I read through the most recent issue of Front Porch Forum and could only feel gratitude for this community.

Thank you to the person who is offering chicks to people who lost theirs to the bears! Warms my heart to know we live in a community where this kind of thing happens.

Thank you to the people who so well articulated my mixed feelings about the elementary school facility project. I think that the public meeting tomorrow night should focus on some of the questions asked at the end of the letter on FPF not just the dollars and cents…

And thank you for all of the postings about dogs, bears, hummingbirds, town roads and more.

And welcome new members most of whom I do not know but feel that we at least have something in common – a good source of neighborly conversation and important information exchange.

UPDATE:  And here’s another posting on the East Montpelier FPF…

I just want to say that I think FPF is fantastic. I have not caught on to Facebook (and have no urge to do so). This chatting between neighbors is wonderful.

The conversations that are currently taking place over the School Bond have been well written, informative, and respectful. Thanks.

#BTV #VT - From Charles Lawton in yesterday’s Portland Press Herald…

… Two election cycles ago, Howard Dean introduced us to the financial aspect of this [e-government] revolution by showing how Internet-savvy political appeals could mobilize institutionally unconnected individuals into an effective donation and voting bloc.

Since then, Internet appeals and social media have become basic tools of political campaigns.

Another Vermont innovation — Front Porch Forum — has brought the same technological capability to what used to be the town meeting, the pancake breakfast and the church bean supper. It is a virtual meeting place for neighbors to share ideas on topics as mundane as a lost cat and as controversial as ATV trails and town charters. To judge by its glowing testimonials and rapid spread to towns across the Green Mountain state, it has been a great success.

Much is simply an expression of neighborliness — the loan of a sump pump, a reference to a native French speaker, thanks for a bigger-than-average turnout for church bingo.

But other testimonials speak to the forum’s value in building community — “I look forward to reading it every night. I’m not a Facebook fan but I LOVE Front Porch Forum.” And still other comments illustrate its value as a well-utilized source for varying but always respectful, never ranting, opinions on hot-button public issues.

In this last respect, the FPF represents e-government as a reflection not of a more efficient bureaucracy but of a more involved citizenry. And that is its greatest contribution and the one we ought to seek to promote here in Maine.

Increasingly people use FPF to tackle some of the tougher challenges faced by their communities… street crime, school and town budgets, disaster recovery… and currently in Burlington, illegal drug use…

Hello Neighbors – Over the last few months, everyone in our household and that of our downstairs neighbors’ (and landlord’s) had noticed certain vehicles consistently parking on the quiet side street next to our house, and just sitting there for a long time. Of course, this sort of thing makes you wary, but we had not seen or experienced anything overtly suspicious or criminal… until yesterday, when I found two used needles and bloodied alcohol swabs discarded curbside, right next to our house…

Last night, after dark, a cherry red car with a loud muffler pulled up to the same spot and sat. Our downstairs neighbor noticed this, and after a few minutes walked out to have a look/be a presence. The car quickly pulled away, turned around and took off toward North Ave. Sure enough, another pair of used needles and dirty swabs were found on the street. We called the cops, and an officer was sent over to have a look; we described the vehicle to him, and he collected one of the syringes. His idea is that people are buying on North St and then pulling back into our relatively quiet, not-much-patrolled neighborhood to shoot up.

Needless to say, this is disturbing and disheartening, and we’re hoping to help bring a stop to it ASAP. Be aware of stopped vehicles lingering at the curbside in your neighborhood, and be very careful to watch out for discarded needles, especially for the sake of children in your area (“luckily”, the needles that we have found have bright orange plastic components and are easy to spot; also, the idiot users have been thoughtful enough to cap them before dumping). Obviously, direct confrontation is not encouraged, but notice patterns and take down license plates of repeat visitors. And, of course, be very careful and wear gloves when cleaning up after these losers (the cops will come to pick them up if you’re not comfortable doing it, but they do not want them as evidence unless they are still loaded).

Be careful out there, and teach your kids the same!

Here’s an example from a new steering committee member of a Burlington Neighborhood Planning Assembly…

My impetus to get involved with my community stems from my childhood in Montpelier where I knew my neighbors and neighbors all helped each other.  FPF has been the missing link in community building for my adult life.

Front Porch Forum Helps Calais Neighbors Connect

What if nearly every household in a small rural town were in daily communication with each other? What would change?

I love Front Porch Forum: I’ve bought a juicer, learned about fuel pricing, got free lily of the valleys and met new neighbors in the process!

FPF is a great place to stay informed about all kinds of issues, and positive debate addresses just that: the issues, not necessarily the individuals.

Furthermore, if you truly have something to get off your chest with your neighbor, then please do it in person. So much of communication is nonverbal and all of this is lost in an email. Got a problem? Have the confidence to go talk to your neighbor.

