|
The Fletcher Community Newsletter |
| The Resource for Town, School, and Community News and Events January-February 2003 |
If your joints creak, your muscles groan, and you’re 40 years or older, we invite you to join us on Sundays at 9 a.m. in the Fletcher Elementary School gym for basketball. This is a pick-up game where everyone plays. Don’t be fooled by our age -- we are very competitive, but heart counts more than style after age 40.
If you’re an adult of any age, Monday nights are basketball nights at the Fletcher School gym. Play begins at 7 p.m. Come prepared for a lively evening of post-ups and fast breaks. We love to win, but fun rules the game.
Tom Sustic Fund—Events and Updates
Tom Sustic, a Fletcher resident, fought a 2-year battle with leukemia from 1999-2000. During this time, money was raised through a series of benefit events in 1999 and 2000 for a fund that was to be established in large part to support a bone marrow transplant for Tom. Unfortunately, after several bone marrow drives and continuous monitoring and searching through several million samples on the available registries in North America and Europe, an ideal donor was never located and Tom died on July 4, 2001. His family used the money raised for the transplant to establish the Tom Sustic Fund which supports families whose children have cancer. There is about $40,000 currently in the Fund.
Several musicians have offered to do performances as part of a series of concerts in Burlington to help the Fund. The intent is to sustain it at its present level as a base amount, and to add to it incrementally with events, growing the fund as an endowment so that it will be self-sustaining and continually generating revenue that would be used to support other families with terminally ill children, particularly those in need of transplantation. Events that benefit the fund will be listed in the Fletcher newsletter.
Saturday, January 18 - The Randal Bays will teach a workshop in Irish style fiddle technique from 1-4 p.m. The workshop will take place in the Perkins lounge of the College Street Congregational Church in Burlington. The class will be aimed at players of intermediate to advanced skill level. Tuition will be $40 and the class will be limited to about 15 students. Because of the size limit, reservations are highly recommended. For reservations and more information about the workshop, contact Malcolm Sanders at 859-0417 or via email at malcolm.sanders@uvm.edu.
Sunday, January 19 -Randal Bays and Daithi Sproule plus Sarah Blair, Julee Glaub, and Pete Sutherland will appear in a concert of traditional Irish music at 7 p.m. at the FlynnSpace in the Flynn Center for the Performing Arts in Burlington, Vermont. Tickets ($13 advance, $15 day of show) are available NOW by calling 863-5966 or on-line at http://www.flynncenter.org/regional/sustic.html. The concert will be presented with support from the Burlington Violin Shop, the Burlington Irish Heritage Festival, the Champlain Valley Festival, Parent to Parent of Vermont, the Vermont Folklife Center, Quickstep Design, Anna Liffey Irish Imports and Gifts, Vermont Tent Company, and others.
These events are not intended as benefit concerts, although many of the folks have offered to donate their services. All proceeds from the events after expenses will support the Tom Sustic Fund. If you would like to help publicize the concert series or to forward a message about the Tom Sustic Fund to others, please contact Mark Sustic. If you are able and willing to receive a PDF file of a poster to print and put up where folks would be interested in knowing about this, send a message to mrksustc@together.net.
Firefly Presents Alice in Wonderland
Firefly Productions will be presenting "Alice in Wonderland" in blacklight on January 25 at 7 p.m. at the Fletcher Union Meeting House. Using puppetry and the magic of blacklight we follow Alice through the rabbit hole and into a wonderland of talking caterpillars, disappearing cats and more. For more information, please call Firefly Productions at 644-2542.
Join an energetic adult group on Thursday nights in the Fletcher Elementary School gym for pick-up volleyball (you show up, you play). Play begins at 7 p.m. and continues until you decide to go home. If you take your volleyball a little bit seriously and have a sense of humor, we invite you to join us. Dig out your knee pads and come work off your winter doldrums in good company
6th Graders to Update Fletcher Telephone Book
The Fletcher Elementary 6th Grade class is updating the Fletcher telephone book as one of many of its fundraising activities to raise money for a trip to Cape Cod and Boston. It has been three years since the last book came out, so its time to update addresses and add new residents and businesses. Sixth grade students, teachers, and parents will be selling advertising space for the yellow pages section. They will also be updating the white pages. Copies of the current listings will be available at the Fletcher General Store. Fletcher residents, please check your listing and call Karen Tinker at 849-6845 with any changes or additions. If you have a business and would like an inexpensive way to advertise, please call Karen for a price list and application. The Fletcher phone book is a great way to let local residents know about your business!
