Jackie Stickley
Apr.26.2010
To an outsider looking in, the diverse array of refugees that arrive in Burlington are finally able to leave all of their old troubles behind in their home country and embark on a new life of hope and opportunity. While this is certainly true in many respects, refugees new to the area face an entirely new set of challenges.
Refugees from all over the world have been starting life anew in Vermont for years. Chittenden County hosts the vast majority of the new arrivals with Burlington seeing the heaviest influx of refugees from various nations such as Bhutan, Myanmar, Somalia, and Congo. A very large chunk of these refugees come from African nations. The Association of Africans Living in Vermont (AALV), located in the North End of Burlington, provides services especially to the African community through various programs including case management, home visits to new arrivals, men's and women's groups, and interpreter services.
It is easy to see how the refugee population enriches the cultural diversity of Burlington by simply walking around the city's streets. The North End in particular is dotted with various ethnic grocery stores and restaurants, as well as African women dressed in their traditional, colorful dress. Dozens of unique languages can be overheard at the bus stops, in restaurants, on Church Street, at the waterfront. To say these ethnic influences stand out in the drastically white city of Burlington is an understatement, and one that makes it particularly difficult for new Vermonters from half way around the world to fit into their new surroundings.
The combination of language barriers and extreme culture differences that new refugees face in comparison to the locals creates an invisible wall to belonging that is difficult to surmount without assistance. Finding themselves unable to communicate or relate with the population of white Vermonters, refugees often only communicate within their own cultural circles and fail to assimilate fully into society.
On top of many refugees' inability to read, write, and understand English, many of them lack the basic skills needed for most jobs. This is often due to any number of hardships they may have experienced in their native lands that prevented them from learning any job skills necessary for life in the Western world. In today's poor economy, the refugee community has been hit the hardest, currently at an over 80% unemployment rate. The cultural barrier on top of the constant stress of having little money and having to hunt for jobs in this economy puts extreme strain on local refugee families.
Luckily, there are a couple of local organizations with the mission to help assist new refugees in settling. The Vermont Resettlement Program (VRRP), based in Colchester, works with refugees to "defend human rights, promote self-sufficiency and education, and forge community partnerships through a full range of services and programs." Heavily volunteer-driven, VRRP focuses on helping refugees-- Bhutanese, Burmese, Iraqi and Somali people primarily-- reach self-sufficiency within eight months and learn English and find jobs for up to five years.
The O'Brien Community Center in Winooski is another great resource for refugees. Although the Center's services are for anyone in the community to use as needed, the area's refugees make up a large part of the make up of the Center's visitors. The O'Brien Center also offers English-language classes and community meetings and potluck suppers to help facilitate the refugees' sense of belonging within the community.
"There's a wide spectrum of people who come in here. At the beginning of the day, there's the English language learning course," Melody McKnight, Events and Facilities Coordinator for O'Brien said. She mentioned refugees from Nepal, India, Tanzania, and Somalia that use the Center and also noted the diversity of the kids that participate in their Teen Night and After School programs. "I just found out that one-in-six Winooski kids come and the majority of them that do come-- two-thirds of them I would estimate-- are immigrants or refugees."
New Americans can particularly benefit from the nutrition class offered at the O'Brien Center. The climate in Vermont could not be more opposite of the climates most of the refugees hail from. Their traditional, native food is not necessarily available here. It is important for new refugees to learn how to fix nutritious meals with unfamiliar foods.
The Refugee Health Program, an offshoot of the Vermont Department of Health, also offers nutrition education as well as an array of services to "promote the physical and mental well being of refugees living in Vermont." Many of the refugees that arrive in Vermont come to flee from the violence in there home countries. The nightmares do not necessarily end once they reach safety, however. Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome and physical disease and injury is very common to newcomers. The Refugee Health Program does its best to assist these refugees in the best way possible, but not all asylum seekers reach out for the help they need. In some cases, women go untreated due to cultural rules that forbid male doctors to touch them.
Once refugees reach the safety of Vermont, the old challenges they faced in their old countries are replaced by new challenges. Organizations like AALV, VRRP, the O'Brien Center, and the Refugee Health Program go a long way in alleviating some of these challenges, but more groups like this are necessary to help the growing refugee population feel truly at home and happy in Vermont.
Hal Colston, Community Service professor at Champlain College and founder of the non profit Good News Garage, meets refugees on a regular basis through the Neighborkeepers meetings at the O'Brien Center. Colston created Neighborkeepers with the goal build meaningful relationships between people within the community and to help them achieve adequate resources to survive. Colston feels that these new Americans are not receiving as much assistance as they need.
"They'll get some [government assistance] when they first get here, but it's only eight months and that's it and they're on their own." Eight months is rarely enough time to learn English, find a job, and truly become part of a foreign community.
On a positive note, however, Colston spoke on the advantage these refugees bring with them-- a strong sense of family and togetherness, as well as closeness to nature that is part of their culture. "My sense is that people that live close to the earth, where they grow their food and [have a] visceral, hands-on approach to living, seem to do much, much better with getting on their feet, getting goals, accomplishing them, and making connections," he explained. "They may be lacking resources like financial resources, or maybe even emotional or physical [resources], but they have this sense of pulling in other support from their community."
Hal Colston, Community Service professor at Champlain College and founder of the non profit Good News Garage, meets refugees on a regular basis through the Neighborkeepers meetings at the O'Brien Center. Colston created Neighborkeepers with the goal build meaningful relationships between people within the community and to help them achieve adequate resources to survive. Colston feels that these new Americans are not receiving as much assistance as they need.
"They'll get some [government assistance] when they first get here, but it's only eight months and that's it and they're on their own." Eight months is rarely enough time to learn English, find a job, and truly become part of a foreign community.
On a positive note, however, Colston spoke on the advantage these refugees bring with them-- a strong sense of family and togetherness, as well as closeness to nature that is part of their culture. "My sense is that people that live close to the earth, where they grow their food and [have a] visceral, hands-on approach to living, seem to do much, much better with getting on their feet, getting goals, accomplishing them, and making connections," he explained. "They may be lacking resources like financial resources, or maybe even emotional or physical [resources], but they have this sense of pulling in other support from their community."
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Google Fiber Optic High-Speed Internet Coming to a Town Near You?
Jacklyn Stickley
Apr.27.2010
What do a Champlain College student, a self-proclaimed "mad scientist," and the governor of Vermont have in common? They have all banded together behind Vermont to compete against thousands of other communities nationwide to become one of the first locales Google chooses to test its state-of-the-art, fiber optic Internet system. As part of the application process, Vermont Telecommunications Authority (VTA) commissioned Champlain film student, Nick Stefani to create a short video. The video includes testimonials from Governor Jim Davis and other fiber optic advocates from the state.. By the end of 2010, Google will implement new fiber optics systems in the locations of their choosing, bringing 1-gigabyte per second Internet that will run 100 times faster than current broadband to a few lucky communities.
As part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) was put in charge of constructing the National Broadband Plan in an effort to bring faster Internet to as many people in the U.S. as possible. To coincide with the plan, Google announced its own experiment back in February to provide between 50,000 to 500,000 people with a competitively priced, fiber optics system on a trial basis. The huge Internet corporation describes this experiment on their blog as an opportunity "to experiment and learn," as well as to share their findings with other fiber optic network developers.
Vermont seems to be gearing towards the fiber optics route anyways. Local organizations, such as East-Central Vermont Community Fiber Network (ECFiber), VTA, ValleyFiber, and Vermont Rural Broadband Project have teamed up to plan out a fiber optic wireless system for the entire state. ECFiber is a grassroots organization that has gathered support over the past two years from local municipalities to create locally-owned fiber optics systems. The VTA, created by the state government to bring high speed Internet to all of Vermonters, has partnered with Sovernet Inc. to acquire a $33 million federal broadband grant to install a statewide fiber optics system. Recently, FairPoint Communciations, a wireless supplier out of Charlotte, NC, announced they were switching from their initial plan to create above-ground towers in Vermont to installing a fiber optics wire system instead.
Progress, however, has been slow in implementing these systems, partially due to the economic slump the U.S. fell into back in 2008. ECFiber has struggled with funding after loans fell through, for example. Governor Douglas has been rewarding fiber optic start-up grants here and there to communities for several years now. In October 2009, Vermont received a $69 million federal grant that went to creating Smart Grid technology-- creating more efficient electric utilities, including building a fiber optics system.
Another challenge is the remoteness of many Vermont communities. The question of whether or not it would be financially beneficial to bring the high speed Internet to every Vermonter is legitimate. However, Loredo Sola, ECFiber’s Governing Board Chair, is convinced that it is. “Universal coverage is economically feasible,” he said. “Vermont municipalities can build a self-supporting FTTH (Fiber To The Home) network covering the entire state.”
Competition for this Google opportunity is intense after 1100 communities across the country applied, but Sola believes Vermont stands a chance due in part to its past working relationship with Google. “It is important to note that Google has embraced the fundamental goal of ECFiber, namely to build a financially self supporting FTTH network with universal coverage and open access,” he explained. “We are part of four different Google network applications.”
For now, Vermonters will just have to sit tight until Google makes the big announcement later this year.
Curious Mark
Joe Dimeck
Apr.27.2008
On a Thursday day night in February, Mark Nastasi carried a cup of jelly beans through Nectars in downtown Burlington, offering a handful to whoever was willing to accept. Most refused, paranoid about the bearded man with unkempt long hair, who was dressed in a tan duster jacket with a military vest over it that had a Grateful Dead patch on the back.
He looked like a shell-shocked vet, trapped in the misery of war—flashbacks of friends’ deaths haunting him—but once you talk to him you’re surprised. He’s coherent, he’s not crazy by any conventional standards—but he’s different.
“On some nights—the bad nights when I don’t make much playing music—I’ll just take the change I make and buy the jelly bean thing out and give them to people,” he said.