People looking for an online neighborhood forum used to have few free choices beyond discussion sites such as Yahoo groups or email lists. Now options are popping up left and right. Besides Nextdoor, which launched nationally last fall, there’s Home Elephant, My Virtual Neighbor, Neighborland, Yatown and Hey, Neighbor! — to name a few. Some are available in just a handful of cities so far.

“There’s probably 20 startups in this space,” said Michael Wood-Lewis, chief executive and co-founder of another site, Front Porch Forum. His company launched eons ago, in Internet terms — 2006…

Neighbors write in with questions, problems, ideas or needs — “Urgently seeking lost dog,” for example — and the company compiles everything into an emailed newsletter that comes out as often as there’s sufficient content.

In Burlington, Vt., 10,000 of the city’s 16,000 households have signed up. In Westford, Vt., residents used Front Porch Forum to start a food pantry. And in tiny Moretown, one of the Vermont communities hit hard by Tropical Storm Irene last August, neighbors reported that having had the e-newsletter for a year beforehand turned out to be a big help.

“During that year, book clubs were formed, dog-walking groups got together, the school’s PTA got stronger, more people were showing up for events,” Wood-Lewis said. “So when a disaster hit, it wasn’t a bunch of kind of vaguely familiar strangers who weren’t sure how to reach each other. They were living in a community.”

Atlanta-based Home Elephant, which launched last year, allows users in the same neighborhood to share news, chat and pass on alerts. People can sign in through Facebook and let the company suggest neighbors to “friend.” Nearly 6,200 neighborhoods in more than 70 countries — including some areas in Maryland — are using it.

Chandler Powell, a Home Elephant co-founder, said… he feels like the David to Nextdoor’s Goliath, because Nextdoor is a Silicon Valley startup with venture capital money. Home Elephant — so named because elephants are social creatures — has no marketing budget and is a nights-and-weekends labor of love at the moment, Powell said.

Nextdoor, with its Facebook-like feed for neighborhood conversations, has an immediately familiar look. It also has designated spots for recommendations, resources, photos and the like, along with a map showing where participants live. And users can receive neighborhood “urgent alerts” sent as text messages to their cellphones.

If there’s no Nextdoor site in your neighborhood, you can start one — but only if you get nine other neighbors to sign up within three weeks. The company is trying to avoid ghost-town websites.

To join, you have to prove you live where you say you do — providing your home telephone number for a verification call, for instance. Or a vetted neighbor can vouch for you, which is how Nextdoor said most people end up joining.

Of the approximately 2,000 Nextdoor neighborhood sites, 20 are in Maryland. Seven more are in the pilot stage locally, waiting for enough sign-ups.

Fascinating keynote speaker, Nicco Mele, will be joined by Governor Shumlin and dozens of other speakers.  Sign up today!

Front Porch Forum is a proud e-Vermont partner and we look forward to participating in this event.

Nearly three quarters (72%) of adults are quite attached to following local news and information, and local newspapers are by far the source they rely on for much of the local information they need. In fact, local news enthusiasts are substantially more wedded to their local newspapers than others. They are much more likely than others to say that if their local newspaper vanished, it would have a major impact on their ability to get the local information they want.

It seems likely that Front Porch Forum members draw more from this portion of the population as well.  In Burlington, Vt., for example, FPF has 10,000 members out of the 16,000 households in the city.  More from Pew…

Local news consumers are more connected to their communities than others, both in length of time in the community and in their connection with neighbors, and more likely to think they can improve their communities. Roughly three in 10 have lived in their community 20 years or longer (32% vs. 20% of others), and thus not surprisingly are more likely to know all of their neighbors. This is driven largely by local news enthusiasts age 40 and older. As a whole, local news enthusiasts are also slightly more likely than other adults to believe they can have a big impact on making their community a better place to live.

Less than half of these local news enthusiasts use online social networking (6% less than other adults), and less than 1 in 10 use Twitter, although 78% use email and the internet…

Pew states that these local news enthusiasts know their neighbors more than others…

And that they believe more than others that they can have a positive impact on the place where they live…

Out of Pew’s sample, 7% of the local news hounds reported using neighborhood e-newsletters…

Download the report here.

#VT - The thing I’m noticing about the water in the village tonight is that as my kids are taking a bath, it smells like a chlorinated pool as far as about 6 feet from the bath tub.

I have no idea what this means. Better a chlorinated pool than a cesspool is how I choose to look at it.

I’m glad that public water supply quality is a topic of conversation on Front Porch Forum, and I do appreciate that town officials use the forum for disseminating information about it.

This was shared with 1,000 Bristol FPF members tonight by Gillian.  Good for Bristol officials for engaging the public.  We’re seeing more and more of this on FPF in towns across Vermont.  I do know of one going the other direction… actually closing down communication with voters… but that’s the exception.