~ The Upper Valley's News Leader

Monthly Archives: October 2018

Altercation on Bus Leads to Arrest

31 Wednesday Oct 2018

Posted by GrowingInArt in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Sharon VT – On 10/30/18 at approximately 1816 hours, State Police received a report of two males in an altercation on a Grey Hound bus at exit 2 northbound on I-89 in the Town of Sharon. Investigation revealed the accused, Anthony Langlois, removed items including a passport and credit cards from another passenger’s purse. Langlois 21, of Plainville MA was taken into custody and transported to Hartford Police Department where he was processed. He was then released on citation to appear in Vermont Superior Court Windsor Criminal Division on12/04/18 to answer to the charge of Possession of Stolen Property and Larceny from a Person.

Newport School Board and Newport Teachers Association reach Impasse in Contract Negotiations.

29 Monday Oct 2018

Posted by GrowingInArt in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Newport NH – The Newport School Board ratified a negotiated contract with the Newport Teachers Association (NTA) for the 2018-19 academic year and this contract failed as a warrant article in the March 2018 school district budget vote. The failure of a community to adopt a ratified contract has a negative effect on the School District. In the education profession, it is typical for a teacher to receive a year of service for each year in the profession in the form of a “step raise” that provides a guaranteed raise through the collective bargaining agreement. In Newport, we have teachers who have gone 7 years without a raise and are “7 years off step.” This results in low morale among the staff.

The Newport School Board has heard many of the concerns of the citizens regarding the teacher contract, including difficulty hiring beginning teachers because of low pay, concerns about teacher retention, “off-step” salary schedules, and health insurance premiums. Because of these shared concerns, Newport School Board requested the opportunity to negotiate with the NTA in August, 2018. After several opportunities to negotiate and a day long meditation, the Newport School Board and Newport Teachers Association were unable to agree upon contract terms.

The Newport School Board presented a set of proposals that addressed all of the priority issues voiced by the Newport community and teachers alike. The Newport School Board realizes that having salaries that are not competitive with other districts in the region causes further erosion of our educational programming and services for our students. The Board provided a salary schedule that brought salaries in line with regional median values to entice new teachers and corrected the step concern to retain our current teachers. The Board pursued a contract that would ensure that resources were allocated in a manner to best meet the educational needs of all students. The proposal was designed to promote working conditions that would attract and then retain the best possible faculty for our children.

The Newport School Board and the Newport Teachers Association reached an impasse after mediation. The next step after a declared impasse is a fact-finding process. The Newport School Board and NTA have set dates to move forward with this process in mid-November. The Board and the NTA are also able to continue negotiations to work an agreed resolution prior to the formal fact-finding hearing. The Newport School Board is committed to ratifying a contract that best meets the needs of our children, our teachers and our community.

Please direct all questions to Dr. Cindy Gallagher, Superintendent at (603) 865-9500 or cgallagher@sau43.org.

New Hampshire Insurance Department Issues Guidance on Health Insurance Fraud

26 Friday Oct 2018

Posted by GrowingInArt in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

MANCHESTER, N.H.– With the effects of Hurricane Willa expected to impact New Hampshire this weekend, Eversource is keeping a close eye on the track of the storm and is planning accordingly. The energy company’s line and tree crews are ready to respond to any damage or outages caused by the high winds and heavy rains the nor’easter is expected to bring to the region.

“We continue to closely monitor the weather forecast and are positioning crews around the state to be there when our customers need us,” said Eversource NH Vice President of Electric Operations Joe Purington. “With predicted wind gusts of up to 50 mph, and soaking rains that will saturate the ground – loosening the roots of already weakened trees – this storm has the potential to bring down trees and tree limbs onto power lines and electric equipment.”