North County ATV Association
Update
By Claire Willette
The North Country ATV Association will be holding their next meeting on February 7 at 7 p.m. at the Abbey Restaurant in Sheldon. We are looking for landowners, concerned citizens, supporter, non-supporters, and alike to attend. If you would like to see what the club is all about or would like to join the club, you may do so at the meeting.
The club has been working on a trail system in Enosburg, where we have some large landowners who have opened up their land to us. The club has already established about 10 miles of trails with many more to go. We are trying to still get trails through the Fletcher/Fairfield area so if you would be willing to open your lands to ATV use, it would be greatly appreciated. We can put trails on the edge of corn fields, hay fields, or through the woods. There is no liability to the landowner. VASA (Vermont ATV Sportsman’s Association) provides the necessary policy protecting the landowner. The club takes care of maintaining trails.
Please contact President Jerry Wolfenbarger (524-9809), Vice President Andrew King (868-9909) or Claire Willettee (849-6729) for more information. You can also visit our website at NCAA-Inc.com to see pictures of club rides and other trail maps, to sign our guest book, and more.
Tuesday, March 4 is Town Meeting Day, with the annual school meeting shortly thereafter. Along with voting on budget and other issues, town officials and School Board members are elected at these meetings. To find out which positions will be elected this year, check last year’s Town Report for any elected position expiring in 2003. If you are interested in running as a candidate for public office, please consider submitting a brief biography or statement for publication in the March newsletter (published at the end of February). This is purely voluntary, and candidates are not required to submit anything. It’s simply a way to help newer residents and those who don’t already know you find out more about those running for office.
Voters to Consider Resolution
on Genetically Engineered Foods
By Alan Plumb
At Town Meeting on March 4, Fletcher voters will discuss and vote on a resolution on genetically engineered foods. The resolution is part of a grassroots effort to create awareness and dialogue on the important issue of genetic engineering. To date, 33 Vermont towns have supported resolutions calling for regulation of genetically engineered foods and crops. In Europe, there has been an enormous outcry against genetic engineering. The resolution asks:
Shall the residents of Fletcher support the following resolution to protect our farms, food, and the environment:
Whereas genetically engineered (GE) foods have been shown to cause long-term damage to the environments, the integrity of rural, family farm economies, and can have serious impacts on human health; whereas GE crops have been found to contaminate other crops through cross-pollination and are stringently regulated in more than 30 countries; and whereas citizens throughout the United States are taking steps to address the problem of GE foods at the state and local levels, in response to the failure of Congress and federal regulatory agencies to adequately address this issue, the residents of Fletcher:
1. Call upon our elected officials, including Vermont legislators, Congressional representatives and U.S. senators, to support the mandatory labeling by manufacturers and processors of all genetically engineered food and seeds ,as well as a moratorium on the further growing of GE crops until there is credible and independent scientific evidence that these products are not harmful to our health, the environment, and the survival of family farms, and
2. Declare our support for legislation at the state and federal levels that will shift all liability from farmers to the commercial developers of GE technology for any damage resulting from the growing of GE crops, and
3. Declare our opposition to the planting of genetically engineered seeds in the Town, and resolve to actively discourage the planting of GE seeds, as a step toward making Vermont a GE-free planning zone by the 2004 growing season.
Thank you to the many people who signed the petition supporting the introduction of the resolution at town meeting.
Elaine’s Town Meeting Reminders
Town Meeting - Town Meeting will take place on Tuesday, March 4, 2003.
Town Report - If you are submitting information for this year’s Town Report, please remember that the information is due by January 22.
Register to Vote - If you are not already registered to vote, the last day to register is February 22.
Wednesdays, January 15 & February 19 - Open "Mike-less"Night (acoustic) from 7-9 p.m. at Dinner's Dunn at the Windridge Bakery in Jeffersonville. No admission; donations appreciated. Call Fred Brauer at 644-5721.
Saturday, January 25 - The Hubcats perform at the Cambridge Elementary School Auditorium from 6:00 to 7:45 p.m. as part of Winterfest Weekend. Fireworks afterward, along with skating with music by professional DJ. No admission. Call Fred Brauer at 644-5721.