Mark ended up in Burlington after hearing that a friend knew a glass blower in the area. Ever since he was a kid, Mark had this affinity for glass work.
“You’re taking particles of sand and you’re turning them into this complex and complete object,” Mark said.
This fascination with the idea of taking scattered pieces of matter (such as sand) and melting them together to create one unified piece could stem from a childhood that was anything but cohesive.
As Mark tells it, when he was 3 his mother cheated on his father with a mafia-connected mechanic. The act prompted Mark’s dad, Joseph Eugene Nastasi (also a mechanic), to leave and cut ties with his family.
Mark spent his childhood living without ever knowing his father, and the man who had the affair with his mother became Mark’s step-dad.
“It went straight from my father to being with my stepfather. From the age of 3 years old to just about 12 years old we were living with him. He’s my younger sister’s and my younger brother’s father.”
But Mark remembers his stepfather as an abusive alcoholic, who would come home drunk and beat him, his mother, and his siblings.
This childhood abuse would effectively deny Mark a normal childhood as it robbed him of the innocence and naiveté many children have—traits that shield them from the unpleasant realities that adults know all too well.
For Mark those realities were known from a very young age. “My mother left me to myself because I was independent—she knew I could take care of myself.”
However, being forced to be self-reliant from such a young age created all types of stress for Mark, and he admits the first time he ever felt happy as a kid was when he smoked pot for the first time at age 15. It temporarily removed the fear and hopelessness that he was constantly living with as a result of his familial situation. Mark also mentions that kids at school treated him as an outcast because his way of thinking and operating was not the same as theirs. After all, most of the kids who went to school with him didn’t have to deal with the chaotic home-life that was the norm for Mark.
Talking about his stepfather, Mark said the following. “I despised the man. There was very little about my childhood that was good because of him, and the only parts of it that were good because of him were because we had money growing up. He was a mechanic , and plus, he had his fingers in mob business, so we had money coming in all the time.”
Mark explained the various hardships of his youth. At age 11, he was diagnosed with depression and institutionalized after trying to strangle himself with a lanyard. At 17, he left home and went off by himself. By 19, he was institutionalized for roughly 4 days after being picked up by the police because he was walking around trying to get hit by cars.
It was around New Years Eve 2005 when Mark was in Oneonta, New York. He was there because he was on probation and couldn’t go anywhere. He had just got out of jail for stealing a steel pipe, a night he called an “eye-opener” and a “stupid story for another time.” Nevertheless, he knew he couldn’t be in Oneonta anymore and had decided to leave.
“I couldn’t stay in New York anymore. I kept getting in trouble,” said Mark. “I was having problems with trying to find a place to stay and work. The same kind of troubles that plague me a lot of the time, but I was going to be 21 soon, and 18 years without knowing my father—without ever having spoke to the man—I was getting sick of it: having to go on what everybody else had told me about him.”
While partying with friends on New Year’s Eve, Mark said he met a guy from Flagstaff, Arizona, whose name he doesn’t recall.
“I’m so horrible with names, and it was 5 years ago. I meet so many people, you know?”
According to Mark, the guy from Arizona offered to put him up for a few days after hearing that Mark was trying to head out to Arizona to find his dad.
“I knew my dad was in Arizona, but I didn’t know exactly where,” Mark says. “My mom told me a few times that was the last place she knew he had been.”
Mark decided to break his probation on New Year’s Day and hitchhike west in order to finally meet the man, who’s genetically responsible for his existence, but never actually made an impact on his life besides not being in it—an impact that might have been more severe and life changing than if he hadn’t left and raised Mark instead.
“It took 28 days to get there,” Mark says. “A lot of rides, a lot of zig-zagging around, a lot of stay over a night here and over a night there, a lot of sleeping in tractor trailers with truckers.”
Once in Arizona, he got together with the guy he met in Oneonta, who offered him a place to crash.
“I was in Flagstaff chilling with that guy, he took me to a party, I met some girl at the party, hung out with her for a couples days—her name was Daisy, she was awesome—really nice girl.”
After hanging in Flagstaff for awhile, Mark said the same guy he met in Oneonta introduced him to other people who were also wandering around. From there, Mark happened to find his way to a drop-in center for the homeless. The center serves as a resource for homeless people and other transients, providing them with information on local shelters and social service programs.
“At the drop-in center, they had a poster board up and on the poster board was the information for a halfway house,” Mark said. “I called the lady and she told me it was $90 a week.”
At the time, Mark said he was working as a day laborer—essentially odd jobbing for whoever could pay him that day—and figured if he kept it up he could pay the $90 a week. However, after telling the lady at the halfway house (whose name he can’t remember) that his sole reason for being in Arizona was to find his father, she told him she used to be a foster parent and would help him out.
“All I had was his name and his birthday—not much at all,” said Mark. “She was able to find his phone number, and give him a call. She called him and told him I was there so it wouldn’t be so awkward me just showing up on his door step. Which is kind of what I wanted to do, but at the same time it might have been a different situation if that is what happened.”
Instead of ambushing his estranged father, Mark said his father picked him up in Flagstaff. They spent the day together, first getting breakfast, but mostly driving around and talking. His dad eventually asked him to stay with him, and Mark took his dad up on the offer.
“It took some time before we could actually have discussions about why things were the way they were,” says Mark. “And still, I think there’s a lot left to be said, but nobody wants to talk about it.”
Mark admits it didn’t take long for his dad, Joseph, to figure out Mark was using drugs—mostly pot.
“It was pretty obvious,” Mark said.
He attributed a lot of the early issues and conflicts his father and him had to Joseph’s opposition to the lifestyle he was living.
“My drug of choice is pot, and it’s not that big of a deal in my opinion, but it was a huge deal to him because it’s illegal still. And I had the cops looking for me for leaving New York to go to Arizona. He wasn’t about that—and other things as well—because he doesn’t do anything illegal anymore because he’s had his run-ins with the law and doesn’t need that kind of attention.”
However, the monotonous routine that Mark felt his dad was living wasn’t what he expected or wanted. For the then 21 year old, he wanted to be going out to parties or bars—not to drink since Mark doesn’t really care for alcohol—but his father was never up for it, hindered by his own bank account.
“My dad’s always very much about saying, ‘We don’t have the money for things like that,’ and I’m the kind of person who believes you don’t need money to have a good time.”
According to Mark, it was this difference of opinion that created tension between him and his father. Mark was expecting to bond with his father, but sitting in his apartment watching movies as he unwound after a day of work wasn’t what Mark had wanted.
“My father’s not a very social person,” he said. “That’s part of the reason we have such a hard time communicating. My father’s really just angry about a lot of things.”
Mark recalls the day he met another tenant at the apartment complex his dad was staying in. They got talking, both realized they liked smoking weed, and became friends.
A little bit later in their friendship, Mark learned the kid also was a user of crystal meth. In fact, most of the apartment complex had plenty of tweaked out residents.
“We were living in an apartment complex where a lot of the kids in there used that shit—a lot of people in Arizona, in general, use that shit.”
Mark said he eventually tried meth, and consequently, became addicted to it. His reasoning for doing it was because the kid, who introduced it to him, seemed fine. Mark said he didn’t seem like someone whose life was in shambles, but in hindsight, Mark realized how stupid the drug is.
Once his dad found out, Mark was asked to leave. He headed out to San Diego, where he slept on the beach for what he feels was 3 months. The problem, according to Mark, was that he had cleaned up and got off meth before heading to California, but it didn’t take long before he met people who used the drug.
“That drug makes you lose connection with time and reality,” Mark says. “It’s a very dissociative drug. It makes you not yourself, and there were times where I wasn’t sure if I was living on the beach for 3 months doing that shit or only a month. I’m pretty sure the span was 3 months, but there’s times when I was awake for 4 or 5 days on end with zero sleep, 150 plus hours zero sleep, delusional—completely out of my mind, not sure if I’m even part of reality or if I’m just the manifestation of somebody’s thoughts—like really crazy, tripped out ideas.”
The breaking point came when Mark said he almost hit a guy with a shovel after being severely tweaked out for a few days. What caused Mark to snap was the theft of all his belongings—the loss of everything he had. Only one person, Mark says, had known where his things were stashed, and when Mark saw him he grabbed a shovel and charged him before being subdued by his friend.
“I snapped out of it and was like, ‘Get me out of here.’ I started crying, and I’m like ‘I’m tweaked—I am a spun fucking duck,’” Mark said. “Over material possessions, too, and I try not to hold myself too much to material possessions because you don’t take anything when you transcend.”
He had to get as far away from meth as possible, and that’s what he did.
At first, he said he tried to joined the military, but when he told the recruiter about being institutionalized, he was turned away. Mark said he returned to Arizona, clean and sober, and took a job at a car wash. He was living with his dad again, but as Mark put it, all the car wash employees smoked pot, which led Mark back to his weed habit. And just ass before, tensions grew between him and his father.
“What it boils down to with me and my father having so many problems is the whole money thing. He obsesses about not having the money to go out and have fun, and that I shouldn’t be smoking pot.”
So Mark said he picked up and returned to California; this time to Fresno. While in Fresno he learned of the inheritance check his grandma had left him when she passed, which had been sitting and building interest. Mark returned to New York to get his birth certificate in order to claim the check for $176,000.
“I lived off that for a few years in New York,” he said. “None of it’s left. I loaned some people some money. I gave my mom $10,000. The girl I was with for awhile, I bought her a car. I bought the Jeep I have now…I bought a lot of pipes since I have this obsession with glass.”
In fact, the last of the inheritance money went to glass blowing classes at the Bern Gallery in Burlington, where Mark continues to crash in his car or on people’s couches. While he has returned to visit his dad in between, he’s not sure if they’ll ever have the kind of relationship he imagined they would.
