backgrounds. Over time, he sai...

Managing big emotions is hard for adults, so what must it be like if you’re 3 feet tall and still in diapers? Anyone who’s been around kids knows how they can get overwhelmed by big emotional reactions. Those can run the gamut from despair to rage to laughing fits, sometimes within the same five-minute period. So, how can you teach kids to manage emotions in a healthy way? Especially if you’re sti...

Neshobe Island is a small island located on the Castleton side of Lake Bomoseen. It has two houses, a barn and some surrounding woods, and that’s about it. In the 1920s and ‘30s, though, the island hosted a who’s who of celebrities and intellectuals most summers. These included Noël Coward, Thornton Wilder, Irving Berlin, Margaret Mitchell, Dorothy Parker, Laurence Olivier, Vivien Leigh, Walt Disn...

At the University of Vermont, the share of in-state students is dwindling, and it’s raising questions about the role and mission of the state’s flagship public university. VTDigger education reporter Peter D’Auria — with the help of data reporter Erin Petenko — has been looking at the enrollment statistics over time, as well as how they compare with those of other large public universities across...

Vermont’s oldest synagogue has been sold — and its new owner plans to turn it into a food hall and apartments.  The nearly 140-year-old brick synagogue in Burlington’s Old North End served as an important center for the city’s Jewish community for decades. Now deteriorating physically, with its congregation mostly dwindled away, it has been sold to an entrepreneur who plans to redevelop the buildi...

Earlier this month, the Green Mountain Care Board made a decision that would affect most people and companies that get their health care through the state’s health insurance marketplace. The board said that two companies that offer insurance through Vermont Health Connect would be able to increase premiums by double digits in 2024. These increases will be less than insurers had asked for. Despite...

Vermonters are still coming to terms with the devastating toll of this summer’s flooding, which inundated downtowns, destroyed homes and businesses, and caused two confirmed deaths. Considered from almost any angle, the impact of this extreme weather on the state has been massive. Among the issues that environmental reporter Emma Cotton has been looking into is how the floods affected wildlife and...

Early this month, heavy rains led to historic flooding in many parts of Vermont, causing massive — as yet uncounted — damage to homes, businesses and infrastructure. At the time of this recording, the state has confirmed that one person was killed by the floods. Like in Tropical Storm Irene in 2011, many towns were under feet of water, and some were transformed into islands, with routes in and out...

For months, Democratic lawmakers and Republican Gov. Phil Scott insisted that extending the Covid-19-era program providing people with vouchers to live in motels past this summer was a no-go. Federal money had run out, and, they said, the program was just too expensive to continue. Then, at the end of June, lawmakers worked out a deal. The program would be extended, for at least some people, until...

It’s not unusual for Vermont’s Department of Corrections to be at the center of debate. The department manages six prisons across Vermont, with more than 1,000 incarcerated people in the system.  The department is perpetually facing challenges, which only increased during the pressures of the Covid-19 pandemic. There are perennial discussions over the ethics of sending people to out-of-state priso...

If you follow this podcast, you’ve probably read a lot of the work of reporter Sarah Mearhoff. She covers politics for VTDigger, and, especially when the legislature is in session, is a close watcher of every aspect of state government. That means that she spends a lot of time in the Vermont Statehouse, the home of the state legislature and the backdrop for an enormous amount of highly consequenti...

There’s a story about forests that you’ve probably heard. Some environmentalists want to protect old trees, and leave the forests alone to sequester carbon. Others say there are good reasons for humans to actively manage forests. Those advocates include loggers and foresters, who earn their livelihoods from the land, but also scientists and other members of the environmental movement.  But amid a...

Several Vermont sheriff departments have come under scrutiny in the past year following drastic turnover, allegations of misconduct or unusual financial activity. Two sheriffs — one former, one recently sworn in — face criminal charges.  The Legislature is considering a constitutional amendment, as a long-term measure to increase oversight. Some lawmakers are also considering a bill that would bar...

Despite Vermont parents’ overwhelming demand for spots in child care and preschools, the supply remains limited. Parents all over the state sit on waitlists for months or even years. If they do score a spot, tuition likely could cost them more than if they sent their toddler to an in-state college for the workday.  And yet, despite the tight market for early childhood services, the educators still...

Noah Kahan remembers getting excited when a song he put on SoundCloud hit a thousand plays.  Now, his songs have been streamed more than one billion times.  Kahan’s metaphorical use of “stick season,” the time between Vermont foliage and proper snow, went viral on TikTok last year and sparked covers by Zach Bryan, Chelsea Cutler, Maisie Peters and countless fans who recorded themselves strumming i...

As Vermont’s Legislature opened its 2023 session and Republican Gov. Phil Scott was inaugurated to his fourth term, one theme got an early spotlight in the Statehouse: Vermont’s urban-rural divide. Much of Vermont’s state population is concentrated in Chittenden County, clustered around the metropolitan center of Burlington, which is Vermont’s largest city with a population of nearly 45,000, accor...

A 97-acre parcel of undeveloped land off Mountainview Road in Williston is home to a wetland, views of Camel’s Hump and Mount Mansfield, and most days, some horses out to pasture from a neighboring farm. It is also the site of a conflict that is forcing one of Vermont’s fastest growing municipalities to reckon with the challenges of building new housing at a time of heightened demand and inadequat...

Montpelier residents put up with an unusually high number of water main breaks , which, in recent years, have led to boil water notices, expensive emergency repairs and school and business closures.  The city’s aging pipe system, some of it nearly a century old, is straining under unusually high water pressure — which in some locations is more than double the state standard. This is due to the sys...

Data from 21 billion Facebook friendships shows that when you know more high-income people, your income is more likely to rise over time, according to an analysis from Opportunity Insights, a nonprofit based out of Harvard University. The data puts numbers to something that’s pretty intuitive: Social connections, even just acquaintances, can pass along job openings and other opportunities.  The st...

Next week, Vermont voters could write abortion protections into the state constitution. But 50 years ago, Vermont was a state where most people went elsewhere to end a pregnancy.  The Vermont Supreme Court had legalized abortion in 1972, with its decision in Beecham v. Leahy. But while elective abortion was allowed, it remained elusive: The University of Vermont’s hospital, which came from a Catho...

For the past two years, Reps. Katherine Sims, D-Craftsbury, and Vicki Strong, R-Albany, have served alongside each other in the Vermont House, jointly representing seven towns in the Northeast Kingdom.  But this year, due to redistricting, Sims and Strong are competing for a single seat. It is the only race in the state where an incumbent is guaranteed to lose.  Along stretches of Route 14 in Craf...

Over the summer, and into the first few months of the school year, school districts across the state scrambled to fill not just teaching positions, but also support staff roles, such as custodians, bus drivers and paraprofessionals.  Earlier this week, two Vermont schools — U-32 in East Montpelier and Spaulding High School in Barre — canceled classes due to staffing shortages, amid a spate of abse...

At first, the Shapovalov family thought they’d be able to avoid the worst of the fighting. Their village, Skelky, along the Dnipro River in Ukraine, was close to a large nuclear power plant. They didn’t think the invading Russian army would dare to shoot anywhere nearby. But the tanks rolled in. They could hear explosions from the bomb shelter some nights.  They spent nearly 40 days living under R...