Community Stories
Almost all towns have built community spirit and engaged new volunteers. Projects have been advanced and accomplished ranging from a town merger in Richford, to building a senior living project in Wilmington, revitalizing downtowns in Bellows Falls and Brandon, or building a youth center in Bradford. Samples of town accomplishments are listed below.
- Richford (1996): Merged village & town; built affordable housing, river paths, a new health center and plans to redevelop Sweat‐Cummings downtown industrial plant; charted millions in grants in support of Community Visit Task Force action plans.
- Rockingham (1998): Downtown housing, downtown revitalization, and rebuilding the Bellows Falls image were goals accomplished: today the reborn downtown is a model of creative economy development.
- Bradford (1999): Village revitalization was boosted with library repairs, the development of Boch park, and ongoing affordable housing efforts; work proceeding still toward town/village merger.
- Brandon (1999): Earned Downtown Designation and encouraged significant downtown investment, built a town economic development budget, promoted new recreation development and seeded Brandon’s recent success as a creative economy model.
- Middletown Springs (1999): Built sections of the town plan and set up the Middletown Springs Conservation Commission.
- Wilmington (2001): Built a Vision for Wilmington’s future economic development, built a senior housing project.
- Northfield (2001): Redeveloped the old town school as a community center and set agreements for water/wastewater development.
- Troy, Westfield, Jay (2002): Built walking trails and events celebrating downtown Troy and took steps in the development of “Tranquil Gardens.”
- Poultney (2002): Built new youth activities and mentorships, expanded collaborations with Green Mountain College, designed new town banners and a town marketing strategy, beautified Main Street and filled storefronts, developed a Community Video, started Artist and Writers Guilds, opened the slate museum, built a consensus Vision for the community.
- Enosburg (2003): Instituted a community‐wide literacy campaign and mentorship program, set up a Restorative Justice Board, new recreation park, town web page, unified town/village public works, financing, planning/zoning and offices.
- Johnson (2004): Leveraged significant federal funds to replace three bridges, build a water system, and implement redesign of downtown; built a community calendar, and instituted a Winter Carnival and a summer concert series to unite and market the community.
- Bristol (2004): Inventoried potential space for small industrial park, set key attributes of businesses to attract, redeveloping Bartlett Falls area, improved storm water system.
- Chelsea (2005): Gained ACCD Planning Grant to staff Community Visit Task Forces, building a community facilities and infrastructure plan.
- Woodstock (2005): Set community priorities for town/village merger, built an east end development corporation, expanding conservation, expanded walking trails and developed a town trails map, and building a Woodstock Vision.
- Pownal (2006): Established a Housing Task Force that built a mobile home tenants association and is planning for an affordable housing project; developed community gardens and activities; built tourism map and a communications campaign to tell the good story of the town’s success.
- Hinesburg (2006): The town voted funds to contract for services to advance initiatives; improved energy efficiency, stopped bus idling, lightbulb campaign, advanced the agricultural economy.
- Derby (2007): Evaluating steps toward town/village merger and solving water sewer infrastructure issues.
- Richford (2007): Working to increase police protection and its connection to community; new health center and grocery in the old Sweat Comings property seen as keystone to future downtown development.
- Killington (2008): Built a system for positive Town/Mountain communications and problem solving; set a 4‐season economic development planning process with substantial funding from a 1% municipal rooms, meals, and sales tax.