“He took care of me the best he could, but it was kind of too late for him to be my dad. At the same time, he probably felt like it was his right to be my dad. And that’s another issue. You gotta remember, if you’re meeting your parents for the first time after a long period of time, they will still feel like they’re your parents and that they can tell you what you can do.”
It was that possibly instinctive paternal response, which made it hard for Mark to connect with his dad. In regards to forgiving his dad, he had the following to say.
“A lot of people told me a lot of bad things about my father for a long time, and I wanted to believe they weren’t true. But don’t do that to yourself. Don’t have false expectations,” he says. “I have more negative feelings towards my mom than I do my father. Because my mom cheated on my father. Maybe that’s why he’s so angry.”
One thing about Mark, which is surprising—given his past—is how positive he is about the future.
“I think it’s every generation’s job to break the negative cycle, and my negative cycle is that I didn’t have my father growing up. So if I ever have kids I’ll never leave them. I’ll raise those kids to be better than I am.”
Mark also offers the following advice for those in a similar situation to his.
“If I could give anything to any person like me, where you have no connection with your father or haven’t for a very long time, try to have a very open mind about the situation. Try to see things from their point of view…I can sit back and look at the situation from when my father told me what happened the day he left and understand why things happened the way they did.”
But for now, Mark is enjoying his time in Burlington, Vermont.
“I love this place,” he says. “I think this is where I want to settle down.”
Mark said he recently met a man, who is letting him stay in a cabin about an hour and a half outside of Burlington. He continues to take glass blowing classes, and is proud to have finally made a piece he can smoke out of. For now, Mark is attempting to take the pieces of a shattered and scattered life and create something whole out of them.
“I know I was meant to do something great with my life cause I wouldn’t still be here if I wasn’t,” he says. “After all the crazy things I’ve been through.”
What that is he still doesn’t know, but his attitude is one focused on being better than the people who shaped his adolescence. His generosity and willingness to talk to anyone has made him a fairly well known fixture on Main St. in only about 2 months, but there are times, he says, that he feels the same hopelessness and anger he felt as a kid.
“I just have to remember that only hurts me,” Mark says. “I have to remind myself not to be anything like the people who made me feel that way—I have to keep positive.”
Apr.27.2008
On a Thursday day night in February, Mark Nastasi carried a cup of jelly beans through Nectars in downtown Burlington, offering a handful to whoever was willing to accept. Most refused, paranoid about the bearded man with unkempt long hair, who was dressed in a tan duster jacket with a military vest over it that had a Grateful Dead patch on the back.
He looked like a shell-shocked vet, trapped in the misery of war—flashbacks of friends’ deaths haunting him—but once you talk to him you’re surprised. He’s coherent, he’s not crazy by any conventional standards—but he’s different.
“On some nights—the bad nights when I don’t make much playing music—I’ll just take the change I make and buy the jelly bean thing out and give them to people,” he said.
Mark ended up in Burlington after hearing that a friend knew a glass blower in the area. Ever since he was a kid, Mark had this affinity for glass work.
“You’re taking particles of sand and you’re turning them into this complex and complete object,” Mark said.
This fascination with the idea of taking scattered pieces of matter (such as sand) and melting them together to create one unified piece could stem from a childhood that was anything but cohesive.
As Mark tells it, when he was 3 his mother cheated on his father with a mafia-connected mechanic. The act prompted Mark’s dad, Joseph Eugene Nastasi (also a mechanic), to leave and cut ties with his family.
Mark spent his childhood living without ever knowing his father, and the man who had the affair with his mother became Mark’s step-dad.
“It went straight from my father to being with my stepfather. From the age of 3 years old to just about 12 years old we were living with him. He’s my younger sister’s and my younger brother’s father.”
But Mark remembers his stepfather as an abusive alcoholic, who would come home drunk and beat him, his mother, and his siblings.
This childhood abuse would effectively deny Mark a normal childhood as it robbed him of the innocence and naiveté many children have—traits that shield them from the unpleasant realities that adults know all too well.
For Mark those realities were known from a very young age. “My mother left me to myself because I was independent—she knew I could take care of myself.”
However, being forced to be self-reliant from such a young age created all types of stress for Mark, and he admits the first time he ever felt happy as a kid was when he smoked pot for the first time at age 15. It temporarily removed the fear and hopelessness that he was constantly living with as a result of his familial situation. Mark also mentions that kids at school treated him as an outcast because his way of thinking and operating was not the same as theirs. After all, most of the kids who went to school with him didn’t have to deal with the chaotic home-life that was the norm for Mark.
Talking about his stepfather, Mark said the following. “I despised the man. There was very little about my childhood that was good because of him, and the only parts of it that were good because of him were because we had money growing up. He was a mechanic , and plus, he had his fingers in mob business, so we had money coming in all the time.”
Mark explained the various hardships of his youth. At age 11, he was diagnosed with depression and institutionalized after trying to strangle himself with a lanyard. At 17, he left home and went off by himself. By 19, he was institutionalized for roughly 4 days after being picked up by the police because he was walking around trying to get hit by cars.
It was around New Years Eve 2005 when Mark was in Oneonta, New York. He was there because he was on probation and couldn’t go anywhere. He had just got out of jail for stealing a steel pipe, a night he called an “eye-opener” and a “stupid story for another time.” Nevertheless, he knew he couldn’t be in Oneonta anymore and had decided to leave.
“I couldn’t stay in New York anymore. I kept getting in trouble,” said Mark. “I was having problems with trying to find a place to stay and work. The same kind of troubles that plague me a lot of the time, but I was going to be 21 soon, and 18 years without knowing my father—without ever having spoke to the man—I was getting sick of it: having to go on what everybody else had told me about him.”
***
While partying with friends on New Year’s Eve, Mark said he met a guy from Flagstaff, Arizona, whose name he doesn’t recall.
“I’m so horrible with names, and it was 5 years ago. I meet so many people, you know?”
According to Mark, the guy from Arizona offered to put him up for a few days after hearing that Mark was trying to head out to Arizona to find his dad.
“I knew my dad was in Arizona, but I didn’t know exactly where,” Mark says. “My mom told me a few times that was the last place she knew he had been.”
Mark decided to break his probation on New Year’s Day and hitchhike west in order to finally meet the man, who’s genetically responsible for his existence, but never actually made an impact on his life besides not being in it—an impact that might have been more severe and life changing than if he hadn’t left and raised Mark instead.
“It took 28 days to get there,” Mark says. “A lot of rides, a lot of zig-zagging around, a lot of stay over a night here and over a night there, a lot of sleeping in tractor trailers with truckers.”
Once in Arizona, he got together with the guy he met in Oneonta, who offered him a place to crash.
“I was in Flagstaff chilling with that guy, he took me to a party, I met some girl at the party, hung out with her for a couples days—her name was Daisy, she was awesome—really nice girl.”
After hanging in Flagstaff for awhile, Mark said the same guy he met in Oneonta introduced him to other people who were also wandering around. From there, Mark happened to find his way to a drop-in center for the homeless. The center serves as a resource for homeless people and other transients, providing them with information on local shelters and social service programs.
“At the drop-in center, they had a poster board up and on the poster board was the information for a halfway house,” Mark said. “I called the lady and she told me it was $90 a week.”
At the time, Mark said he was working as a day laborer—essentially odd jobbing for whoever could pay him that day—and figured if he kept it up he could pay the $90 a week. However, after telling the lady at the halfway house (whose name he can’t remember) that his sole reason for being in Arizona was to find his father, she told him she used to be a foster parent and would help him out.
“All I had was his name and his birthday—not much at all,” said Mark. “She was able to find his phone number, and give him a call. She called him and told him I was there so it wouldn’t be so awkward me just showing up on his door step. Which is kind of what I wanted to do, but at the same time it might have been a different situation if that is what happened.”
***
Instead of ambushing his estranged father, Mark said his father picked him up in Flagstaff. They spent the day together, first getting breakfast, but mostly driving around and talking. His dad eventually asked him to stay with him, and Mark took his dad up on the offer.
“It took some time before we could actually have discussions about why things were the way they were,” says Mark. “And still, I think there’s a lot left to be said, but nobody wants to talk about it.”
Mark admits it didn’t take long for his dad, Joseph, to figure out Mark was using drugs—mostly pot.
“It was pretty obvious,” Mark said.
He attributed a lot of the early issues and conflicts his father and him had to Joseph’s opposition to the lifestyle he was living.
“My drug of choice is pot, and it’s not that big of a deal in my opinion, but it was a huge deal to him because it’s illegal still. And I had the cops looking for me for leaving New York to go to Arizona. He wasn’t about that—and other things as well—because he doesn’t do anything illegal anymore because he’s had his run-ins with the law and doesn’t need that kind of attention.”
However, the monotonous routine that Mark felt his dad was living wasn’t what he expected or wanted. For the then 21 year old, he wanted to be going out to parties or bars—not to drink since Mark doesn’t really care for alcohol—but his father was never up for it, hindered by his own bank account.
“My dad’s always very much about saying, ‘We don’t have the money for things like that,’ and I’m the kind of person who believes you don’t need money to have a good time.”
According to Mark, it was this difference of opinion that created tension between him and his father. Mark was expecting to bond with his father, but sitting in his apartment watching movies as he unwound after a day of work wasn’t what Mark had wanted.
“My father’s not a very social person,” he said. “That’s part of the reason we have such a hard time communicating. My father’s really just angry about a lot of things.”
***
Mark recalls the day he met another tenant at the apartment complex his dad was staying in. They got talking, both realized they liked smoking weed, and became friends.
A little bit later in their friendship, Mark learned the kid also was a user of crystal meth. In fact, most of the apartment complex had plenty of tweaked out residents.
“We were living in an apartment complex where a lot of the kids in there used that shit—a lot of people in Arizona, in general, use that shit.”
