A Keene election night episode back in November has died quietly with City Council. A motion to accept an outside investigator's report on the dustup between Council Ruth Venezia and council candidate Dorrie O'Meara 
as informational -- and take no further action -- was approved unanimously by Council as an early order of business Thursday night. O'Meara had called for Venezia's removal from council, after Venezia confronted her about yard sign placement with a profanity-laced verbal tirade outside the Ward 2 polls last November. Neither Keene police nor the attorney general's office had found Venezia suspect of any actionable wrongdoing.
SLIM BOOK
Taxpayers regularly concerned about city spending will perhaps take heart in a handout to councilors last night. What is described as a seriously slimmed-down Capital Improvement Project book, covering the next five years, was distributed to councilors last night. Work on its content will be a prominent order of business for Council's Finance Organization & Personnel Committee for the next couple of cycles. So prominent, in fact, that FOP's next two meetings will start an hour early, at 5:30, next Thursday night and again on February 9th.
BOARD ELECTIONS
The school warrant won't be all that Keene voters deal with in March. The filing period for three school board seats and the office of district clerk begins this coming Wednesday. The seats currently are held by Board chair Kathleen O'Donnell, Kristen Blais and Carl Panza ... it's uncertain how many of the three, if any, plan to seek re-election. Meanwhile, unregistered voters are running out of time to sign up to participate in the so-called first, or deliberative, meeting session on February 12th. The deadline is a week from tomorrow, on which occasion the city clerk will hold special evening hours ... 7 to 7:30 ... to accommodate people who can't get there to sign up during the day. Unlike the actual warrant and board voting in March, there is no on-site registration for the first-session.
CRAIGSHOME
A homeowner in Jaffrey hopes she’s seen the end of people coming to her door, thinking the house is up for rent. It’s not, and Kari Lindstrom-Quiter actually had to put up signs saying it wasn’t, after pictures went up on Craigslist, advertising its availability. This is the second time her home went up on the Internet in a fake ad, with people wiring money to Europe or Nigeria, receiving keys and thinking they had a new home. Lindstrom-Quiter says one family even showed up with a moving truck.
CASS MATE
A young man who used to live in the home of an eleven-year-old girl killed last year is in jail. The Union Leader is reporting Kevin Mullaney, who now lives in Vermont, used to live in the home of Celina Cass, the child from West Stewartstown whose body was pulled from the Connecticut River. Mullaney is being held on several charges, including forgery of the name of the girl's mother. The Union Leader reports a grand jury is being convened in Coos County today, and the homicide prosecutor is refusing to confirm or deny if the grand jury is focusing on the death of Celina Cass.
SWIFT RESCUE
The driver of a minivan which plunged into the Souhegan River is alive and recovering, thanks to quick work by her rescuers. Police say the Dodge Caravan went off of Route 31 in Wilton Thursday night during a snowstorm and into the water. The Swift Water Rescue team managed to cut the woman out of the van, and using ladders and a rope pulled her out. She was taken to a hospital in the area, and although her name and condition are not being released officers say she appeared to be doing fine.
UNION FUSS
Several bills not at all popular with union members are moving through the New Hampshire Legislature. That's the reason hundreds of teachers, firefighters and other members of unions formed a noisy crowd during a hearing Thursday at the Statehouse. One would eliminate automatic deductions from paychecks for union dues while another would eliminate collective bargaining rights for public employees. Thursday's hearing was for public comment, and there was plenty of it. Lawmakers acknowledge some of the bills will be re-worked before coming up for a full legislative vote.
PROTECTED LAND
It's point, set, and maybe match for those battling the Northern Pass Project, with thousands of acres of forest land passing Thursday into the care of the Forest Society. Conservation restrictions for 58-hundred acres of land surrounding the Balsams Grand Resort Hotel in Dixville Notch passed from the hotel's former owners to the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests. It not only protects the working forest and miles of trails, it also now prevents the Northern Pass Project from crossing the conservation land without eminent domain.
NUKE NEWS
So much for the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant shutting down sometime in March. That was the state's plan until a federal judge yesterday sided with the owners of Vermont Yankee who are trying to keep it open. Plant owners Entergy Nuclear went to court after the state refused to extend its license, even though the Nuclear Regulatory Commission granted Vermont Yankee permission to operate for another 20 years. Federal Judge J. Garvan Murtha issued a 102-page ruling on the matter. Vermont is the only state where lawmakers have a say in the re-licensing of nuclear power plants.
