Category Archives: Community Building
After 24 years, community connection blossoming
#VT – My husband and I have been living in Cambridge, VT for 24 years. We don’t have children of our own which has made it difficult to get to know people in our community and the events that happen here. Front Porch Forum changed that for us… thank you.
The Cambridge FPF covers all 1,500 households in this small rural town, and it has about 1,300 members who use it in wonderful ways. No wonder FPF packs such a wallop for the member quoted above.
How do Vermonters prepare for Town Meeting Day decisions?
#BTV #VT – Increasingly, the answer to this question includes Front Porch Forum. Ninety Vermont towns are served by FPF and public officials, advocacy groups and voters alike use their FPF to share information, state opinions and encourage participation in local democracy. Occasionally an FPF will get heated in the days approaching Town Meeting… but that’s how community works. Ideally neighbors pull together and move the community forward after Town Meeting Day, regardless of which candidates and ballot measures prevail.
FPF is popping up in traditional media this week. Two recent front pages (one and two) of the Burlington Free Press mentioned FPF’s role in Town Meeting issues. And Seven Days quoted former City Councilor Ed Adrian today…
In a February 28 posting on Front Porch Forum, Adrian lodged five points of criticism against Bushor, including: “To the best of my knowledge, Sharon has never posted on FPF. Anything.”
Ed will be glad to know that Sharon posted a campaign-related item to her FPF today!
Feeling connected…
#VT – “Thanks to Front Porch Forum for the first time I have felt truly connected to the people and happenings in the town I live and grew up in.”
That’s from Elias, who lives in a small town in Vermont.
Small-town NY social network rescues horses
The tiny Argyle Front Porch Forum continues to outperform expectations. See these two recent postings from Shannon…
Sadly I have been asked to help with a very hard emergency situation. One of our fellow Argyle residents is losing their home. They have tried all the options out there and the last effort to do a loan modification ended up not working out after all. It looks as though next Friday the 8th could be the last day this family can be in their home.
They have 5 horses who all need a safe place to go. They are looking for homes for them and they do not need to stay together. Each horse will come with aprox. 55 bales of hay. There are 2 horses who are 9 and could be ridable when properly trained. The other 3 are mainly companions although the oldest (30) could still work with kids.
I realize this is a tall order to fill in a week’s time. We just don’t have the space here for them either. If we split them up perhaps they can all land in a safe spot. Please pass this on, post it on your facebook pages or any place you think it would help. The 2 younger horses would be great training projects. The gelding needs all his training and the mare already has lots of training e/w and some dressage but freaks out if you raise your voice. She is an Adn. TBX. Gray.
Shannon – Double L Stable Equine Rescue and Sanctuary
And her follow up…
Wow! Was I surprised at the number of calls I got in regards to the 5 horses in need on Coach Rd. Over 100 calls! Not only did Argyle animal lovers step up but I had at least half a dozen calls from folks who thought they might have info that would help the family losing their home… I believe all the horses may be spoken for but I will update everyone if any of the homes fall though. Way to go Argyle! You picked up the post and really ran with it… I had more success just posting this on the Argyle Front Porch Forum to spread the word then I have ever had before, even posting it on our national Petfinder site!
It takes a village to raise a teenager…
#VT – “Looking for a loud and obnoxious (& cheap) alarm clock to get my teen up in the morning. I’m sure there must be a few of them out there?”
That’s my favorite Front Porch Forum posting of the hour… from Peter on the Waterbury FPF.
New Feature: Share Postings with Neighboring FPFs
#BTV #VT – Starting today, Front Porch Forum members can select to share their postings with neighboring FPFs. Look for the check box on the NEW POSTING page at FrontPorchForum.com (login required).
National gathering of community foundations feature FPF
#VT – Front Porch Forum is one of the successful services being highlighted today at the Knight Foundation’s Media Learning Seminar in Miami. FPF is pleased and grateful to be included in this prestigious event.
“We don’t need another newspaper, we have Front Porch Forum”
#VT – How fortunate we are in Bristol to have Front Porch Forum at our disposal. I certainly hope that someone is recording all these postings using some media that is not ephemeral (imagine if the Constitution had been recorded on 8 track?) as future generations may be able to use current Front Porch Forum postings the way our generations use the old Bristol Heralds- a view into a time gone by.
I was talking with a good friend the other day who had been considering starting up another newspaper that would deal with only local issues, much like the last several efforts to do the same but which all met an early demise. We don’t need another newspaper- we have Front Porch Forum which meets all those needs.
I just hope that future generations can enjoy this as much as we do and that they will be able to look back to our time and try to understand the issues that confront us in the same way that we use old publications in our quest to understand the issues of earlier times, and as George Santayana observed, “Those who cannot learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.”
Shared by Ted with his Bristol, Vermont, neighbors on their FPF today.
Monkton, Ferrisburgh, Enosburgh open Front Porch Forums
#VT – Welcome to the good people of Monkton, Ferrisburgh and Enosburgh to Front Porch Forum. Anyone living in these towns may now join their FPF at FrontPorchForum.com.
And a special thanks to the Monkton Community Coffeehouse, Enosburg Area Business Assn., Enosburgh Town School District, Town of Ferrisburgh, and others for sponsoring this expansion of FPF services. We now cover 90 Vermont towns. Here’s a map and complete list.
Social media — the new graffiti?
Graffiti was traditionally the only means love or hate-filled teenagers had of letting the world know about their passions.
Now, thanks to Twitter and Facebook, they can literally let the world know about it – and no-one will come along and remove it.
“Vandalising and spraying – the local council will just come and take it off,” says Kito, a youth worker of the Queen’s Crescent Youth Club. “They will wash it off. So you put it up, they wash it off, you put it up.
But if you put it up on your BlackBerry it’s yours, it’s your personal message and nobody bothers you.”
Vandalism is increasingly seen as a pointless activity. As one teenage girl at the Queen’s Crescent Youth Club put it: “If I get angry about something, I go on Facebook.”
About Blog
Ghost of Midnight is an online journal about fostering community within neighborhoods, with a special focus on Front Porch Forum (FPF). My wife, Valerie, and I founded FPF in 2006... read more
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