Williston Observer

Simon’s will be town’s first convenience store

By Greg Elias
Observer staff

Workers spread asphalt and stocked shelves last week, preparing to open St. George’s first convenience store.

Simon’s will give residents of the tiny town, population about 800, a place to shop without driving miles to Williston or Hinesburg. It will be the newest outlet in a regional chain of about a dozen stores owned by the Handy family doing business as Sisters and Brothers Investment Group LLP.

The 4,500-square-foot store on Vermont 2A will include four gas pumps and a Dunkin’ Donuts outlet, standard fare for other area convenience stores. But with a relatively generous amount of space, the store will cater to a town without a grocery store by also carrying some meat and produce.

“We’re not going to be a Hannaford or anything like that,” said Joe Handy, who likened the outlet to a country store. “But if there are (basic) items you need, we’ll have them.”

He expects the store to open within the next two weeks. The project has received most of its local and state permits. All that remains is final inspections and paving, landscaping and stocking the store.

The store generated controversy after it was proposed more than two years ago. The St. George Development Review Board approved the store but rejected a request to install a drive-up window for Dunkin’ Donuts.

The board was concerned about safety. St. George Villa, a mobile home park, is located across from the store, and the board was worried that a drive-up window would create more hazards for the many youths that will likely cross the thoroughfare to reach the store.

The Handy family appealed the decision, but later dropped the legal action amid concerns that it would create bad feelings among future customers and the town has a whole.

Dunkin’ Donuts “would like to have a drive-through in all their locations,” Handy said. “But at the end we had a contract with them.”

Jose Couto, who along with his partners owns the Dunkin’ Donuts franchise that will operate the outlet, was unpacking boxes on Friday at the store. He said the franchise still hopes to eventually convince the town to permit a drive-through window. But for the time being, he said the St. George location would do OK without it.

Though the formal review process started in March 2005, the store was originally contemplated years earlier. The late Salamin Handy bought land from the town for the store in the mid-1990s. The purchase agreement stated that the land could be used for a store or restaurant, according to former St. George zoning administrator Richard Ward.

Including Dunkin’ Donuts, the store will employ about 15 people, said Charles Handy, another one of the family members who are partners in Simon’s chain.

The St. George store was originally scheduled to open by Aug. 1. But frequent rain in recent weeks delayed paving, which in turn held up landscaping work, Joe Handy said. He now thinks the store will open between Aug. 7 and Aug. 10.

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By Ben Moger-Williams
Observer staff

Despite town and private efforts to keep it in Williston, the technology company Qimonda is moving its offices to South Burlington at the end of this year, according to a company spokesperson.

Qimonda will begin relocating to a newly constructed 70,000-square-foot office building in Technology Park – about three miles from its current location – at the end of 2007 and into early 2008, confirmed Tim McKenzie, Technology Park’s business development director.

Qimonda operates a research and development facility in Hillside East, a business park on Hurricane Lane. The company recently decided to grow and hire about 30 engineers this year – and possibly more next year – but there was no more room in the Williston location, the company said.

“We have an open requisition for 30 new employees at that site, and the current facility is just not going to hold them,” said Donna Wilson, director of communication for Qimonda North America.

Wilson said depending how the market goes, the company will likely hire about 30 more engineers next year after the move. Qimonda’s “ Burlington Design Center,” as it is known, designs Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM) modules that are used in cell phones, mp3 players and GPS devices. Wilson said the market is hot and getting hotter.

“Given our business ramp we need to bring those people on board now,” she said.

PLANS CHANGE

Over the past year, Bill Dunn, owner of Hillside East, has worked with the town to try and expand the business park to keep Qimonda in Williston. Last year Dunn asked the town to rezone 55 acres of land that he owns just north of the park to accommodate a new facility for the company. The area was originally zoned as agricultural/rural, and could not be used for a commercial site. After a series of hearings, the town approved changes to the Comprehensive Plan that nudge the commercial zoning district northward to include a revised area of 12 acres, while requiring Dunn to permanently conserve the remaining 43 acres. But Dunn still had to draw up detailed site plans to present to the Development Review Board, and faced the daunting Act 250 permit process. Dunn said Qimonda simply could not hold out any longer.

