As a cold-snap envelopes our little corner of Vermont, and the New Year looms around the corner, we are pleased to report that no decision has yet been released by Judge Durkin concerning our appeals with regard to the Act 250 permit of the JLD Properties Walmart project in St. Albans.   We appreciate the time Judge Durkin is taking to consider all of the evidence in this in this landmark case. Developer Jeff Davis, who reportedly lives on vast and untroubled  acreage in Underhill, submitted his annual letter of complaint to the St. Albans Messenger; but we have grown weary of responding with the obvious suggestion that Mr. Davis and Walmart could easily have ended the stand-off many years ago by simply proposing to locate the store on a previously developed urban lot and reducing the size to something that would not threaten our local economy.

On a different front, the St. Albans Town Development Review Board hearing with regard to an application to build a 140,000-sq. ft. Lowe’s store near the proposed Walmart, has once again been postponed  at the request of the developers.   Apart from the petition by the NWCRG for interested party status that was rejected by the DRB , we are told that there is a second and successful petition for status by a different group that is now on file with the DRB.  This is heartening news to us, although we still maintain that the NWCRG’s petition for status was improperly denied.  We are told that the next hearing will now take place only after January.