A reception will follow the lecture in the Chase Center.

Here are a few of our favorite spots:

Catamount Outdoor Family Center, Williston, VT

Grafton Ponds Outdoor Center, Grafton, VT

Mountain Meadows Cross Country and Snow Shoe Area, Killington, VT

http://www.abajournal.com/magazine/article/lawyers_giving_back11/

Please join us for the presentations of 4 Chinese visiting scholars:
* Professor Yu Wenxuan will present: “The Environmental Impact Assessment Systems in China and in the U.S.”
* Professor Zhang Bao and Professor Zhang Minchun will present: “The Development of Specialized Environmental Courts in China”
* Professor Guo Wu will present: “The Introduction of Environmental Customary Law in China”

 The anonymous grant, which will be distributed over four years, will allow the center to hire a director with national experience and to expand its agricultural law and policy curriculum and training, research and support programs.

“This generous grant recognizes Vermont Law School’s growing strength in agricultural law and policy,” said Professor John Echeverria, acting director of the Environmental Law Center.

 The agriculture center builds on Vermont’s reputation for small-scale agricultural innovation and ethos of environmental and social sustainability. It will provide support for community-based agricultural systems, sustainable agriculture advocates, agencies, food hubs, incubators and farmers.

 “This center is unique in its focus on sustainable food, food safety and the regulatory, tax and governance systems that support agricultural policy,” said Dean Jeff Shields.

 VLS is launching a national search for a director to work with VLS’s environmental faculty, Food and Agricultural Law Society students, alumni who work in organizations such as the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, the Center for Food Safety, and the Vermont Department of Agriculture, and a network of national and international advisors.

 The VLS agriculture center is:

• Expanding the law school’s curriculum to create a comprehensive academic program in agriculture and food policy.
• Continuing research and education projects, such as The Farmer’s Handbook for Energy Self-Reliance. The handbook is distributed to more than 4,000 farmers and taken to more than a dozen farmers’ forums and conferences nationally.
• Organizing conferences for agricultural leaders such as the 2010 Food, Fuel, and the Future of Farming, which brought together more than 200 scholars, activists, policy leaders and farmers.

The center focuses on legal and policy issues related to community-based agriculture, including the regulation of food, the Farm Bill and agricultural subsidies, energy-efficient food production, energy independence for farmers and other issues that are key to retaining a successful working landscape for rural communities.

 Current projects range from agriculture policy to individual faculty and student research in a variety of areas. Recent projects include a study of the regulatory barriers to grain production in Vermont, the Open Space Vermont blog, and a survey of property tax incentives for U.S. agricultural lands.

 The center also is supporting the research of key scholars in sustainable agriculture and food issues by hosting a Sustainable Food Systems Summer Scholar during VLS’s summer session. Last year’s inaugural Summer Scholar was Mary Jane Angelo, a professor at the University of Florida Levin College of Law and a former senior attorney for the Environmental Protection Agency. This year’s Summer Scholar will be Stephanie Tai, a professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School and an expert on the role of environmental and health sciences in developing regulatory safeguards.

 More information about the VLS agriculture center is available at http://www.vermontlaw.edu/x12888.xml

We are moving right along in Admissions.  Applications are rolling in, candidates and families are visiting the office, files are read and decisions posted.  The cycle zips along.  The application deadline is March 1, but please do not wait until the last minute to apply.  We have good scholarship funding, first come – first served.

For those who are interested in learning more about Vermont Law School, we are hosting an information day on Saturday, January 28th.  For more info, see the link: http://www.vermontlaw.edu/Admissions/Visit_VLS/Information_Session.htm

Following a familiar playbook, the oil and gas industry’s first tactic has been to divert attention from the series’ groundbreaking findings by accusing the Times of being anti-natural gas, anti-jobs and anti-American. This is what comes from taking on powerful economic and political interests these days. Few media outlets have the resources or the stomach for taking on a story like this and the countless hours spent in digging out facts, asking tough questions, vetting sources, unearthing documents buried in agency files and penetrating the maze of laws and regulations that are supposed to protect the public but often end up protecting the regulated industry. Remember Deepwater Horizon? A drilling technology so layered with supposed “fail-safe” devices it didn’t warrant the most rudimentary form of environmental assessment by the government agencies charged with protecting the public interest. Where were the media watchdogs before the Macondo well blew?