Wednesday, February 5 - "Vermont Women in Song,” featuring some of Vermont's most talented female singer-songwriters at Dinner's Dunn at the Windridge Bakery in Jeffersonville from 7 to 9 p.m. No admission; donations appreciated. Call Fred Brauer at 644-5721.
Saturday, February 8 - Book discussion group. Facilitated by Jules Older, discuss The White Bone by Barbara Gowdy at the Varnum Library in Jeffersonville at 3 p.m. No charge. Sponsored by the Varnum Library, CAC, and the Vermont Council on the Humanities. Call April at 644-6632 for info.
Saturday, February 8 - Autumn Portraits presented by Eric Glass of Sandglass Theater. An evening-long solo puppet-and-mask performance begins at 7 p.m. at the Second Congregational Church in Jeffersonville. Admission by donation. Call Carol Baker at 644-2570 for info.
15 Open Mike-less night, 7-9 p.m., Windridge Bakery, Jeffersonville
18 Randal Bays Fiddling workshop, 1-4 p.m., Flynn Space, Burlington
19 Randal Bays, Daithi Sproule, etc. concert, 7 p.m., Flynn Space, Burlington
20 Martin Luther King Day, no school, Town Office closed
22 Town Report information due to Town Clerk
25 Recycling and trash drop off, 9 am-1 pm, Town Garage
25 Firefly’s Alice in Wonderland, 7 p.m., Fletcher Union Meeting House
25 Hubcats concert, 6-7:45 p.m., Cambridge Elementary School, Jeffersonville
Weekly Events (At Fletcher Elementary School)
Sundays, 9 a.m. - Over 40 basketball
Mondays, 7 p.m. - Adult, open age basketball
Thursdays, 1:15-2:45 p.m. - Fletcher Community Playgroup
Thursdays, 7 p.m. – Adult volleyball
Around the world late this month, cultures are acknowledging the return of the sun, of the promise of spring and lengthening days. To me here in Fletcher, spring hardly seems possible—the cold and snow deeply entrenches our many beds of irises so firmly trapped in the height of winter. I’m forcing myself to re-read Louise Gluck’s poem, “Wild Iris,” to remember that spring’s voice shall return, that
At the end of my suffering
there was a door.
Hear me out: that which you call death
I remember.
It is terrible to survive
as consciousness
buried in the dark earth.
Then it was over: that which you fear, being
a soul and unable
to speak, ending abruptly, the stiff earth
bending a little. And what I took to be
birds darting in low shrubs.
You who do not remember
passage from the other world
I tell you I could speak again: whatever
returns from oblivion returns
to find a voice:
from the center of my life came
a great fountain, deep blue
shadows on azure sea water.
I’m trying to remember that the year is new and shiny—even if we haven’t had much sun these early days of January: even if a foot of snow fluttered steadily down over my mood and pines. I’m trying to remember that the days are lengthening. My periodontist reminded me recently that we are gaining nearly a minute of daylight per day, which “adds up” to borrow his words. It struck me, as I was preparing this column, that I might try to find other signs of cheerfulness in January and February and to share with you news of February festivals that celebrate the promise of the returning sun.
Linda Young is a writer who lives in Fletcher. She will contribute a column to the newsletter and is particularly interested in local history, community-building, and town issues. If you have a column idea, please email her at blyoung@sover.net.
November 4, 2002 (Approved):
November 18, 2002 (Approved):
December 9, 2002 (Approved):
December 16, 2002 (Approved):
December 30, 2002 (Approved):
5 Vermont Women in Song concert, 7-9 p.m., Windridge Bakery, Jeffersonville
7 North County ATV Association meeting, 7 p.m., Abbey Restaurant, Sheldon
8 Recycling and trash drop off, 9 am-1 pm, Town Garage
8 Book discussion group, 3 p.m., Varnum Library, Jeffersonville
8 Autumn Portraits performance, 7 p.m., Second Congregational Church, Jeffersonville
17 President’s Day, Town Office closed
19 Open Mike-less night, 7-9 p.m., Windridge Bakery, Jeffersonville
22 Last day to register to vote for new voters
22 Recycling and trash drop off, 9 am-1 pm, Town Garage
24-March 4 Winter recess, no school
Select Board – 1st& 3rd Mondays, 7 p.m.
Planning Commission – First Thursday, 7 p.m., when needed
Development Review Board – 3rd Tuesday, 7 p.m., when needed
Listers – as posted
November 20, 2002 (Approved):