The Burlington Free Press from Burlington, Vermont • Page 21

Sljr ghtrluigfan Tf ps Deaths 2 Your View 4B Chittenden Roundup Sunday, December 7, 1 986 Legislators Pick Leaders For Session I I 1 1 a 4 By DAVID GRAM The Associated Press MONTPELIER Legislative party caucuses on Saturday set up the expected showdown between incumbent Speaker Ralph Wright, D-Bennington, and Republican Rep. Edward Zuccaro of St. Johnsbury. Wright is favored to win re-election to the powerful speaker's post Jan. 7, when the Legislature begins its new two-year term.

The job is an important one because the speaker controls committee assignments and the flow of legislation. Meeting in a morning session, Republicans nominated Zuccaro for speaker, and elected Rep. Michael Bernhardt of Londonderry as party leader and Rep. Sara Gear of Burlington as assistant leader. Bernhardt, assistant Republican leader in the last session, moved up in Saturday's voting to replace Rep.

Susan Auld of Middlesex, who retired from the House to run for lieutenant governor. Auld lost that race to Howard Dean, D-Burlington. Gear was elected assistant leader after three ballots in a race that initially included Reps. Gwendolyn Bron-son of Shelburne, Robert Walsh of South Burlington and Thomas Spater of Chester. Bronson and Walsh dropped out after the second ballot and Gear defeated Spater in a secret ballot on the third.

Caucusing in the afternoon, the Democrats nominated Wright, re-elected Rep. Paul Poirier of Barre as majority leader, and elected Rep. Francis Brooks of Montpelier assistant leader. Brooks replaces Dean, who ran for lieutenant governor and won. Both parties used the occasion of the caucuses for pep talks as they geared up for the first legislative session in which the Democrats will hold a clear House majority.

Poirier told his fellow Democrats that if they maintain a unified front in legislative debates, the party's agenda, including strong educational funding and environmental protection, can be met. How large a majority the Democrats have is unclear. A Dec. 19 runoff election between Republican Paul Hannon and Democrat Roger Fletcher in the third Orleans district will settle what a recount last week showed to be a tie vote. If Hannon wins, the Democrats would hold a razor-thin 76-74 majority in the 150-member House; if Fletcher is victorious, the Democrats would hold a 77-73 margin.

A Democratic majority is expected to help Wright, who won his first term as speaker two years ago with the Republicans still holding a numerical majority. Poirier told his fellow Democrats he "cannot emphasize enough the importance that we be 76 and Turn to LEGISLATORS, 1 2B Associated Press Photo by TOBY TALBOT Douglas Kitchel Jr. stands in a field at his 1 farm in Ryegate, site of a proposed wood-chip energy plant. Ryegate Welcomes Energy Plant The paper company over there (CPM Inc.) is the No. 1 taxpayer in town, I'm No.

2, and I'd just as soon be No. Douglas Kitchel Jr. Ryegate Farmer in Ryegate than they did in Randolph. In a private meeting this summer, Kunin told John Weesner, Decker's project manager for the Vermont proposals, that the company should get out of Randolph and look at the Northeast Kingdom for a possible site. "I suggested they go where jobs are needed, where they would be close to the natural resource," she said in an interview last week.

"I'm very happy that this came about. What is considered controversial in one area, is considered a boon to the other." Randolph, a town of 4,400 residents, has cultural and business ties to the booming Upper Valley. More than 2,200 residents there signed a petition against the plant. The biggest concern was the truck traffic, which would have gone through the center of the community and over a structurally weak bridge, but the opponents also charged it would harm Randolph's quality of life. "These plants abuse the life of a town," said Bobby Gosh, a Randolph restaurateur.

Those charges are not heard in Ryegate, population 1,040. The way of life here is dominated by the area's Turn to RYEGATE, 6B By JOHN DONNELLY The Associated Press RYEGATE When Decker Energy International proposed a wood-chip energy plant in Randolph this year, residents fiercely fought it, citing environmental and health concerns. Decker dropped its Randolph project, and observers predicted the Florida company would leave Vermont for good. They were wrong. Decker officials, acting partly on the advice of Gov.