“That’s a long, drawn-out process,” Dunn said in a telephone interview. “And Qimonda unfortunately just couldn’t wait.”

Dunn said the recent discovery of wetlands on his property is holding up the process further. But, he said he will continue with the permitting process, and hopes to construct a building on the new site in the near future – for a new client. Dunn said he is “talking to a couple of people” about moving into Qimonda’s space, but did not elaborate.

“I’m going to go ahead with the permitting of the site until I hit an obstacle I cannot overcome,” Dunn said. “I think it’s a terrific location.”

Qimonda, an offshoot of Infineon, has been in the Williston location for about seven years.

“I’ll be sorry to see them go,” Dunn said. “We did our best to keep them.”

Qimonda currently employs about 120 people. The company will occupy most of the new building in Technology Park, McKenzie said, but the park is still looking for another tenant to fill the remaining 8,000 square feet or so.

Qimonda is headquartered in Munich, Germany, and employs about 12,500 people worldwide, according to the company Web site. They specialize in DRAM computer memory chips, and had net sales of $5.2 billion in fiscal year 2006.

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By Kim Howard
Observer staff

Loran Stearns, 9, carefully traced a dress pattern on white fabric before her.

The fabric was to serve as the outfit for her puppet chef, which at this point Tuesday morning consisted of a head made of a Styrofoam ball and paper mache, painted, at the end of an 18-inch stick.

“It’s really fun,” Loran said of the puppet-making camp she’s attending through the Williston Recreation Department this week. “If we’re lucky, we get to do a puppet show at the end.”

Loran is one of 14 campers attending this week’s puppet-making session of Williston’s Summer Art Camp. Hairdryers buzzed Tuesday morning to dry just-painted puppet heads. Students traced and cut felt, silk and other material for puppet clothing or decoration. They tested fleece colors for hair. Puppets in progress included a tree, a leaf, a hatching chick, a rock climber, family dog and chocolate monster.

“Would anyone else like their head glued on before I unplug?” camp assistant Allison Demas, 22, called out, with glue gun in hand.

Summer Art Camp in Williston is in its fourth year, according to instructor Liz Demas. Demas, a teacher at Williston Central School for 18 years, created the Williston camp after directing and teaching the Shelburne Summer School Art Camp. The Williston version, coordinated through the Williston Recreation Department, serves students ages seven to 13. Each weeklong session runs three hours a day. Each session costs $120, though discounts for multiple sessions or multiple children from one family are granted.

Topics include jewelry making, clay whistles and tiles, mirror mosaics and paper making. A new session this year, multicultural arts celebration, drew four participants, including second-time arts camper Elizabeth Waller, 11.

As she worked on creating her puppet Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, Elizabeth explained that in the multicultural arts session campers “visit” a different country each day. On Monday, she said, they’d visited Mexico and learned how bark paper is made from fig trees. Tuesday afternoon, China was on the schedule.

Demas said art camp is appealing for students because of the “luxury of time and materials.” Instead of a 40-minute art class typical for school, camp sessions are three hours each. Puppet-making in particular is appealing to campers, she said, which may explain why roughly half the group are second-time participants.

“There’s a lot of problem solving in this particular camp,” Demas said. If a camper wants their puppet’s arms to move, for example, campers and Demas must brainstorm how to get a wire into the right places to make that happen.

Also appealing is the fact that “there’s no right puppet,” Demas said. Though there is a basic puppet structure – beneath the head is a horizontal toilet paper cardboard roll to serve as shoulders – campers can be as creative or inventive as they want to be, Demas said.

Thomas Lang, 10, was one such inventor. Where many other campers had created a small head for their puppet, Thomas had selected a large cardboard mask to duct tape, paper mache and paint silver. He was in the process of selecting silver and gray felt as the “outfit” that would hide his hand during a puppet show. He sought out gray fleece for hair. He hoped his puppet might get to be a narrator in the puppet show campers would get to perform on Friday.

