- Courtesy of Andrew Collier
- The Middlebury Short Stop
The winning numbers (8, 40, 49, 58, 63 and a Powerball of 14) in the national game were drawn Wednesday night and matched a ticket sold this week at the Middlebury Short Stop convenience store, which is one of 26 in the Jolley chain.
The winner had yet to come forward, but in interviews on Thursday morning, state officials and the chain's general manager, Shawn Bartlett, were ecstatic.
Bartlett said he got a phone call from the state Department of Liquor and Lottery earlier Thursday morning and worried it might be bad news. It was the opposite.
"We're family-run, so it's pretty special," said Bartlett, a 37-year veteran of the Jolley chain, which is owned by Bruce and Mary Ellen Jolley. "During the last couple of years, it's been pretty tough times for all of us with the COVID situation, so it's just nice to have positives."
Powerball is a national lottery game with $2 tickets sold in 45 states plus Washington, D.C. Drawings are held three days a week, and the jackpot grows until a winning ticket is sold.
The winner can get a lump sum payment of about $208 million or receive the full amount in annual installments across 29 years.
For selling the winning ticket, the store will receive $30,000, which is the most allowed under state statute, according to Andrew Collier, the deputy commissioner of the Vermont Department of Liquor and Lottery. But that's well below the 1 percent of the total (or $3.7 million, in this case) offered in other states.
Regardless, Collier said the chain was thrilled by the news.
Vermont will also benefit: The winner — or winners, if a group banded together to buy the ticket — will have to pay income taxes on their haul, some of which will go into state coffers. And the state takes 6 percent of the winnings, which pencils out to about $12.5 million if the winner takes a lump sum payment.
"Our slogan is, 'Home of the daily smile,' so obviously somebody's happy," Bartlett said. "It's just nice with all the negatives recently to see something positive."
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