Here we have an industry that has insulated itself from potential liability by securing an exemption from the Safe Drinking Water Act for the hydro-fracking technology being used to extract gas from deep underground. An industry that claims the chemicals used in the fracking fluids are trade secrets that can not be made public. Chemicals only recently disclosed in response to a subpoena from the Environmental Protection Agency, and that will take years to evaluate. An industry that has been sending wastewater containing radionuclides and other toxic elements to municipal treatment plants not equipped to deal with them. A practice, by the way, that was stopped shortly after the Times reported it. That was just one of the many positive responses the series has generated.

It would be different if the Times was guilty of publishing false or misleading information. The oil and gas industry accuses the Times of shoddy research, but the paper has released a huge archive of original documents, some obtained through normal channels and some through the time-honored process of leaks from whistleblowers. The industry says the Times got its facts wrong but fails to cite a single factual error in any of the newspaper’s coverage. The industry complains that some of the documents contain redacted material. Yet the redactions are limited to protecting the identities of the sources who leaked them after their agency superiors refused to honor public records requests for their disclosure — standard operating procedure for this kind of investigative journalism.

The Times has also rightly broadened the discussion to issues beyond the environment by tapping into industry and government officials who question whether oil and gas companies and federal energy officials have over-sold natural gas’ reserves. The result: The Securities and Exchange Commission and the New York Attorney General are investigating. The oil and gas industry could not be more thrilled by the exuberance from Wall Street, federal lawmakers and the White House about the prospects for shale gas as the next big thing. Maybe so, but the same was said for corn ethanol and other “miracle” fuels that have proven to be problematic from both an environmental and economic standpoint. The latest study by National Center for Atmospheric Research concludes that shifting from coal to natural gas could reduce global warming by about .01° Celsius by 2100, but only if methane releases from gas extraction can be kept under 2.5 percent. That may prove impossible to achieve.

Big bucks are at stake. So are public health and environmental quality. The oil and gas industry can be counted on to vigorously pursue this 21st century gold rush and to bring all its wealth and power to bear on those who stand in the way. But the Times has dived in anyway and is doing an unusually rigorous job at covering an extremely important issue. One can only hope that the overseers of the paper will not lose their nerve, as some of our political leaders have, in the face of this furious but unjust onslaught.

I am writing on behalf of Alliance, the Black Law Students Association and Law Students for Reproductive Justice to thank the entire VLS community for their involvement in this weeks World AIDS Day on goings.  There were very few people I saw that were not donning a red ribbon on Wednesday and Thursday.  Through a 50/50 raffle and the sales of Jonah’s decadent red-velvet cupcakes, we raised $236.13 over the course of two days of tabling and at the Red Party.   The winner of the 50/50 raffle was Megan , who generously donated her winnings back to the cause.

The community demonstrated a commitment to the preventing the spread of HIV as we gave away hundreds of prophylactic products.  RU12 (http://www.ru12.org/hiv-testing.html) and  HIV/HCV (http://www.acornvtnh.org/resources/orasure.html, http://www.vtcares.org/aboutus/offices.html)  came to campus and administered free HIV testing for 20 people.   This was our first venture in bringing testing to campus, so space was limited.  We intend to bring testing back to campus, but in the mean time RU12, HIV/HCV and Planned Parenthood New England all provide free HIV testing at their facilities.

Special recognition should go out to Krystil  for her dedication in bringing these testing organizations to school and surrounding community.  A special thanks also goes to Ben  and the Think and Drink crew for incorporating World AIDS Day into their festivities!

Thank you, again, to the whole VLS community for all the support and participation in this week’s events.  Good luck with finals, and happy holidays to follow.