LYNDONVILLE, Vt. (WCAX) – Lyndonville Police say just before 10:00 a.m., they received a report from Creative Counters LLC that a woman had taken a dump truck and other company property from their site overnight.

Lyndonville Police searched the surrounding area for the truck but couldn’t find it. They entered the vehicle info into the National Crime Information Center, and at around 5:15 p.m., police in Bangor, Maine spotted and intercepted the dump truck and arrested the driver, 40-year-old Alicia Alling.

Alling is set to appear in Caledonia County Court answering to multiple charges including grand larceny.

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Maine Tasting Center, at 506 Old Bath Road in Wiscasset, will host the second annual Maine Needham Festival on Saturday, Sept. 28.

This family-friendly event celebrates the cultural and culinary tradition of Maine needhams with food, games, vendors, themed drink specials, needham-making demonstrations and classes, and even a homemade needham contest.

Needhams, also known as “potato candy,” are a traditional Maine candy consisting of a coconut and potato filling covered in chocolate. With a history dating back over 150 years, needhams have long been one of Maine’s favorite sweet treats.

Last year Gov. Janet Mills signed a bill that designated the last Saturday of September as Maine Needham Day, thereby creating an annual day of commemoration for this historic treat and the small businesses that have kept it going for well over a century.

Motivated by this official recognition, Malaika and Gerard Picard, owners of Maine Needham Co. in Saco, partnered with Sara Gross, of Wiscasset’s Maine Tasting Center, to plan the first festival to celebrate Maine Needham Day.

This year, the planning committee has grown to include Kristen Fraizer, of Wilbur’s of Maine in Freeport, and Bob and Kate Gartland, of Robin’s Confections in Biddeford.

A display about the first Maine Needham Festival. (Courtesy photo)

The festival is intended to be a day of celebration centered around the culinary tradition of the Maine needham, Maine potatoes, and, of course, Maine itself.

“There are many candymakers here in Maine that carry on the needham tradition and we’re thrilled to have so many of them participating in the festival – as vendors, sponsors, and even as judges for our homemade needham contest!” said festival coordinator and Maine Needham Co. owner, Malaika Picard.

Wilbur’s of Maine and Robin’s Confections are two such candymakers, who will both be participating as vendors, judges, and sponsors of the event.

Maine Tasting Center is proud to, once again, host the festival on its newly renovated campus.

“Our entire purpose is to educate about and promote Maine’s food industries and producers, so participating in this event was an easy decision for us!” said Maine Tasting Center General Manager Sara Gross. “We’re really excited to help bring this community celebration to life.”

Amongst the festival’s many attractions will be needham-making demonstrations led by Maine Tasting Center Culinary Director Liz Gross, and the debut of a specialty needham-inspired brew by Blaze Brewing Co., of Biddeford, in the campus tasting room.

Other attractions include local artisans and vendors, live music by Isaac Boll and Jud Caswell, food trucks, and much more. Thanks to its generous sponsors, the Maine Needham Festival is free to attend.

Planning for the festival is well underway but additional support is needed to make it the best it can be. The committee continues to seek sponsors, vendors, volunteers, and homemade needham contest competitors.

For more information or to sign up, go to meneedhamfest.com.

SEARSMONT, Maine (WABI) – The New England Forest Foundation is building a stronger community. They recently gifted six companies across the state grants with the goal of more climate-friendly forestry work. Maine’s Robbins Lumber Company was one of the businesses granted this money.

”We’re just trying to accomplish good forestry, that’s all we’re doing,” said Robbins Lumber forester Ethan Jacobs

The United States Department of Agriculture is partnering with the New England Forest Foundation to start a Climate-Smart Commodities Partnership Project. The $30 million project gives an opportunity for companies like Robbins Lumber not only to increase carbon in the forests in their area but across the state.

“It benefits the landowners, it benefits the general public, because all of these thinnings are going to be using, to make electricity,” answered Jim Robbins. Robbins now works as a consultant for the company but was an owner for many years before retiring.

Dense forests, despite having a lot of trees, supplies wood that isn’t necessarily useful. By thinning large sections of woods, this creates bigger and stronger trees resulting in more climate-friendly use out of the forests.

The climate isn’t the only thing benefiting from this project.

“Plus, it provides a lot of jobs. In rural Maine, where we need jobs, the forest industry is one of the biggest employers for the people in the state of Maine. So it really helps the rural areas,” added Robbins.

For Robbins Lumber, the hearing of the news was a mix of reactions. The money leads to more work asked of the company that deals with contractors that have to perform the labor.

“It was some mixed feelings,” said Jacobs. “At first, it’s exciting and then the other half of it is, ‘well, how are we going to pull it off?’ The biggest issue, in my opinion, is actually getting the contractor actually interested in being able to do this work.”

Despite new building technologies, Robbins Lumber claims that wood is just as important as it has ever been.

“Wood is the best product you can build anything with. We’re encouraging people to build more stuff out of wood and replacing concrete and steel which produces a tremendous amount of carbon because they have to use so much fuel to produce it. Wood uses hardly any energy at all to produce, so it helps the climate by getting the trees to grow fast, storing carbon, and providing wood for the mills so people can do more building with wood,” concluded Robbins.

At this point, the program is just entering phase one in an effort to learn more about the effectiveness of the project itself.

To learn more information about the program and the efforts of the New England Forestry Foundation, click here.

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