Madeleine Kunin, simply brought the Randolph plan 50 miles northeast, to this picturesque farming community on the banks of the Connecticut River. Ryegate, on the southern fringe of the industry-poor Northeast Kingdom, has since welcomed Decker as much as Randolph battled it. Decker recently won town approval for a $25 million plant on a 40-acre parcel of farmland next to the Connecticut River. The plant would burn chips of low-grade wood to produce electricity. Every day, 40 tractor-trailer trucks would haul wood chips to the site, a half-mile from the tiny village of East Ryegate.

The company still faces several obstacles before it can build the 20-megawatt plant, including a full-scale review from the Public Service Board and two separate challenges over a guarantee of relatively high prices for its electricity. But for the first time it has a town on its side. This dramatic turn in Decker's fortunes has come about partly because the residents of Randolph and Ryegate have very different attitudes about what kind of industry is acceptable in their community, and partly because the logistics in the plan have worked out better Slain Golf Pro Remembered As 'One Wonderful Woman' McCarren's Future On PSB Uncertain I 1 i child, turned her auto into a second home as an adult. "Her trunk was the garage, the back seat was the laundry and library filled with clothes and books, while the front seat was the music room. Sarah loved her music," Silverman recalled.

Hunter made the most of life. She was active, pragmatic and energetic, and not philosophical or bookish, Robbins remembered. But it was Hunter's smile that infected everyone with good humor and made her legions of friends in her short life. "Her smile was the best. It was so brilliant and so expressive," Silverman said.

"In the photos, it looks like she had been caught by the camera at the height of laughter," said her brother. The family agonized for the 10 weeks that Hunter was missing and her brother said they felt rage and sadness when her body was found. "That sadness will be with us for a long time. Her soaring spirit will be with us forever more," he said. try mile and teach anyone else how to do the same," said Hunter's sister, Lindeley Silverman.

"Sarah Hunter was one wonderful woman." Hunter loved the outdoor life. She was the head professional at the Manchester Country Club, a member of the Ladies Professional Golf Association, and a staff member of the Ben Sutton Florida Golf School, as well as an avid skier, sailor, hiker and biker. The tributes by Hunter's brother, John Hunter, and Silverman made people who did not know her wish they had and people who did know her wish they had known her better. Mourners choked back tears as family members offered glimpses of Hunter's life and personality: her poor handwriting, her effervescent smile and her childhood curiosity. Hunter also was generous with family and friends.

"She would always come home with a half-dozen Izod shirts and say, 'These aren't seconds, you her brother said. Mourners laughed as Silverman told how Hunter, often carsick as a By COLE G. LIBBY Bennington Banner MANCHESTER It was more a celebration than a funeral Saturday as nearly 400 friends and relatives gathered to share memories of Sarah Lewis Hunter, the Manchester golf pro whose body was found Thanksgiving Day in a Pawlet cornfield. "You may have noticed this is not a funeral, but a celebration of a very wonderful life," said homilist Dr. William J.

Robbins, longtime family minister from Camden, Maine. The 32-year-old woman was last seen Sept. 18 at a Manchester convenience store. Her purse was found Oct. 4 in Danby, about five miles from where her body was discovered.

Her car had been found in an alley behind a service station. State police Saturday said there were no new developments in their investigation of her death by strangulation. Hunter was the youngest of five brothers and sisters who remembered her as the "baby" of the family, with patience and a smile for everyone. "She could hit a golf ball a coun "I have to decide what's for me, what's for the position and what is for the state of Vermont," said McCarren, 39. "You have to ask yourself if you can still be effective and bring a lot of energy to the job and whether it's time for new people." The Public Service Board is a three-member quasi-judicial board that regulates utilities.