Mark said he eventually tried meth, and consequently, became addicted to it. His reasoning for doing it was because the kid, who introduced it to him, seemed fine. Mark said he didn’t seem like someone whose life was in shambles, but in hindsight, Mark realized how stupid the drug is.
Once his dad found out, Mark was asked to leave. He headed out to San Diego, where he slept on the beach for what he feels was 3 months. The problem, according to Mark, was that he had cleaned up and got off meth before heading to California, but it didn’t take long before he met people who used the drug.
“That drug makes you lose connection with time and reality,” Mark says. “It’s a very dissociative drug. It makes you not yourself, and there were times where I wasn’t sure if I was living on the beach for 3 months doing that shit or only a month. I’m pretty sure the span was 3 months, but there’s times when I was awake for 4 or 5 days on end with zero sleep, 150 plus hours zero sleep, delusional—completely out of my mind, not sure if I’m even part of reality or if I’m just the manifestation of somebody’s thoughts—like really crazy, tripped out ideas.”
The breaking point came when Mark said he almost hit a guy with a shovel after being severely tweaked out for a few days. What caused Mark to snap was the theft of all his belongings—the loss of everything he had. Only one person, Mark says, had known where his things were stashed, and when Mark saw him he grabbed a shovel and charged him before being subdued by his friend.
“I snapped out of it and was like, ‘Get me out of here.’ I started crying, and I’m like ‘I’m tweaked—I am a spun fucking duck,’” Mark said. “Over material possessions, too, and I try not to hold myself too much to material possessions because you don’t take anything when you transcend.”
He had to get as far away from meth as possible, and that’s what he did.
At first, he said he tried to joined the military, but when he told the recruiter about being institutionalized, he was turned away. Mark said he returned to Arizona, clean and sober, and took a job at a car wash. He was living with his dad again, but as Mark put it, all the car wash employees smoked pot, which led Mark back to his weed habit. And just ass before, tensions grew between him and his father.
“What it boils down to with me and my father having so many problems is the whole money thing. He obsesses about not having the money to go out and have fun, and that I shouldn’t be smoking pot.”
So Mark said he picked up and returned to California; this time to Fresno. While in Fresno he learned of the inheritance check his grandma had left him when she passed, which had been sitting and building interest. Mark returned to New York to get his birth certificate in order to claim the check for $176,000.
“I lived off that for a few years in New York,” he said. “None of it’s left. I loaned some people some money. I gave my mom $10,000. The girl I was with for awhile, I bought her a car. I bought the Jeep I have now…I bought a lot of pipes since I have this obsession with glass.”
In fact, the last of the inheritance money went to glass blowing classes at the Bern Gallery in Burlington, where Mark continues to crash in his car or on people’s couches. While he has returned to visit his dad in between, he’s not sure if they’ll ever have the kind of relationship he imagined they would.
“He took care of me the best he could, but it was kind of too late for him to be my dad. At the same time, he probably felt like it was his right to be my dad. And that’s another issue. You gotta remember, if you’re meeting your parents for the first time after a long period of time, they will still feel like they’re your parents and that they can tell you what you can do.”
It was that possibly instinctive paternal response, which made it hard for Mark to connect with his dad. In regards to forgiving his dad, he had the following to say.
“A lot of people told me a lot of bad things about my father for a long time, and I wanted to believe they weren’t true. But don’t do that to yourself. Don’t have false expectations,” he says. “I have more negative feelings towards my mom than I do my father. Because my mom cheated on my father. Maybe that’s why he’s so angry.”
One thing about Mark, which is surprising—given his past—is how positive he is about the future.
“I think it’s every generation’s job to break the negative cycle, and my negative cycle is that I didn’t have my father growing up. So if I ever have kids I’ll never leave them. I’ll raise those kids to be better than I am.”
Mark also offers the following advice for those in a similar situation to his.
“If I could give anything to any person like me, where you have no connection with your father or haven’t for a very long time, try to have a very open mind about the situation. Try to see things from their point of view…I can sit back and look at the situation from when my father told me what happened the day he left and understand why things happened the way they did.”
But for now, Mark is enjoying his time in Burlington, Vermont.
“I love this place,” he says. “I think this is where I want to settle down.”
Mark said he recently met a man, who is letting him stay in a cabin about an hour and a half outside of Burlington. He continues to take glass blowing classes, and is proud to have finally made a piece he can smoke out of. For now, Mark is attempting to take the pieces of a shattered and scattered life and create something whole out of them.
“I know I was meant to do something great with my life cause I wouldn’t still be here if I wasn’t,” he says. “After all the crazy things I’ve been through.”
What that is he still doesn’t know, but his attitude is one focused on being better than the people who shaped his adolescence. His generosity and willingness to talk to anyone has made him a fairly well known fixture on Main St. in only about 2 months, but there are times, he says, that he feels the same hopelessness and anger he felt as a kid.
“I just have to remember that only hurts me,” Mark says. “I have to remind myself not to be anything like the people who made me feel that way—I have to keep positive.”
Monday, April 26, 2010
Champlain Secessionist
Colin Mixson
Rob Williams is a Vermont resident, a professor at Champlain College and a firm believer in the politics and ideas that formed the republic of the United States of America. So it may seem ironic to learn that since 2005, Rob Williams has been the editor and publisher of Vermont Commons, the state’s largest secessionist newspaper, and a proponent of Vermont’s peaceful retirement from the union.
Rob’s revolutionary streak began with the conclusion of the 2000 presidential election, which for him, “was the first inkling that things were getting weird.” The election raised a few important questions for Rob, in particular the possibility that the electoral process has been undermined by a troupe of electronic voting machines, and that the foundation of our republic, and thus our republic itself, were in grave danger.
If the 2000 election roused his suspicions, then the events following 9/11 hammered them home like a fat, proverbial hammer. To Rob, 9/11 was a “lever” that the U.S. government used to justify, “dropping the bomb in Afghanistan, invading Iraq, and beginning to clamp down on civil-liberties with the U.S.A. Patriot Act.”
Finally, the “so called” election of 2004 cemented Mr. Williams’ sneaking suspicion that the United States was no longer the republic it had once been.
“You basically had two, millionaire, Yale, alum candidates,” says Rob, “John Kerry and George Dub. I realized at that point just how limited the range of choices there were in terms of viable presidential candidates.”
It was in that same year that Rob attended a conference in Middlebury, VT sponsored by a man named Kirk Patrick Sale, a person who according to Rob is, “a longtime, left leaning writer/activist.” The conference was attended by about fifty people, all of who were discussing the curious idea of secession, of which Rob admits frankly, “…sounds kind of crazy when you first hear it.” While at the conference, Rob kept himself busy by taping interviews of people at the conference, and asking his fellow Vermonters what motivated them to secede. Sometime during the conference, Williams was introduced to Thomas Naylor, the co-founder of the Second Vermont Republic, a secessionist think tank located in Charlotte, VT and author of the 2008 book Secession: How Vermont and All the Other States Can Save Themselves from the Empire.
These conversations, coupled with his background in U.S. history led Williams to creating the Vermont Commons in the spring of 2005. Today, the Vermont Commons pushes out 10,000 copies to 200 locations in Vermont, six times a year. That’s not including the Vermont Commons web site, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and blog, which features twelve writers from across the state.
“We like to say we’re Vermont’s only statewide, independent newspaper,” Rob says with a smile. He also goes on to comment on Vermont’s Commons having one of the most overtly stated biases. “We are very clear that we are not objective. We are subjective; we have a point of view.” says Rob,” as used to be the case in the early days of the U.S. republic. Every newspaper was partisan in the sense that it had a point of view. We think we ought to bring that back, rather than pretending that we are objective, when any intelligent reader understands that no newspaper is objective. That’s ok, as long as it’s stated upfront.”
What Rob is stating up front is that the United States no longer operates as a functioning republic, but as an, “out of control empire.” Williams cites the prodigious amount of U.S. military bases located around the world, what he describes as “rampant militarism,” as well as voter fraud and the fact that the average congressional district size is as large as the population of Vermont, which he says, “is in no way democratic.”
Today, Rob keeps himself busy trying to live the life of an independent businessman, a trait Rob believes that all Vermonters should strive to embody in the quest for an independent state, and independent living. In addition to managing affairs at Vermont Commons, Williams keeps busy by teaching in the communication and creative media department at Champlain College, as well as by rearing Vermont's only domestic Yak herd at his Waitsfield ranch.
"I'm a businessman," says Rob, "and it's hard. We want people to understand that we're not trying to build a wall around Vermont, but our first plank is Vermont's financial independence. We want to stimulate entrepreneurialism, we want to stimulate small business's, we want to stimulate people's ability to be commercial."
Rob Williams' quest, and the quest of all Vermont secessionists is an unquestionably hard one. It's not difficult to understand why many people question the viability, both ethically and pragmatically, of secession as an answer to Vermont's problems. Vermont, like any other state, currently enjoys federally funded highways, military protection, federal services and relies on the U.S. dollar for commerce and trade. So it would seem unlikely, even in the face of what many Vermonter's feel to be a moral prerogative in the face of an uncaring, imperial power, that secessionists will ever enjoy the popular sentiment, or political clout required for secession. However, that doesn't seem likely to deter Rob Williams, whose secessionist rhetoric seems to be unceasingly accompanied by a sly smile, betraying the obvious satisfaction of a man who feels he is doing the right thing.
Apr.21.2010
Rob Williams is a Vermont resident, a professor at Champlain College and a firm believer in the politics and ideas that formed the republic of the United States of America. So it may seem ironic to learn that since 2005, Rob Williams has been the editor and publisher of Vermont Commons, the state’s largest secessionist newspaper, and a proponent of Vermont’s peaceful retirement from the union.
