Also on today’s menu:
Concord-Laconia Bus Route Established
MacDowell Award Honors Abenaki Filmmaker
Leaked Documents Include Infrastructure Warning
A court trial in a case that has been making its way past appeals by the state of New Hampshire since it was introduced in 2019 is now taking place in Rockingham County Superior Court. Brought by 17 school districts that claim the state is failing to meet its obligation to provide an adequate education, the case will decide whether the state’s contribution of about $3,800 per student is enough. The Con-Val school district, for example, spends nearly $11,000 per student, according to the state’s calculation.
The Granite State’s per-pupil cost estimates are based on state education requirements and do not take into account the cost of transportation, special education, and other obligations, so district voters who simply divide the operating budget by the number of students get a much-higher per-pupil figure.
Michael Tierney, the lawyer representing the plaintiff districts, said the suit aims to spell out the true cost of state requirements. The state argues that lawmakers define what constitutes an adequate education and the means of paying for it.
A separate lawsuit challenging the use of varied local tax rates to pay for public education is slated for trial this fall.
Concord-Laconia Bus Route Established
The Community Action Program-Belknap and Merrimack Counties has secured grant funding for a new Concord-to-Laconia bus route that will provide transportation for commuters as well as Lakes Region residents who need rides to stores and hospitals. The agency hopes to begin bus runs by the end of summer.
The planned route will run up Route 3 from Concord with stops at new developments off Exit 17 of Interstate 93, the Boscawen county complex, the Franklin Industrial Park, downtown Franklin, Tilton Walmart and Market Basket, the Belknap Mall in Belmont, and Concord Hospital-Laconia.
The agency is still working out specific stops to meet commuters’ needs, but one goal is to help employers attract workers by solving the transportation problem that has been hampering their ability to attract people from farther away.
MacDowell Award Honors Abenaki Filmmaker
Abenaki filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin learned of an armed standoff at Oka, on Mohawk lands, between protestors, Quebec police, and the Canadian army in 1990, resulting in her 1993 award-winning documentary, Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance.
Now Obomsawin’s contributions as a filmmaker are being honored with an Edward MacDowell Medal, an award that has recognized people such as Toni Morrison, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Robert Frost for their “outstanding contribution to their field”. Kanehsatake is one of 56 films that Obomsawin has made with the National Film Board of Canada.
“Obomsawin’s exemplary 52-year body of work uplifting Indigenous stories and triumph inspired us with compelling and unequivocal enthusiasm to award her with the 2023 Edward MacDowell Medal,” said Bird Runningwater, a member of the selection panel. “Even more special is that Alanis Obomsawin descends from the Abenaki People, and MacDowell’s residency program takes place in Wabanaki, the Dawnland, on the traditional homelands of the Western Abenaki. This marks the first time MacDowell honors someone from the Indigenous lands where the residency has historically taken place.”
Leaked Documents Include Infrastructure Warning
Among the trove of classified U.S. military documents that have spread on social media in recent weeks is an acknowledgement that “A pro-Russia hacking group is receiving instructions from a presumed Federal Security Service (FSB) officer to maintain network access to Canadian gas infrastructure and wait for further instruction. ... The FSB officers anticipated a successful operation would cause an explosion at the gas distribution station. … If Zarya succeeded, it would mark the first time the IC [intelligence community] has observed a pro-Russia hacking group execute a disruptive attack against Western industrial control systems.”
This is a topic I discussed with Joseph M. Weiss, the managing partner in Applied Control Solutions LLC, back in May 2021. Weiss is an international authority on cybersecurity, control systems, and technology science, and he warned that the sensors, actuators, drive valves, motors, pumps, and relays that comprise the operational technology systems for the nation’s utilities fail to meet the reliability standards necessary to prevent disasters that could claim lives as well as livelihoods.
The White House, National Security Council, and Department of Homeland Security have declined to comment on the pipeline claims.
Café Chatter
On Ultimate Conspiracy Theory: The Jewish woman’s bath house, the Mikveh, is entered naked. And in some ceremonies, such as conversion, it is used similar to a baptismal as you go into the water naked. Once you are up to your shoulders, your female attendant lets the rabbis know. They open a window in the entry door to watch you dip completely in the water three times. A symbolic ritual.
— Candace Skurnik
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