The two other members, in part-time positions, are Rosalyn Hunneman and Richard Cowart. McCarren, a lawyer who built a reputation as a consumer advocate for women and low-income people before her appointment by Snelling, said she has received offers for jobs "from other parts of the country" but has accepted nothing. "I had a good time," said McCarren, who applied but was not chosen last year to become a member of the Federal Communications Commission. "This seems to happen to everybody in Vermont. You end up having to make some fundamental decisions about your career." A graduate of the University of California at Berkeley and UCLA, McCarren moved to Vermont in By KATHLEEN H.

COOLEY Free Press Staff Writer Gov. Madeleine M. Kunin and Public Service Board Chairman V. Louise McCarren will meet before the New Year to discuss whether McCarren will be reappointed as head of Vermont's utility regulatory board. McCarren, whose six-year term will expire in February, was appointed in April 1981 by then-Gov.

Richard A. Snelling. Kunin has not decided what she will do with the opening, said Robert Sherman, Kunin's spokesman, although he said the governor plans to meet with McCarren to discuss her future with the board. "It's our understanding that she wants to be reappointed," he said. "The governor has not met with Louise and I don't know what the decision will be." In a telephone interview from Chicago while attending a forum at Northwestern University, McCarren said she felt ambivalent about being reappointed to the regulatory board's only full-time position.

LOUISE McCARREN 1972. She said she was concerned that the chairmanship appointment would become political and acknowledged that it was Kunin's decision who would head the board. "I have a strong commitment to the board," she said. "The problem is I have to find out what I'm going to do when I grow up." Sanders Proclaims '87 Race Will Be His Last Mayoral Bid 7 7 is. "It appears that the Democrats and Republicans are finally wising up and understanding that they may as well get rid of the myth that there is a difference between the two parties and will be rallying around one candidate," he said.

If that occurs, Sanders said, "We are going to be in for the fight of our lives." So far, Democrats Paul Lafayette, a Burlington alderman, and Caryl Stewart, a former city Democratic chairman, have announced they will attempt to unseat Sanders, and they will face off for the Democratic nomination. The mayor's acceptance speech was interrupted frequently by cheers and applause, as he described the importance of the coalition and its work. "What we are doing in the city of Burlington which is unique in the United States of America is to take on the Democratic Party, the Republican Party and the big-money interests in our community and have built an independent progressive movement which is fighting as hard as it can for peace and for social justice," Sanders said. The mayor cited what he feels are the achievements of his administration, including: protecting the financial interests of the poor and working people of the city without raising property taxes in five years; creating "hundreds of new the "revitalization of the Old North rebuilding the streets and sidewalks of the city; and maintaining access to the waterfront. By CHARLES FINNIE Free Press Staff Writer Mayor Bernard Sanders, unanimously nominated by the Progressive Coalition Saturday as its 1987 mayoral candidate, said this race for mayor win or lose will be his last.

"Eight years is enough and I think it is time for new leadership, which does exist within the coalition, to come up," Sanders said, following a speech accepting the nomination from the coalition at its tirst political caucus. Sanders said the decision that this would be his last bid for mayor was a difficult one to make, and one he had not finalized until Friday afternoon. He declined to comment on what he would do instead. Alderman Terrill Bouricius, PC-Ward 2, said the three-term mayor's announcement marks a period of necessary growth for the coalition. "It's time to show this is a movement with an ideological base.

He is the leader of the movement, but he is not the movement itself." Alderman Gene Bergman, PC-Ward 2, also described Sanders' decision in terms of its positive effects on the coalition. "It lets people plan for the future and it gets rid of a lot of doubt," he said. Sanders said the 1987 election might "perhaps be the hardest" mayoral race for the Progressives since their first victory in 1981, because they may have to face an essentially unified opposition. Free Press Photo by MARK SASAHARA Evidence Search Burlington Police Officer Jim Muller and his police dog search an abduction victim's car for clues early Saturday in South Burlington. The woman was making a phone call from a gas station on Kennedy Drive about 3:30 a.m.

when a man beat her and forced her into her car, South Burlington police said. The woman jumped from the moving car at Kimball Avenue and Kennedy Drive, and suffered a broken ankle, cuts and bruises. Police found her car at a nearby condominium complex. The 6-foot suspect had a beard and was wearing blue jeans and a baseball cap..