Rob’s revolutionary streak began with the conclusion of the 2000 presidential election, which for him, “was the first inkling that things were getting weird.” The election raised a few important questions for Rob, in particular the possibility that the electoral process has been undermined by a troupe of electronic voting machines, and that the foundation of our republic, and thus our republic itself, were in grave danger.
If the 2000 election roused his suspicions, then the events following 9/11 hammered them home like a fat, proverbial hammer. To Rob, 9/11 was a “lever” that the U.S. government used to justify, “dropping the bomb in Afghanistan, invading Iraq, and beginning to clamp down on civil-liberties with the U.S.A. Patriot Act.”
Finally, the “so called” election of 2004 cemented Mr. Williams’ sneaking suspicion that the United States was no longer the republic it had once been.
“You basically had two, millionaire, Yale, alum candidates,” says Rob, “John Kerry and George Dub. I realized at that point just how limited the range of choices there were in terms of viable presidential candidates.”
It was in that same year that Rob attended a conference in Middlebury, VT sponsored by a man named Kirk Patrick Sale, a person who according to Rob is, “a longtime, left leaning writer/activist.” The conference was attended by about fifty people, all of who were discussing the curious idea of secession, of which Rob admits frankly, “…sounds kind of crazy when you first hear it.” While at the conference, Rob kept himself busy by taping interviews of people at the conference, and asking his fellow Vermonters what motivated them to secede. Sometime during the conference, Williams was introduced to Thomas Naylor, the co-founder of the Second Vermont Republic, a secessionist think tank located in Charlotte, VT and author of the 2008 book Secession: How Vermont and All the Other States Can Save Themselves from the Empire.
These conversations, coupled with his background in U.S. history led Williams to creating the Vermont Commons in the spring of 2005. Today, the Vermont Commons pushes out 10,000 copies to 200 locations in Vermont, six times a year. That’s not including the Vermont Commons web site, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and blog, which features twelve writers from across the state.
“We like to say we’re Vermont’s only statewide, independent newspaper,” Rob says with a smile. He also goes on to comment on Vermont’s Commons having one of the most overtly stated biases. “We are very clear that we are not objective. We are subjective; we have a point of view.” says Rob,” as used to be the case in the early days of the U.S. republic. Every newspaper was partisan in the sense that it had a point of view. We think we ought to bring that back, rather than pretending that we are objective, when any intelligent reader understands that no newspaper is objective. That’s ok, as long as it’s stated upfront.”
What Rob is stating up front is that the United States no longer operates as a functioning republic, but as an, “out of control empire.” Williams cites the prodigious amount of U.S. military bases located around the world, what he describes as “rampant militarism,” as well as voter fraud and the fact that the average congressional district size is as large as the population of Vermont, which he says, “is in no way democratic.”
Today, Rob keeps himself busy trying to live the life of an independent businessman, a trait Rob believes that all Vermonters should strive to embody in the quest for an independent state, and independent living. In addition to managing affairs at Vermont Commons, Williams keeps busy by teaching in the communication and creative media department at Champlain College, as well as by rearing Vermont's only domestic Yak herd at his Waitsfield ranch.
"I'm a businessman," says Rob, "and it's hard. We want people to understand that we're not trying to build a wall around Vermont, but our first plank is Vermont's financial independence. We want to stimulate entrepreneurialism, we want to stimulate small business's, we want to stimulate people's ability to be commercial."
Rob Williams' quest, and the quest of all Vermont secessionists is an unquestionably hard one. It's not difficult to understand why many people question the viability, both ethically and pragmatically, of secession as an answer to Vermont's problems. Vermont, like any other state, currently enjoys federally funded highways, military protection, federal services and relies on the U.S. dollar for commerce and trade. So it would seem unlikely, even in the face of what many Vermonter's feel to be a moral prerogative in the face of an uncaring, imperial power, that secessionists will ever enjoy the popular sentiment, or political clout required for secession. However, that doesn't seem likely to deter Rob Williams, whose secessionist rhetoric seems to be unceasingly accompanied by a sly smile, betraying the obvious satisfaction of a man who feels he is doing the right thing.
More Methadone
Colin Mixson
Mar/30/2010
"On May 18, 2000, the governor of Vermont signed into law Bill S.303 that legalizes long-term methadone treatment, ending a long debate between the legislature and the governor on how to respond to the alarming increase in heroin abuse in the state. The first long-term methadone clinic is expected to open in Vermont by the summer of 2002."
Portsmouth Herald, 01/11/2000
For just shy of a decade, Burlington has been home to one of Vermont’s two methadone clinics. Methadone is a drug used to block withdrawal symptoms and combat addiction in opiate based narcotics. It has proven to be safe and effective. When medically supervised, long-term methadone treatment causes no adverse effects to the heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, bones, blood, brain, or other vital body organs. Methadone withdrawal is also much slower than it is with heroin. The result of which makes it possible to maintain an addict on methadone without harsh side effects. This is fortunate, because the nature of heroin addiction can sometimes make it necessary for patients to remain on methadone treatment for many years.
Furthermore methadone maintenance is highly cost-effective. According to the New York Academy of Medicine one year of methadone treatment costs about $5,000 per patient. The Office of National Drug Control Policy also stated that methadone treatment costs about $13 per day and is considered a cost-effective alternative to incarceration. This seems especially frugal considering the $109,000 lifetime Medicaid cost for each injecting drug user with AIDS.
Most importantly, methadone treatment makes living without addiction a possibility for many people. The National Institute on Drug Abuse found that outpatients receiving methadone treatment decreased their weekly heroin use by 69%. The Office of National Drug Control Policy states, "This decrease in use allows for the individual's health and productivity to improve. Patients were no longer required to live a life of crime to support their habit, and criminal activity decreased by 52% among these patients and full-time employment increased by 24%."
However, despite the drug’s effectiveness, its availability is generally limited. Vermont itself only recently legalized the use of methadone, and today has only two clinics. One is located in Brattleboro; the other is located at the University Health Center in Burlington. This is all well and good, or at least it would be if Vermont was more akin in size to Hawaii, or Rhode Island. While Vermont is not notably large in terms of population or geography, it is none the less of sufficient size, regardless of its infamous weather, that spanning Vermont on a daily basis can be described as a universally undesirable task. Unfortunately, this is exactly how methadone clinics operate, on a day to day basis.
Instead of receiving their medication on a weekly or monthly basis, patients must resign themselves to appearing at their assigned clinic on a regular, and strictly observed schedule in order to receive their daily dose. Although methadone treatment is more effective, and presumably more desirable than incarceration, the scarcity of clinics in Vermont leaves many people driving several hours, and hundreds of miles a day to receive their medication. This can be especially problematic in a state like Vermont, which in the winter months is frequented by notorious ice and snow storms.
Anyone trying to hold a job, maintain a car or just save their money can understand the predicament of driving across state to make a meeting; a fact made more or less frustrating considering the meeting itself often takes as little as five minutes. The cost in transportation alone could prove financially crippling, and the balancing act of meeting a methadone appointment and fulfilling ones work obligations is taxing, and often impossible.
Another problem that occurs with having only two clinics in the state is that those cities which have clinics become veritable Mecca’s for recovering drug addicts. Many of these people will be helped by the program, but many of them will relapse. In fact, many people receiving treatment at the University Health Center are court appointed. They go there because they prefer drug treatment to incarceration, and may have no intention of quitting the drug they were convicted of using. Of course these people cannot be considered recovering drug addicts, but simply drug addicts, who by their very nature impose a criminal element on the city. Even the intent to quit does not preclude a person from the selling the drug, or providing connections to other users. By housing one of only two clinics, Burlington is also become the daily venue of conventions for drug users from the across the state.
Statistically speaking, methadone clinics help a lot of people cure themselves of opiate addiction. From a large scale perspective, it seems as though the whole process is working just fine. However, from the human perspective, methadone treatment can sometimes prove an insurmountable task in and of itself.
Mar/30/2010
"On May 18, 2000, the governor of Vermont signed into law Bill S.303 that legalizes long-term methadone treatment, ending a long debate between the legislature and the governor on how to respond to the alarming increase in heroin abuse in the state. The first long-term methadone clinic is expected to open in Vermont by the summer of 2002."
Portsmouth Herald, 01/11/2000
For just shy of a decade, Burlington has been home to one of Vermont’s two methadone clinics. Methadone is a drug used to block withdrawal symptoms and combat addiction in opiate based narcotics. It has proven to be safe and effective. When medically supervised, long-term methadone treatment causes no adverse effects to the heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, bones, blood, brain, or other vital body organs. Methadone withdrawal is also much slower than it is with heroin. The result of which makes it possible to maintain an addict on methadone without harsh side effects. This is fortunate, because the nature of heroin addiction can sometimes make it necessary for patients to remain on methadone treatment for many years.
Furthermore methadone maintenance is highly cost-effective. According to the New York Academy of Medicine one year of methadone treatment costs about $5,000 per patient. The Office of National Drug Control Policy also stated that methadone treatment costs about $13 per day and is considered a cost-effective alternative to incarceration. This seems especially frugal considering the $109,000 lifetime Medicaid cost for each injecting drug user with AIDS.
Most importantly, methadone treatment makes living without addiction a possibility for many people. The National Institute on Drug Abuse found that outpatients receiving methadone treatment decreased their weekly heroin use by 69%. The Office of National Drug Control Policy states, "This decrease in use allows for the individual's health and productivity to improve. Patients were no longer required to live a life of crime to support their habit, and criminal activity decreased by 52% among these patients and full-time employment increased by 24%."
However, despite the drug’s effectiveness, its availability is generally limited. Vermont itself only recently legalized the use of methadone, and today has only two clinics. One is located in Brattleboro; the other is located at the University Health Center in Burlington. This is all well and good, or at least it would be if Vermont was more akin in size to Hawaii, or Rhode Island. While Vermont is not notably large in terms of population or geography, it is none the less of sufficient size, regardless of its infamous weather, that spanning Vermont on a daily basis can be described as a universally undesirable task. Unfortunately, this is exactly how methadone clinics operate, on a day to day basis.
