North Country

Lynne Placey, a North Country woman who’s struggling to make ends meet but has refused to take money from Northern Pass, has been given $2,650 by a group that admires her gumption.

Placey, of Stewartstown, says she turned down an offer of around $500,000 from Northern Pass for a right-of-way on her land although her only income is Social-Security and giving piano lessons.

“She’s a modern-day hero,” said Rikki Ramsden, one of the owners of Atta Girl Records of Thornton, which was behind the fund-raising effort.

The federal government has provided $5 million to help protect some of the most beautiful land in the North Country. NHPR’s Chris Jensen reports.

The U.S. Forest Service is providing $5 million to purchase a conservation easement near Errol.

The money will prevent development but still allow sustainable logging and recreation.

J.T. Horn is an official with the Trust for Public Land. It has been working on the huge, conservation project.

Half of the North Country’s sixteen representatives voted in favor of House Bill 228  which bars any organization that performs elective abortions from receiving any state or federal funds.

Wisconsin lured Kestrel Aircraft away from Maine – and consequently Berlin – with a far stronger, multi-million dollar package, the Portland Press Herald is reporting.

Here’s what the newspaper says each state offered Kestrel.

WISCONSIN:

• $30 million in tax credit allocations immediately through the Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority

• $30 million in tax credit allocations by the end of 2012 through the Wisconsin development authority

The Concord Monitor is reporting that a statewide poll shows almost 70 percent of those responding are against the Northern Pass hydro-electric project being able to use eminent domain to get land they need.

The hope for hundreds of new jobs in Berlin making aircraft parts has apparently evaporated. NHPR’s Chris Jensen reports.

Last year a new start-up company called Kestrel Aircraft said it was considering building parts in Berlin.

CEO Alan Klapmeier said the plant might be located next to the new biomass plant.

It would use heat from that facility to produce high-tech, composite bodies for the new plane.

That would mean at least 150 to 200 jobs, Klapmeier said.

The six-to-eight passenger plane would be assembled nearby in Maine.

The Forest Society says it has raised the $850,000 needed for a conservation easement at the Balsams Grand Resort Hotel in Dixville Notch. It blocks a right-of-way for the proposed Northern Pass hydro-electric project. NHPR’s Chris Jensen reports.

The Forest Society’s deadline for raising $850,000 for a 5,800-acre conservation easement at the Balsams resort was January 15th.

It raised the money with a record 1,500 contributions.

And, The Forest Society says Northern Pass’ hope to use the land for its electric towers deserves some of the credit.

John D. Judge, who will take over as head of the Appalachian Mountain Club next month, says its priorities will include continued opposition to the Northern Pass project and trying to get more children away from computer games and into the outdoors.

The proposed hydro-electric project would clearly have a detrimental impact on recreation and conservation, said Judge.

A newspaper in Duluth, Minn. is reporting that Wisconsin officials have offered Kestrel Aircraft land for an assembly plant, a move that could greatly reduce the chances Kestrel would make parts in Berlin.

But in a telephone interview Thursday afternoon Kate Doughtery, a spokeswoman for Kestrel, told NHPR that no decision has been made on the plant's location.

Last year it looked like Kestrel, a new start-up company, would build the aircraft in Maine.

The Center for Public Integrity has a new report on pollution problems in New England including the Old Town Fuel & Fiber, which is owned by the same company as Gorham Paper and Tissue.

State officials say they are ending an investigation into a piece of a human skull found in the Eli Wallace Horse Cemetery in Littleton last summer because it doesn’t appear there has been any crime.

In a news release today state officials said Bonnie Stinchfield of Littleton admitted she buried the bone last summer.

“She said that her husband had been in possession of the piece of bone since at least 1988.  He had received the bone from another man who was moving and didn’t want it anymore,” the release said.