What was his puppet? A dustball.

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By Kim Howard
Observer staff

Stephen Perkins could have become a school administrator nearly 15 years ago, after he finished his master’s degree in education.

“After I finished that degree, I said ‘who really needs that kind of aggravation?’” Perkins, 56, said this week. “Life was good, the ( Winooski School District) music program was going well. I had no great desire.”

And yet this year Perkins was named the 2007 Robert F. Pierce Vermont Secondary School Principal of the Year. The Vermont Principals’ Association administers the award.

Perkins, who has lived in Williston since 1977, was approached in 2003 to consider filling the principal’s vacancy at Winooski High School after successive turnover in the position led to mounting instability.

“The average life expectancy (of a Winooski High School principal) was 18 months,” Perkins said. “All of the research out says (that) to have any kind of effective change, you need to be in a place for four years.”

For 19 years, Perkins had taught instrumental music in Winooski, beginning a string program, piano lab and guitar class with grant funding. He’d been president of the teachers’ association. He had strong relationships both with staff and the community, he said; when he asked teachers to vote on whether he should become principal, the vote was a unanimous “yes.”

He told the School Board he’d try the position for two years, provided he could return to his teaching position if either he or the board were dissatisfied. Neither party was.

“Rumor has it I lived here the first year,” Perkins said. He organized staff potluck dinners and attended all student concerts, athletic games and other events. He made sure parents knew his door was open. He promised teachers they would set a small number of achievable goals, and would not move on to new ones until those goals were met.

Entering his fifth year as principal, the Winooski High School team has made notable progress. Disciplinary referrals decreased 60 percent his first year as principal, something Perkins attributes largely to his consistent responses to students with similar behavioral issues. The teaching staff re-wrote and made uniform the high school curriculum.

The school also needed to do a lot of work on issues of diversity and acceptance, Perkins said. About 18 percent of the high school’s students are learning English as a second language; 22 languages are spoken among the school’s 240 students. As a refugee resettlement area, Winooski schools have a significant influx of newcomers each year.

Perkins’ colleagues express a high regard for their leader.

“The staff as a whole was just thrilled to death for Steve when we heard he’d been given this award,” said Maida Townsend, who’s taught French at the school since 1989. “We really believe in him and were tickled to death that others recognized, him.”

Three teachers interviews used words like “respect,” “listens,” “collaborative,” “open door,” and “innovative” to describe Perkins’ approach to leadership.

“He’s been really good about classroom observations,” Townsend said, noting many principals don’t visit classrooms as often as they should. “He gives feedback to us and that’s really important to us.”

Business teacher Courtney Poquette, who just finished her first year as a teacher, not only cites Perkins “welcoming and warm” attitude, but his innovative approach for giving students more opportunities. Students this coming year are being offered dual enrollment in information processing, allowing them to get college credit while they earn high school credit. Perkins also initiated summer school on-line classes, partnering with a college, Poquette said, so that more subjects could be offered with fewer human resources.

Winooski had a bad rap for a long time, math teacher Sharon James said, but that is starting to change.

“It was his coinage of ‘best small school in the state,’” said James, who retired this year after 23 years at the school. “He’s really worked to put that (message) out.”

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Williston restaurant decides to change name

By Greg Elias
Observer staff

A Williston pizzeria recently changed its name after a restaurant with a similar moniker threatened legal action.

Picasso’s is now called Today’s Gourmet. Brian Jordan, co-owner of the restaurant in Taft Corners Shopping Center, said the change was made about a month ago to avoid a courtroom showdown with Piecasso Pizzeria & Lounge in Stowe.

“Instead of wasting money on a lawyer, we said ‘let’s change our name,’” Jordan said. “It was just a case of trying to pick your battles. We’d rather use the money to pay our employees right and for advertising.”

Piecasso owner Eduardo Rovetto said he learned of the sound-alike counterpart before it even opened last fall. His son noticed a sign for the new business while shopping in Williston.