Instead of receiving their medication on a weekly or monthly basis, patients must resign themselves to appearing at their assigned clinic on a regular, and strictly observed schedule in order to receive their daily dose. Although methadone treatment is more effective, and presumably more desirable than incarceration, the scarcity of clinics in Vermont leaves many people driving several hours, and hundreds of miles a day to receive their medication. This can be especially problematic in a state like Vermont, which in the winter months is frequented by notorious ice and snow storms.
Anyone trying to hold a job, maintain a car or just save their money can understand the predicament of driving across state to make a meeting; a fact made more or less frustrating considering the meeting itself often takes as little as five minutes. The cost in transportation alone could prove financially crippling, and the balancing act of meeting a methadone appointment and fulfilling ones work obligations is taxing, and often impossible.
Another problem that occurs with having only two clinics in the state is that those cities which have clinics become veritable Mecca’s for recovering drug addicts. Many of these people will be helped by the program, but many of them will relapse. In fact, many people receiving treatment at the University Health Center are court appointed. They go there because they prefer drug treatment to incarceration, and may have no intention of quitting the drug they were convicted of using. Of course these people cannot be considered recovering drug addicts, but simply drug addicts, who by their very nature impose a criminal element on the city. Even the intent to quit does not preclude a person from the selling the drug, or providing connections to other users. By housing one of only two clinics, Burlington is also become the daily venue of conventions for drug users from the across the state.
Statistically speaking, methadone clinics help a lot of people cure themselves of opiate addiction. From a large scale perspective, it seems as though the whole process is working just fine. However, from the human perspective, methadone treatment can sometimes prove an insurmountable task in and of itself.
Disturbing Downtown
Joe Dimeck
Mar.22.2010
In a college town like Burlington, where drinking is as common as Vermont cheddar, it would be easy to assume fights at the downtown bars happen quite regularly.
But as downtown lieutenant, Art Cyr, puts it, “It’s not so much that we see a lot of assaults, but we have a lot of disturbances. On a weekday night, we may not have any. The bulk of our disturbances are Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night, more so Friday and Saturday.”
A disturbance usually involves some angry drunk person, who has been removed from an establishment. Rather than cut their losses, move on, and go home or to some other bar, they decide to make a scene. Yell at the bouncers, try to sneak back in, or refuse to go anywhere. These kind of disputes are common and it typically takes a cop to come along to get the person on their way. Sometimes, they make matters worse and end up taking a ride to the police station.
Another regular cause for either a fight or a disturbance is what Lt. Cyr calls the “Beer Bump”.
“It could be two people, who were drinking, that if they were sober and bumped into each other it’d probably be, ‘Hey, sorry about that man.’ But now because they’re drunk it turns into a fight.”
However, a fight doesn’t technically have to be two guys punching each other.
“When I say a fight, a pushing match, that’s a fight, but it doesn’t rise to the level of an assault charge,” says Lt. Cyr. “One of two things can happen: depending on the severity of what’s going on you could be arrested for disorderly conduct or you could be issued a ticket for disorderly conduct.”
From January 2010 to March 2010, Burlington’s downtown has had 114 disturbances. More times than not, the people involved are college-aged, not necessarily college students, but people between the ages of 21 and 26. While numbers for the assaults could not be provided, Cyr mentions that some of the instances of assault have been quite severe.
“There’s been numerous fights where there’s many people involved, but we’ve also had stabbings downtown related to late night parties and stuff going on downtown.”
Out of the average 5-6 disturbances that the Burlington police deal with on a weekend night, most are typically two people getting into some kind of disagreement while intoxicated. At least, that’s how Lt. Cyr sees it, and he’s spent much of his 15 year long career downtown.
“If there’s a fight, there’s usually an underlying issue, and it’s either one of three things. This is not a guarantee, there are times when other circumstances can cause a fight, but it’s alcohol related, drug related, or significant other related.”
And while most would assume many of the fights involve primarily men, Lt. Cyr notes that the ladies get into their fair share of brouhahas.
“There’s just as many female fights as there are male fights.”
Nevertheless, the key to resolving many of the problems so no one gets hurt or unfairly arrested seems to come down to quick response times. There’s a reason for a heavy police presence downtown, especially on weekends. The sooner they can get to and stop a dispute, the more likely it is the problem hasn’t gotten out of hand.
“Sometimes we’re right there in the very beginning. Sometimes it already ended. Sometimes in progress when we get there,” says Cyr. “You have to do an investigation. It’s not like a week long investigation. You do the best you can on the scene at the time.”
Even then, there’s always a chance that the sight of cops won’t get the people involved to calm down.
“You have to take into consideration a couple things,” says Cyr. “One, are tempers still flying? If tempers are still flying we’ll take both people, and may have to take you into protective custody and get you out of there. But if tempers have calmed down, and the crowd’s not going nuts, we can do it right there. We’ll talk to both people, and then there’s witnesses. Then you have door bouncers, who aren’t drinking, and they can give you a witness statement in regards to what happened.”
If you ever find yourself in a situation where you have to fight to defend yourself, don’t be afraid to do what you need to do in order to disable the attacker. But if you do successfully fend off some ill-tempered brute, rendering them unable to continue, make sure you stop.
“If you’re fighting and you’re defending yourself that’s not a crime. It’s not illegal to defend yourself,” says Cyr. “Now, you have to be careful. If you keep hitting the person after they’ve stopped or are unable to keep fighting you then become a combative assaulting person.”
And that is one surefire way to make a bad night awful. After all, having to defend yourself against someone too drunk to reason is one thing. However, being taken to jail and charged with a crime just because you threw in a few more shots after knocking someone out is a rotten way to end a night.
Fortunately, the State of Vermont and the Burlington Police Department offer training and advice to all bars in regards to diffusing or quickly reporting a disturbance.
“It deals with protocol for the staff, how to deal with fights, your responsibility as a bar owner or a staff member, signs of intoxication, what to look for when people haven’t got to the stage of fighting yet but are working up to it,” says Cyr.
“Other stuff is having enough staff on duty, and having them clearly marked so people know who they are and what they’re doing so that people know who they can turn to if there’s an incident.”
While the training might not prevent disturbances, it makes it easier to get them under control quickly. Lt. Cyr believes reducing the number of disturbances comes down to education and getting people to be responsible in regards to the decisions they make. In particular, he believes teaching people to stop binge drinking is vital to preventing the kind of assaults and disturbances he deals with throughout the week.
“When you’re 21 years old, you’re not a 14 year old kid anymore, you’re a young lady or a young man, and you’re on your own and you have to take responsibility for your own actions,” says Cyr. “Before you even get downtown, take responsibility, and realize binge drinking is not the thing.”
Mar.22.2010
In a college town like Burlington, where drinking is as common as Vermont cheddar, it would be easy to assume fights at the downtown bars happen quite regularly.
But as downtown lieutenant, Art Cyr, puts it, “It’s not so much that we see a lot of assaults, but we have a lot of disturbances. On a weekday night, we may not have any. The bulk of our disturbances are Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night, more so Friday and Saturday.”
A disturbance usually involves some angry drunk person, who has been removed from an establishment. Rather than cut their losses, move on, and go home or to some other bar, they decide to make a scene. Yell at the bouncers, try to sneak back in, or refuse to go anywhere. These kind of disputes are common and it typically takes a cop to come along to get the person on their way. Sometimes, they make matters worse and end up taking a ride to the police station.
Another regular cause for either a fight or a disturbance is what Lt. Cyr calls the “Beer Bump”.
“It could be two people, who were drinking, that if they were sober and bumped into each other it’d probably be, ‘Hey, sorry about that man.’ But now because they’re drunk it turns into a fight.”
However, a fight doesn’t technically have to be two guys punching each other.
“When I say a fight, a pushing match, that’s a fight, but it doesn’t rise to the level of an assault charge,” says Lt. Cyr. “One of two things can happen: depending on the severity of what’s going on you could be arrested for disorderly conduct or you could be issued a ticket for disorderly conduct.”
From January 2010 to March 2010, Burlington’s downtown has had 114 disturbances. More times than not, the people involved are college-aged, not necessarily college students, but people between the ages of 21 and 26. While numbers for the assaults could not be provided, Cyr mentions that some of the instances of assault have been quite severe.
“There’s been numerous fights where there’s many people involved, but we’ve also had stabbings downtown related to late night parties and stuff going on downtown.”
Out of the average 5-6 disturbances that the Burlington police deal with on a weekend night, most are typically two people getting into some kind of disagreement while intoxicated. At least, that’s how Lt. Cyr sees it, and he’s spent much of his 15 year long career downtown.
“If there’s a fight, there’s usually an underlying issue, and it’s either one of three things. This is not a guarantee, there are times when other circumstances can cause a fight, but it’s alcohol related, drug related, or significant other related.”
And while most would assume many of the fights involve primarily men, Lt. Cyr notes that the ladies get into their fair share of brouhahas.
“There’s just as many female fights as there are male fights.”
Nevertheless, the key to resolving many of the problems so no one gets hurt or unfairly arrested seems to come down to quick response times. There’s a reason for a heavy police presence downtown, especially on weekends. The sooner they can get to and stop a dispute, the more likely it is the problem hasn’t gotten out of hand.
“Sometimes we’re right there in the very beginning. Sometimes it already ended. Sometimes in progress when we get there,” says Cyr. “You have to do an investigation. It’s not like a week long investigation. You do the best you can on the scene at the time.”
Even then, there’s always a chance that the sight of cops won’t get the people involved to calm down.