 

The company reminds customers to always stay clear of downed wires and to report them immediately to 9-1-1. Be sure to report any outage online at Eversource.com, or by calling 800-662-7764. Customers who signed up for the company’s two-way texting feature can send a text to report an outage and receive outage updates as they happen.
Just as Eversource is prepared to respond to whatever the storm brings, customers should also prepare for any severe weather by assembling or restocking a storm kit and creating an emergency plan with family members, friends and neighbors. Eversource offers the following tips on its website to help customers prepare for emergencies:

Additional preparedness tips can be found at Eversource.com and readynh.gov.

D-H to Host Showing of Documentary, Panel Discussion on Medical Mistakes and Efforts to Improve Patient Safety

25 Thursday Oct 2018

Posted by GrowingInArt in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

LEBANON, NH — Medical mistakes lead to as many as 440,000 deaths each year, making it the third-leading cause of death in the United States. As part of its ongoing commitment to patient safety, Dartmouth-Hitchcock will present an in-depth documentary about medical errors and the work being undertaken to create a new age of patient safety.

Through interviews with leaders in health care, footage of real-world efforts leading to safer care, and one family’s compelling journey from victim to empowerment, “To Err is Human” provides a unique look at our health care system’s ongoing fight against preventable harm.

Dartmouth-Hitchcock will present two showings of the film, on Monday, October 29 in Lebanon and on Tuesday October 30 in Manchester. The film will be followed by panel discussions including the film’s producer and health care providers and professionals from Dartmouth-Hitchcock They will discuss patient safety issues raised in the film and the work being done at Dartmouth-Hitchcock to reduce medical errors and increase patient safety.

The October 29 presentation will be held at 5 p.m. in Auditoria E-F of Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon; panelists in the post-film discussion will include D-H CEO and President Joanne Conroy, MD; “To Err is Human” producer Mike Eisenberg; D-H Chief Quality and Value Officer George T. Blike, MD; Jean Avery, RN, director of the Patient Safety Training Center (PTSC) at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center; D-H Chief Legal Officer and General Counsel John Kacavas; and Tanya Lord, Director of Patient and Family Engagement for the Foundation for Healthy Communities and the mother of a patient who experienced a medical error at a hospital in another state.

The October 30 presentation will be held at 5 p.m. in Mara Auditorium at Southern New Hampshire University in Manchester. Blike, Eisenberg, and Lord will be joined on a panel there by Peter Thurber, operations manager of the PTSC, and Jonathan Thyng, MD, Associate Medical Director for Primary Care at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Nashua.

The film and the panel discussions are free and open to the public. To learn more about the documentary, visit the “To Err is Human” web site at: https://www.toerrishumanfilm.com/

Strum Ruger Company Wins Inaugural Sullivan County Commissioners Community Partnership Award

25 Thursday Oct 2018

Posted by GrowingInArt in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Newport NH– The Sullivan County Board of Commissioners announced that Sturm, Ruger & Company has won the inaugural Sullivan County Commissioners Community Partner Award for 2018.  According to Chairman Jeff Barrette, “This award recognizes the outstanding and generous contributions Sturm Ruger has made to Sullivan County for many years.  As we revamped our employee recognition program this past year we thought it was appropriate to also include our community partners and say thank you to them as well.”

Ruger’s contributions include supplying the Sheriff’s Department and Department of Corrections with duty weapons and they have conducted armorer’s training free of charge for County personnel.  Additionally, they supported the 2018 New Hampshire Association of Counties Annual Conference, which was hosted by Sullivan County, by donating two weapons for a fundraising raffle and helping the town of Newport put on a shooting demonstration for conference guests.

Barrette continued, “Sturm, Ruger & Company is a pillar in our county and has been for many generations.  I don’t know that we’ve taken time to appropriately thank them over the years for what they mean to our community.  This award is Sullivan County’s way of saying thanks for what they do for our employees and our taxpayers.”

The Community Partner Award will be formally presented at the Sullivan County Service Awards dinner on Friday, October 26th, at the Common Man Restaurant in Claremont.

