Lake Champlain
President Bush has signed legislation that allocates $55 million to protect the environment of Lake Champlain. (VPR)
State’s new web site
Vermont has quietly launched a new state web site that will soon allow the public to register cars or buy a hunting license online. The web site was developed by a Maine company and cost the state about $230,000. (VPR)
House recount
John Rodgers, a Democrat who won a Northeast Kingdom House seat from an incumbent Republican, has retained his seat in a recount. Rodgers beat Kevin Goodridge of Albany by 19 votes out of about 27-hundred votes cast. Rodgers’s House seat was among six seats held by conservative Republican state representatives from the Northeast Kingdom. (AP)
Government corruption
A Chicago-based watchdog group places Vermont 49th out of 50 in a study that ranks states on their laws against government waste, inefficiency and corruption. The BGA report gives Vermont a low overall rating because of its lack of a whistleblower protection law and its weak limits on conflicts of interest and on gifts to lawmakers. William Russell, the chief of the Vermont Legislative Council, says the report doesn’t take into account Vermont’s culture, which so far hasn’t needed those laws. (AP)