“You have to take into consideration a couple things,” says Cyr. “One, are tempers still flying? If tempers are still flying we’ll take both people, and may have to take you into protective custody and get you out of there. But if tempers have calmed down, and the crowd’s not going nuts, we can do it right there. We’ll talk to both people, and then there’s witnesses. Then you have door bouncers, who aren’t drinking, and they can give you a witness statement in regards to what happened.”
If you ever find yourself in a situation where you have to fight to defend yourself, don’t be afraid to do what you need to do in order to disable the attacker. But if you do successfully fend off some ill-tempered brute, rendering them unable to continue, make sure you stop.
“If you’re fighting and you’re defending yourself that’s not a crime. It’s not illegal to defend yourself,” says Cyr. “Now, you have to be careful. If you keep hitting the person after they’ve stopped or are unable to keep fighting you then become a combative assaulting person.”
And that is one surefire way to make a bad night awful. After all, having to defend yourself against someone too drunk to reason is one thing. However, being taken to jail and charged with a crime just because you threw in a few more shots after knocking someone out is a rotten way to end a night.
Fortunately, the State of Vermont and the Burlington Police Department offer training and advice to all bars in regards to diffusing or quickly reporting a disturbance.
“It deals with protocol for the staff, how to deal with fights, your responsibility as a bar owner or a staff member, signs of intoxication, what to look for when people haven’t got to the stage of fighting yet but are working up to it,” says Cyr.
“Other stuff is having enough staff on duty, and having them clearly marked so people know who they are and what they’re doing so that people know who they can turn to if there’s an incident.”
While the training might not prevent disturbances, it makes it easier to get them under control quickly. Lt. Cyr believes reducing the number of disturbances comes down to education and getting people to be responsible in regards to the decisions they make. In particular, he believes teaching people to stop binge drinking is vital to preventing the kind of assaults and disturbances he deals with throughout the week.
“When you’re 21 years old, you’re not a 14 year old kid anymore, you’re a young lady or a young man, and you’re on your own and you have to take responsibility for your own actions,” says Cyr. “Before you even get downtown, take responsibility, and realize binge drinking is not the thing.”
Energy (In)Efficiency
Joe Deimeck
Mar.24.2010
Sometimes in life what you see might not be representative of what actually is going on. The lack of renewable energy technologies in downtown Burlington might perplex the city’s progressive and environmentally aware population, but according to Burlington Electric’s Chris Burns it’s a combination of energy efficient technologies that provide the best opportunity for saving money and energy.
“There’s no silver bullet. We call it diversification. You’ve gotta get a little bit from everything,” Burns says.
And everything means everything from insulating every nook and cranny of a house to lighting, heating, and ventilation controls.
In fact, Burns says, “A lot of it is control stuff. A lot of it is outside air economizers. Take a look at Burlington’s climate, there are many many hours in the year where you can have Mother Nature do the work for you.”
This is why Burlington Electric has installed free air ventilation systems in many of the convenience and grocery stores around Burlington. According to Burns, it’s simply more cost-effective than the renewable stuff.
“Let’s say it costs you 5000 dollars to do a free air economizer system in a convenience store refrigeration walk-in—hypothetically—you might be saving 2000 dollars a year on your power costs. Now, the problem with solar—photo voltaic—is that the price is really expensive. So to get a 1000 watt PV array installed right now would cost you about 7500 bucks, and if it was oriented perfectly to solar south it would save about 140 dollars a year. So 140 bucks a year and it’s gonna cost you 7500 bucks to do it.”
The financial incentive is clear, but how do they work? Outside sensors take readings of the temperature. When the temperature drops low enough, the refrigeration compressors are turned off while the duct work is opened and low energy fans bring in the cold air. Once it becomes too hot or humid, the compressors are turned back on.
Another small, but effective technology in use throughout much of Burlington are occupancy sensors, which keep track of whether there’s people in a room or not. If no one’s there, the lights go off until someone enters. In some cases, these occupancy sensors can also control ventilation.
“There’s sensors around the room that sit there and say, ‘This place is unoccupied, or for some reason there’s only 15 people in this room when there should be a hundred,’” says Burns. “’I’m only going to give enough ventilation for nobody or 15 people or 100 people. I’m going to react to what you need.’”
The smart ventilation controls not only save energy, but they cut down on maintenance costs as well.
“The wear and tear on the equipment comes down, but the energy savings are tremendous,” Burns says. “We’re also doing this in underground parking garages with carbon monoxide based on exhaust. Instead of running these exhaust systems 24/7, let’s be smarter about it.”
With everything controlled by computers, it’s natural to wonder what would happen if the system failed. Would people suffocate as the ventilation control system thinks no one is around? Chris Burns noted the concern fire code officials had, but fortunately these systems fail closed. Basically, when they fail the system will remain on 24/7 until somebody realizes the controls have failed. The safety measure is that it reverts back to the way it would operate without the energy efficient controls in place. Rather than stale or tainted air, it’s energy inefficiency until the problem is fixed.
But as Burns mentions, the real struggle is convincing people that energy efficiency makes more sense economically and environmentally than renewable technologies.
“There’s this, I’m not going to call it conflict, but maybe it’s a misunderstanding, and maybe there’s a little competition between the energy efficiency folks and the renewable folks. Energy efficiency just isn’t very sexy. People start to get glassed over pretty fast once I start talking to them about it, but people like solar panels and wind turbines.”
In an effort to make Burlington more energy efficient, Burlington Electric is using what Burns calls a “carrots and sticks” approach. The “sticks”, he says, come in the form of the energy efficiency code for residential and commercial buildings.
“What we did back in the early 90s is we developed energy efficiency construction codes for all buildings,” says Burns. “When someone goes in to get their permit—an electrical permit, a planning and zoning permit, a building permit—they need to prove the building meets this baseline of energy efficiency.”
The code is stricter in regards to new construction projects than it is with existing buildings.
“For a new construction project for them to get their occupancy permit they need to have a medal from Burlington Electric that says you meet the code. And if it’s an existing building, which we have a lot of, if any component of that building which you’re replacing is covered by the code it must be brought up to code.”
So if someone wants to replace the heating system or the windows of a building, those new additions must meet the code. However, whenever Burlington Electric evaluates any potential renovation project, if they see that the building is deficient in certain areas they seize the opportunity. It is in those moments when the “carrots” approach is exercised.
And it is through incentives provided by the P.O.W.E.R program (Property Owners Win with Efficiency and Renewables), which passed in May 2009, that Burlington Electric makes it easier for citizens and business owners to make their properties more energy efficient.
Essentially, if a property owner can’t afford the cost of an energy efficiency project, Burlington Electric will cover 10-50% of the project’s cost. The loaned money is then paid back through an increase in the owner’s property tax. If the person sells the property before the loan is repaid, the next owner will inherit the remaining cost via the property tax.
The challenge, however, has been convincing building owners to take the steps towards energy efficiency. In a city like Burlington, where demand for housing is high and the population is filled with college students and young professionals, who typically leave after a few years, getting people to invest in these renovations is difficult.
A big part of what Burlington Electric does is form relationships with its biggest energy users because unlike most energy companies, BED isn’t about upping usage rates to make more money. After all, it’s a non-profit branch of the city. Instead, Burlington Electric is concerned with reducing usage rates. By reaching out to its biggest energy users they not only provide the opportunity and incentive to become energy efficient, but they also make it so BED is among the first places called when those customers do want to upgrade their property.
“I think the problem is that Burlington is a popular place to be. It’s the landlords’ market,” says Burns. “It’s not like we have a glut of empty apartments around. So low supply, high demand, the landlord can pretty much get what they want and they don’t have to take care of their buildings. That’s why we put the energy codes in place. We adjust that code every few years as the technology improves. The code has been around since 1991, but it’s been revised about 5 times.”
Mar.24.2010
Sometimes in life what you see might not be representative of what actually is going on. The lack of renewable energy technologies in downtown Burlington might perplex the city’s progressive and environmentally aware population, but according to Burlington Electric’s Chris Burns it’s a combination of energy efficient technologies that provide the best opportunity for saving money and energy.
“There’s no silver bullet. We call it diversification. You’ve gotta get a little bit from everything,” Burns says.
And everything means everything from insulating every nook and cranny of a house to lighting, heating, and ventilation controls.
In fact, Burns says, “A lot of it is control stuff. A lot of it is outside air economizers. Take a look at Burlington’s climate, there are many many hours in the year where you can have Mother Nature do the work for you.”
This is why Burlington Electric has installed free air ventilation systems in many of the convenience and grocery stores around Burlington. According to Burns, it’s simply more cost-effective than the renewable stuff.
“Let’s say it costs you 5000 dollars to do a free air economizer system in a convenience store refrigeration walk-in—hypothetically—you might be saving 2000 dollars a year on your power costs. Now, the problem with solar—photo voltaic—is that the price is really expensive. So to get a 1000 watt PV array installed right now would cost you about 7500 bucks, and if it was oriented perfectly to solar south it would save about 140 dollars a year. So 140 bucks a year and it’s gonna cost you 7500 bucks to do it.”
The financial incentive is clear, but how do they work? Outside sensors take readings of the temperature. When the temperature drops low enough, the refrigeration compressors are turned off while the duct work is opened and low energy fans bring in the cold air. Once it becomes too hot or humid, the compressors are turned back on.
Another small, but effective technology in use throughout much of Burlington are occupancy sensors, which keep track of whether there’s people in a room or not. If no one’s there, the lights go off until someone enters. In some cases, these occupancy sensors can also control ventilation.
“There’s sensors around the room that sit there and say, ‘This place is unoccupied, or for some reason there’s only 15 people in this room when there should be a hundred,’” says Burns. “’I’m only going to give enough ventilation for nobody or 15 people or 100 people. I’m going to react to what you need.’”
The smart ventilation controls not only save energy, but they cut down on maintenance costs as well.