NH DHHS Awarded $1.85 Million CDC Grant for Initiatives to Improve Dental Health of NH Residents

22 Monday Oct 2018

Posted by GrowingInArt in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Concord, NH – The New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) has announced a five-year, $1.85 million grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that will help the Granite State improve and sustain oral health. The funding will go toward promoting oral health in three targeted areas: assisting school children who face barriers to dental treatment; ensuring fluoride optimization in community water systems; and improving surveillance and reporting of the State’s oral health system.

“This grant allows us to celebrate October, National Dental Hygiene Awareness Month, in a very meaningful way,” said Hope Saltmarsh, DHHS Oral Health Program Director. “We are putting these funds to work to target New Hampshire initiatives of decreasing tooth decay and closing gaps in demographic and geographic differences in oral health.”

Tooth decay is the most common chronic childhood disease. The first area addressed with the funds is the NH Oral Health Program’s school-based dental programs to promote good oral health care among New Hampshire’s youth. Through school-based dental programs from 2001 to 2014, the percentage of third graders in NH with sealants increased 15% and those with untreated dental decay decreased 14%. Even with these improvements, children in some areas of the state continue to experience higher rates of untreated decay than their peers. The new CDC grant will facilitate a follow up survey of third graders’ oral health and provide services to more students in elementary and middle school-based programs that have a higher percentage of untreated decay.

Secondly, the Oral Health Program will work in coordination with fluoridated community water systems to ensure fluoride optimization. This will be done through monitoring of water quality, promoting training, and incentivizing optimization. Community assessments will be conducted to allow the Oral Health Program to better understand community perceptions about fluoridation, and to better communicate the health benefits that have been experienced in key communities throughout the state, including Concord, Durham, Laconia, Lancaster and Manchester.

The final grant outcome will be improvements to the State’s monitoring and reporting systems. Oral diseases, risk factors and access to preventive services information will be used in conjunction with data gathered from the New Hampshire Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System, a joint CDC–DHHS project. According to the data, a third of women enrolled in Medicaid reported needing to see a dentist for a problem during pregnancy, but only about half actually visited a dentist due to their inability to afford care. Poor oral health is associated with increased risk for diabetes, heart disease, stroke, and adverse pregnancy outcomes. The funding will ensure robust reporting and observation of data gathered from the NH Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System.

Lebanon Police to Hold Public Forum for Input on Strategic Plan

18 Thursday Oct 2018

Posted by GrowingInArt in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Lebanon NH -The Lebanon Police Department would like to invite you to a Public Forum designed to gather input from community members to assist the department in its Strategic Planning process. The Lebanon Police Department will develop a fiveyear Strategic Plan over the next several months. The Strategic Plan will be a guiding document that prioritizes the department’s goals and objectives, outlines how it will meet its strategic goals and objectives, provides metrics to assess the department’s performance, and ensures communication of progress to all stakeholders.

 

It is the goal of the Lebanon Police Department to promote positive interactions between the police and the community to promote transparency and to build trust. It is the hope of the Lebanon Police Department that the community at large provide input topics, such as effective community engagement, crime reduction and prevention, community priorities, quality of life issues, and overall department performance.

 

The Public Forum will be held on Wednesday, November 14, 2018 from 6PM – 8PM in the Lebanon City Hall Council Chambers, located at 51 N. Park Street. For more information, please contact Administrative Assistant Haley Tucker at 603448-8800, or haley.tucker@lebanonnh.gov

New Precision Diagnostics May Save More Trauma Patients

18 Thursday Oct 2018

Posted by GrowingInArt in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

LEBANON, NH – Trauma patients – with injuries ranging from those suffered in auto accidents to battlefield wounds – often seem, initially, to be stable, only to deteriorate without warning.  If not recognized early, this deterioration in condition can lead to shock or even death.

Doctors and researchers in the Emergency Department at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center (DHMC), as well as colleagues at Dartmouth College, the Thayer School of Engineering, and the Geisel School of Medicine, hope to improve care for seriously injured patients with a new $3 million Precision Trauma Care Research Award  from the Department of Defense’s Combat Casualty Care Research Program.