“I said, that can’t be, the Secretary of State wouldn’t allow that,” Rovetto said. New businesses are required to register their trade names with the state, and statute forbids names that are “deceptively similar.”

Soon after Picasso’s opened, Rovetto said, customers were congratulating him on the new outlet and vendors were confusing his long-established restaurant with the one in Williston.

Rovetto said he contacted Picasso’s owners and asked them to reconsider the name. They refused.

“They knew I was there, but they still went ahead with it,” he said.

Jordan said he did not learn that there was a similar business name until just two days before Picasso’s opened. He said the business then consulted with both a lawyer and the Secretary of State’s office and were told the name would pass legal muster, so he and his partners decided to stick with Picasso’s.

So began a months-long dispute between the businesses. Rovetto eventually had a lawyer draw up a cease-and-desist order. Even after Picasso’s agreed to change its name, the businesses argued over how soon that would occur, finally settling on June.

“He just wanted us to do it overnight, and it was not possible, nor were we willing,” Jordan said. He noted that the business needed considerable time to alter signs, print new menus and notify vendors.

The businesses do agree that stricter scrutiny of business names by the Secretary of State’s office could have helped them avoid the dispute in the first place.

When he complained to the agency, Rovetto said he was told that his pizzeria’s “cutesy” name was the problem, making it possible for a new business to register a similar name with a more conventional spelling. Rovetto said he spent thousands on legal help to convince Picasso’s to change its name.

“It was unjustified that I had to pay for their mistake,” he said. “In this day and age, the Secretary of State should have a system like Google” that can turn up similar business names with a simple computer search.

Jordan thought registering the name with the state meant he was free to use it without repercussions. He said the dispute also cost him thousands to change names on his signs, menus and delivery vehicles.

“It’s a lesson learned,” he said. “Even if the state says it’s OK, do your own research.”

With 4,317 new “doing business as” names registered in 2006 and a small staff to record them, mistakes can happen, said Deputy Secretary of State Bill Dalton. But after reviewing the pizzeria dispute, Dalton said he thinks the agency made the right decision in permitting the Picasso name.

The agency primarily serves a “filing cabinet function” when registering trade names, Dalton said. When a new business is registered, the agency does check to make sure it does not violate a state law that forbids deceptively similar names. But he said the agency does not have the legal authority to reject a new business name simply because it is like an existing one.

Dalton acknowledged that deciding when the deceptively similar threshold is crossed is often a tough call. But he noted that businesses that are unhappy with a new business name always have recourse in court.

“I’m very comfortable with the decisions the office makes on these issues,” Dalton said. “But I’m also empathetic” with the legal expenses businesses sometimes bear when there is a disagreement.

Picasso’s opened last August, and its menu includes pizzas, sandwiches, salads and chicken wings. The small restaurant includes a handful of tables and features Picasso reproductions on its walls.

Piecasso has been in business for about seven years, first leasing a small space in a shopping center on Mountain Road in Stowe before moving to its own building across the road about two years ago. It offers a wide-ranging menu, which in addition to pizza includes more than a dozen entrees.

There is a lounge with disc jockeys spinning records a couple of times a week. The restaurant is decorated with Picasso reproductions – and a few prints by the master painter himself.

Though he owns by far the larger business, Rovetto said Piecasso was hardly a corporate behemoth throwing its weight around in a name dispute. Nor was he worried about competition from a Williston pizzeria located many miles away.

Instead, Rovetto said, he takes pride in his pizza – he learned how to make it from his parents, who were from Sicily – and wants to protect his brand name.

The pizza made by the Williston restaurant “wasn’t my product,” he said. “And the product is my claim to fame. Without that, we’d be Papa John’s.”

Jordan said he holds no grudge against Rovetto. He hopes publicity about the name change will inform his customers that Today’s Gourmet is still the same business, just with a different name. He also wants to get word out about an expanded menu that will now include pasta.

“We didn’t try to steal anything from anybody,” he said. “Our dough and sauce are different. It was just the name that was similar.”

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