“The wear and tear on the equipment comes down, but the energy savings are tremendous,” Burns says. “We’re also doing this in underground parking garages with carbon monoxide based on exhaust. Instead of running these exhaust systems 24/7, let’s be smarter about it.”
With everything controlled by computers, it’s natural to wonder what would happen if the system failed. Would people suffocate as the ventilation control system thinks no one is around? Chris Burns noted the concern fire code officials had, but fortunately these systems fail closed. Basically, when they fail the system will remain on 24/7 until somebody realizes the controls have failed. The safety measure is that it reverts back to the way it would operate without the energy efficient controls in place. Rather than stale or tainted air, it’s energy inefficiency until the problem is fixed.
But as Burns mentions, the real struggle is convincing people that energy efficiency makes more sense economically and environmentally than renewable technologies.
“There’s this, I’m not going to call it conflict, but maybe it’s a misunderstanding, and maybe there’s a little competition between the energy efficiency folks and the renewable folks. Energy efficiency just isn’t very sexy. People start to get glassed over pretty fast once I start talking to them about it, but people like solar panels and wind turbines.”
In an effort to make Burlington more energy efficient, Burlington Electric is using what Burns calls a “carrots and sticks” approach. The “sticks”, he says, come in the form of the energy efficiency code for residential and commercial buildings.
“What we did back in the early 90s is we developed energy efficiency construction codes for all buildings,” says Burns. “When someone goes in to get their permit—an electrical permit, a planning and zoning permit, a building permit—they need to prove the building meets this baseline of energy efficiency.”
The code is stricter in regards to new construction projects than it is with existing buildings.
“For a new construction project for them to get their occupancy permit they need to have a medal from Burlington Electric that says you meet the code. And if it’s an existing building, which we have a lot of, if any component of that building which you’re replacing is covered by the code it must be brought up to code.”
So if someone wants to replace the heating system or the windows of a building, those new additions must meet the code. However, whenever Burlington Electric evaluates any potential renovation project, if they see that the building is deficient in certain areas they seize the opportunity. It is in those moments when the “carrots” approach is exercised.
And it is through incentives provided by the P.O.W.E.R program (Property Owners Win with Efficiency and Renewables), which passed in May 2009, that Burlington Electric makes it easier for citizens and business owners to make their properties more energy efficient.
Essentially, if a property owner can’t afford the cost of an energy efficiency project, Burlington Electric will cover 10-50% of the project’s cost. The loaned money is then paid back through an increase in the owner’s property tax. If the person sells the property before the loan is repaid, the next owner will inherit the remaining cost via the property tax.
The challenge, however, has been convincing building owners to take the steps towards energy efficiency. In a city like Burlington, where demand for housing is high and the population is filled with college students and young professionals, who typically leave after a few years, getting people to invest in these renovations is difficult.
A big part of what Burlington Electric does is form relationships with its biggest energy users because unlike most energy companies, BED isn’t about upping usage rates to make more money. After all, it’s a non-profit branch of the city. Instead, Burlington Electric is concerned with reducing usage rates. By reaching out to its biggest energy users they not only provide the opportunity and incentive to become energy efficient, but they also make it so BED is among the first places called when those customers do want to upgrade their property.
“I think the problem is that Burlington is a popular place to be. It’s the landlords’ market,” says Burns. “It’s not like we have a glut of empty apartments around. So low supply, high demand, the landlord can pretty much get what they want and they don’t have to take care of their buildings. That’s why we put the energy codes in place. We adjust that code every few years as the technology improves. The code has been around since 1991, but it’s been revised about 5 times.”
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Vermont’s Farming Families: True Work Ethic
Matthew Toll
3/30/2010
The culture in the state of Vermont is sometimes hard to “figure out”. Sometimes the University of Vermont and the college life-style come to mind first. While to others, Vermont is commonly thought of as a rural, agriculturally oriented state. These two cultures, although very different, often merge into each other in the city of Burlington.
Vermont isn’t well known for its big business and national trade, but the maple syrup industry breaks the mold. The state of Vermont is the largest producer of maple syrup in the United States by far, producing as much as 900 thousand gallons of syrup annually. This is the most of any state in the U.S. according to the United States Department of Agriculture, with Maine coming in second with a fraction of that: 395 thousand gallons.
Family owned and operated maple syrup shacks and full farms are the backbone of this industry. With the syrup business growing so much and the growth of out of state, mass-producing farms, many Vermont families have turned their business from produce such as meat and vegetables to the production of delicious maple syrup.
The Branon Family Maple Orchards are a perfect example of a merging of contemporary Burlington ideals mixed in with the hard-working nature that family-owned and operated farms are known for. Originally started primarily as a dairy farm, the Branon family has owned and operated their land for nearly 6 generations. Slowly they’ve begun to shift their focus from dairy and meats to maple syrup, as that is the industry that has become most sustainable for Vermont farmers.
Located in Bakersfield, Vermont, with land in Fairfield as well, the Branon Family Orchards are in a perfect location, close to Burlington while still being in the country, with plenty of land. By being this close to Burlington, they’re able to sell large quantities in their own state, as well as export it out of state for a larger profit.
The state of Vermont also celebrates a reputation for hard-workers, and the work ethic on these farms doesn’t sell their reputation short at all. Nearly everyone in the family pulls their weight in one way or another. Evan Branon, a twenty year old who is currently a student in Burlington, goes home every weekend during the busy syrup harvest to help his family earn a living and continue their business.
“I’m proud to be part of a family that can run a successful business in hard economic times, and one that also contributes to the state of Vermont. Although it may not be what I want to do for a living, I’m always willing to come home from school to help out with the work,” said Evan.
Having a good work ethic instilled in him since a young age by his family, Evan Branon is able to apply that to school, as well as anything else he chooses to pursue.
Branon explained, “I feel lucky to have grown up with such a hard working mindset among my parents and the rest of the family. I’m not sure I’d be as good of a student had I not grown up in the environment that I did.”
With over forty major maple syrup producers in the state, what makes the Branon’s syrup special, and how do they attract business with such a large number of “sugar-houses” in the surrounding area? Much of the draw of the Branon Family Orchards is the close atmosphere you feel, like everyone there is working to help each other; but what truly draws in the tourists and buyers is the quality and freshness of the syrup produced at the farm. They tap syrup from trees as old as 100 years, while making sure they don’t over-tap any one tree or growth. The Branon Orchards offer every grade of maple syrup, making sure it’s completely organic, and also produce Vermont Maple Sugar and Vermont Maple Cream.
Since the syrup industry is so important to the sustainability of Vermont, it’s important that family farms such as the Branon’s don’t become few and far between, as they are needed to keep trade industries in Vermont successful. They contribute to Vermont industry and trade, upholding values, and also work to keep the environment clean and healthy, making the Branon’s true Vermonters.
3/30/2010
The culture in the state of Vermont is sometimes hard to “figure out”. Sometimes the University of Vermont and the college life-style come to mind first. While to others, Vermont is commonly thought of as a rural, agriculturally oriented state. These two cultures, although very different, often merge into each other in the city of Burlington.
Vermont isn’t well known for its big business and national trade, but the maple syrup industry breaks the mold. The state of Vermont is the largest producer of maple syrup in the United States by far, producing as much as 900 thousand gallons of syrup annually. This is the most of any state in the U.S. according to the United States Department of Agriculture, with Maine coming in second with a fraction of that: 395 thousand gallons.
Family owned and operated maple syrup shacks and full farms are the backbone of this industry. With the syrup business growing so much and the growth of out of state, mass-producing farms, many Vermont families have turned their business from produce such as meat and vegetables to the production of delicious maple syrup.
The Branon Family Maple Orchards are a perfect example of a merging of contemporary Burlington ideals mixed in with the hard-working nature that family-owned and operated farms are known for. Originally started primarily as a dairy farm, the Branon family has owned and operated their land for nearly 6 generations. Slowly they’ve begun to shift their focus from dairy and meats to maple syrup, as that is the industry that has become most sustainable for Vermont farmers.
Located in Bakersfield, Vermont, with land in Fairfield as well, the Branon Family Orchards are in a perfect location, close to Burlington while still being in the country, with plenty of land. By being this close to Burlington, they’re able to sell large quantities in their own state, as well as export it out of state for a larger profit.
The state of Vermont also celebrates a reputation for hard-workers, and the work ethic on these farms doesn’t sell their reputation short at all. Nearly everyone in the family pulls their weight in one way or another. Evan Branon, a twenty year old who is currently a student in Burlington, goes home every weekend during the busy syrup harvest to help his family earn a living and continue their business.
“I’m proud to be part of a family that can run a successful business in hard economic times, and one that also contributes to the state of Vermont. Although it may not be what I want to do for a living, I’m always willing to come home from school to help out with the work,” said Evan.
Having a good work ethic instilled in him since a young age by his family, Evan Branon is able to apply that to school, as well as anything else he chooses to pursue.
Branon explained, “I feel lucky to have grown up with such a hard working mindset among my parents and the rest of the family. I’m not sure I’d be as good of a student had I not grown up in the environment that I did.”
With over forty major maple syrup producers in the state, what makes the Branon’s syrup special, and how do they attract business with such a large number of “sugar-houses” in the surrounding area? Much of the draw of the Branon Family Orchards is the close atmosphere you feel, like everyone there is working to help each other; but what truly draws in the tourists and buyers is the quality and freshness of the syrup produced at the farm. They tap syrup from trees as old as 100 years, while making sure they don’t over-tap any one tree or growth. The Branon Orchards offer every grade of maple syrup, making sure it’s completely organic, and also produce Vermont Maple Sugar and Vermont Maple Cream.
Since the syrup industry is so important to the sustainability of Vermont, it’s important that family farms such as the Branon’s don’t become few and far between, as they are needed to keep trade industries in Vermont successful. They contribute to Vermont industry and trade, upholding values, and also work to keep the environment clean and healthy, making the Branon’s true Vermonters.
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