The three-year grant will develop an easy-to-use, noninvasive system for the detection of ongoing internal hemorrhaging in soldiers or other seriously injured patients initially classified as injured but stable. The Dartmouth-Hitchcock/Dartmouth College group will collaborate with the Mayo Clinic, the Ohio State University, and Maryland Shock Trauma.

“Emergency providers don’t currently have a good way to predict which patients will remain stable, and which will go into shock,” explains Norman A. Paradis, MD, an emergency physician at D-H and a professor of emergency medicine at Geisel, who serves as the project’s principal investigator.

“Our objective is to develop a non-invasive system that gives an accurate and early alarm that a patient has begun to deteriorate,” Paradis says.  “Individual patients will benefit from early intervention and medical systems will benefit because they can focus their attention and resources on patients who have been correctly identified as needing immediate care, while our system continuously monitors their other patients.”

Paradis says the grant was inspired by an email from Baghdad written in June 2007. Battlefield military physicians wrote:  “[T]here are three groups of casualties: 1) the ones who are really sick and (almost) everyone knows it; 2) the ones who have minimal injuries and will live almost regardless of what we do; and 3) those who look like they aren’t too bad but then deteriorate. (We are) most interested in identifying group three.”

The development team will include trauma specialists, engineers, computer programmers, and other experts to create a monitoring system that will gather signals continuously from multiple sites on the patient, using state-of-the-art sensors and computational technologies.

“The combination of machine learning and state-of-the-art sensing technology will allow us to better understand the early responses to hemorrhage,” Paradis says.  “We anticipate not only creating an innovative medical technology, but to also producing important new science.”

The U.S. Army Medical Research Acquisition Activity is the awarding and administering acquisition office. This work is supported by the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs endorsed through the Department of Defense, through the Defense Medical Research and Development Program, Joint Program Committee 6, Combat Casualty Care Research Program – Precision Trauma Care Research Award under Award No. W81XWH-18-2-0076.

Vermont Game Wardens Seek Help with Poachers

16 Tuesday Oct 2018

Posted by GrowingInArt in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Waterbury VT – Vermont State Game Wardens are appealing to the public for help in curtailing poaching activities. Wardens are asking for people who witness or have knowledge of poaching to contact them quickly.

If you hear a shot in the night, see lights in a field or have any information about a poaching incident, please contact Vermont Fish and
Wildlife game wardens immediately. Col. Jason Batchelder, Vermont’s chief game warden said: “The quickest way to reach a warden is by
calling your nearest State Police office so the radio dispatcher can give the information to a warden in the area.” Try to give details like names, vehicle descriptions, vehicle plate
information, and direction of travel. Wardens can often discover evidence and piece together a case if they investigate the situation rapidly.

If you have information about any illegal activity relating to Vermont’s wildlife, you also can anonymously call Operation Game Thief at 1-800-75ALERT (1-800-752-5378). Rewards are paid for information leading to arrests

Dartmouth to Hire Investigator For Hazing Allegations

16 Tuesday Oct 2018

Posted by GrowingInArt in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Hanover NH- Dartmouth College is hiring an external investigator to look into hazing allegations of 12 student organizations and the Dimensions performance group. The Dartmouth reports that Senior Associate Dean of
Student Affairs – Liz Agosto ’01, made the announcement on Thursday evening.
The decision came after Dartmouth received an increased number of reports of hazing incidents this term. Some incidents included thosethat could threaten the health and safety of students.

According to Agosto, the organizations will be informed this week whether they are
under investigation. The Hanover Police Department is also looking
into possible cases of criminal activity.
The College will internally investigate reports of incidents like
students wearing “unicorn costumes”— not by the external investigator.
The investigation will consist of interviews with Greek house
presidents and, in the case of suspected hazing, new members and new
member educators.-

← Older posts

Previous News

  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015

Blog at WordPress.com.

Cancel