BARRE, Vt. (AP) – One of the city’s business leaders warns that the downtown is dying.

Wally Roberts, executive director of the Barre Partnership, the city’s designated downtown development corporation, said statistics show the downtown is losing jobs and employers in the retail sector.

He urged the City Council to apply for a $40,000 state grant to take a hard look at the central business district and explore how to reverse the trend. The council agreed.

“The city’s commercial district is basically dying slowly,” Roberts told councilors at their meeting Tuesday.

“It is losing stores, it’s losing employees and it’s losing payroll,” he said.

Roberts said a market analysis could provide a blueprint for enhancing downtown.

Perry joins NH Fish and Game

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) – Gov. Craig Benson on Wednesday nominated the former commissioner of Maine’s Inland Fisheries and Wildlife to head the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department.

Lee Perry, who served in the top wildlife post under former Gov. Angus King until February, would fill the remaining two years of a post left vacant by the resignation of Wayne Vetter.

Vetter decided to leave the $84,000-a-year post following allegations of sexual harassment in the workplace, which he denied. He was suspended without pay for six months beginning in November 2002.

In exchange for the resignation, Vetter agreed to an $80,000 settlement. Former Senate President Bill Bartlett has been acting executive director.

Coast Guard rescues five

BOSTON (AP) – The Coast Guard rescued five men from a life raft early Wednesday after their New Bedford-based fishing boat took on water and sank.

The Coast Guard dispatched a rescue helicopter to an area about 70 miles off Chatham, Mass., at about 11 p.m. Tuesday after receiving an emergency signal from a radio beacon on the boat Ilha Brava.

The beacon, called an EPIRB, was activated when it hit salt water as the boat went down, said Coast Guard Petty Officer Jaimie Knife.

The waters were shrouded with a heavy fog, but rescuers used night vision goggles and spotted the life raft close to the location given by the radio beacon, the Coast Guard said.

The men were hoisted by helicopter to a waiting ambulance at about 1 a.m.

The men were transported to Cape Cod Hospital for evaluation and reported in good condition.