Students on the Simon's Rock campus gather at the library in preparation for the Bard Queer Leadership Project. Press photo courtesy of Bard College at Simon's Rock

News

Here are the Hill Country Observer’s news articles, listed from newest to oldest. The Hill Country Observer covers town events, local government, community stories and more — from public health to housing to education and freedom of mind in New York, Vermont and Western Massachusetts.

  • Issue:

    Gun shows draw controversy

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    Where critics push for limits, some fear loss of freedom By THOMAS DIMOPOULOS Contributing writer SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y.The line at the door to the City Center began forming hours before the show opened. By 10 a.m., crowds of shoppers moved about the gun-laden tables inside the exhibition hall. Outside on Broadway, demonstrators held up 26 read more

    Gun shows draw controversy
  • Issue:

    Panel backs licenses for undocumented workers

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    Vermont may allow driving privilege regardless of legal status By EVAN LAWRENCE Contributing writer Vermont’s debate over providing driver’s licenses to undocumented foreign workers appears to be shifting from the question of whether to issue licenses to the question of what kind to provide. In January, a nine-member study committee appointed last year by the read more

    Panel backs licenses for undocumented workers
  • Issue:

    Disaster waiting to happen?

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    By TRACY FRISCH Contributing writer GHENT, N.Y.When a huge fire broke out last summer at an industrial waste processing plant in Columbia County, firefighters initially tried to quell the blaze with water. But the firefighters soon had to retreat as a series of explosions rocked the 30,000-square-foot building that was home to TCI of New read more

    Disaster waiting to happen?
  • Issue:

    Take a sip, feel the heat

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    By STACEY MORRIS Contributing writer PITTSFIELD, MASS. Dana St. Pierre recalled a recent experience at the Honest Weight Food Co-op Food Fair in Albany. There were dozens of vendors with booths set up along the lake in Washington Park selling edible delights ranging from homemade soups and grass-fed beef sliders to cupcakes and homemade peanut read more

    Take a sip, feel the heat
  • Issue:

    Songbird’s decline fuels climate-change debate

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    Groups seek endangered-species status for Bicknell’s thrush By CRAIG IDLEBROOK Contributing writer The fate of a little bird that spends its summers in the high elevations of the Green Mountains could soon become a new focal point in a national battle over regulating climate-changing emissions. Earlier this year, the federal government started the formal process read more

    Songbird’s decline fuels climate-change debate
  • Issue:

    Chip plant draws immigrant workers in Saratoga

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    Chip plant draws immigrant workers, adds international flavor in Saratoga By THOMAS DIMOPOULOS Contributing writer CLIFTON PARK, N.Y.Haiting Wang was happy to show off the new two-story structure he will soon call home. Standing in front of his still-under-construction house last month, he was flanked by a backhoe and a workers’ scaffold as a symphony read more

    Chip plant draws immigrant workers in Saratoga
  • Issue:

    EPA tries to navigate conflicting demands on Housatonic cleanup

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    EPA tries to navigate conflicting demands on Housatonic cleanup By DAVID SCRIBNER Contributing writer   PITTSFIELD, Mass.Twelve years ago this month, General Electric Co. signed a consent decree with state and federal environmental agencies under which it agreed to clean up PCB pollution in the Housatonic River, setting the stage for the dredging of 1.5 read more

    EPA tries to navigate conflicting demands on Housatonic cleanup
  • Issue:

    Who’s got your number? License-plate scanners raise privacy concerns

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    License-plate scanners help police but raise privacy concerns By CRAIG IDLEBROOK Contributing writer BENNINGTON, Vt.One day in late September, Bennington police were given information about a possible drug deal set to occur within the town limits. The police began to search the area for a vehicle of one of the suspects. Officers couldn’t find a read more

    Who’s got your number? License-plate scanners raise privacy concerns
  • Issue:

    TCI’s history includes past fires, worker death

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    By TRACY FRISCH Contributing writer   GHENT, N.Y. The Aug. 1 fire that destroyed the TCI of New York plant in West Ghent was not the company’s first, nor was the smaller fire earlier this year in which a trailer of oily rags at the plant ignited. In the mid-1980s, fire broke out at TCI’s read more

    TCI’s history includes past fires, worker death
  • Issue:

    An artist’s grand plans for Hudson

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    Old theater building seen as international center for performance art By JOHN TOWNES Contributing writer   HUDSON, N.Y. Within a few years, the hulking old Community Tennis building in Hudson could be transformed into new artistic hub under the guidance of one of the world’s best-known performance artists. Marina Abramovic, who has spent four decades read more

    An artist’s grand plans for Hudson