Pat Bradley

A Minnesota renewable energy company is looking to help set up a solar-powered furnace business in Vermont.

The furnaces would be made in a 6,000 square-foot former mill building in Bellows Falls. The Eagle-Times reports the company, Rural Renewable Energy Alliance, has agreed to provide its patented design of solar panels that create heat through a furnace through a Vermont company. The local company would be called RREAL Warm.

Copyright 2012 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

Two New York women and a Vermont country inn have settled a lawsuit that accused the business of refusing to host the couple's wedding reception.

The American Civil Liberties Union says The Wildflower Inn in Lyndonville agreed to pay a $10,000 civil penalty to the Vermont Human Rights Commission and place $20,000 in a charitable trust.

Kate and Ming Linsley contacted the ACLU after Ming's mother was told last year by the Wildflower Inn's events manager that the inn didn't host "gay receptions" due to the innkeepers' "personal feelings."

The state of Vermont is getting a $104.4 million federal grant to continue the process of setting up a health benefits exchange, a key part of state and federal health care reform efforts.

The money will be used to develop information technology, business and outreach operations that will be part of the state's exchange.

Vermont is on target to meet the federal schedule and begin enrolling people in the exchange in October 2013.

Environmental, conservation and health groups in the region are calling for an appeal of a court decision this week that overturned the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule.

Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin and state officials were at a farm in Middlesex Wednesday morning to highlight agricultural and farm recovery, and continuing relief efforts, since Tropical Storm Irene hit the state nearly a year ago.

Vermont authorities say they would try to collect any over-payments that may have been made to a former state trooper charged with falsifying his time sheets.

County Attorney T.J. Donovan has filed a lien on former Sgt. Jim Deeghan's home, which was put up for sale.

The Burlington Free Press reports Donovan wrote to Colchester Town Clerk Karen Richard that the state is trying to protect its interests by filing the lien. He wrote if convicted, Deeghan could face a possible restitution order.

A Vermont judge has ordered a new trial for a man convicted of murdering his wife in 1994, after newly analyzed DNA evidence raised questions about the case.

Fifty-year-old John Grega, formerly of Lake Grove, N.Y., on Long Island, was serving life without parole in the rape and murder of his then-31-year-old wife Christine while they were vacationing at a West Dover condominium.

Last month, his lawyers filed a motion to have his conviction thrown out, which potentially could have set him free. A hearing had been set for Friday.

A Vermont state representative is apologizing for comments about a development project planned for land next to Interstate 89 in Randolph.

Randolph Democrat Patsy French says she had it wrong when she told a legislative committee on Tuesday that town zoning regulations would severely restrict what types of retail establishments could be placed around a proposed Vermont visitors' center and products showcase off of Exit 4.

A year after Tropical Storm Irene inundated Vermont, all the 476 farms that reported damage from the storm are still operating.

But Governor Peter Shumlin and agriculture officials said Wednesday farmers are still struggling with the losses caused by the flooding.

Shumlin and the others held a news conference Wednesday at the 1782 Settlement Farm in Middlesex, a vegetable farm that lost crops during the flooding that began Aug. 28.

Officials estimate that 26,000 acres of farmland was damaged, accounting for $20 million in losses.

A major retailer and state and local officials are weighing proposals to fix a traffic-clogged interchange in Colchester, Vermont.

Costco, which has a store at the U.S. 7-Interstate 89 interchange, has offered to add a turning lane, rearrange pavement striping and create other improvements as it seeks approval for gas pumps.

The company said its proposal would serve as a stopgap solution until the state Agency of Transportation comes in with its proposed "double crossover diamond," a complicated highway exchange to lessen traffic.