FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 12/21/10
Contact: Helen Labun Jordan, e-Vermont Project Director, 802 225-6091
e-Vermont Selects 2011 Communities
MONTPELIER, VT — The e-Vermont Community Broadband Project will bring digital tools and in-depth internet training to 12 additional rural communities in 2011. The twelve, announced today, will benefit from the expertise and resources of e- Vermont’s statewide partners as the local groups develop ways to take full advantage of the Internet for creating jobs and innovative schools, providing social services, and increasing community connection. These towns join the first 12 pilot e-communities, selected in spring 2010.
The 2011 e-Vermont communities will be Bridgewater, Calais, Castleton, Dover, Fairfield, Hardwick, Jay/Westfield, Middletown Springs, Moretown, Morristown, Richford, and Vergennes. “As we work with rural communities to support the best use of high speed Internet tools in business, government, community and education, we are bringing Vermont one step closer to truly eliminating the digital divide,” says Project Director Helen Labun Jordan, “Rural regions can’t be left behind in digital skills — we may be receiving high speed Internet later than more urban areas, but we’re going to make up for lost time through programs like e-Vermont.”
e-Vermont is one of the few national broadband adoption initiatives focused on rural needs and it is being viewed as a national model. These towns are among the first to explore how the Internet can be harnessed as a tool for community development.
Although the e-Vermont Community Broadband Project can only bring in-depth services to 24 communities, it will be offering tools and resources to all of Vermont through workshops, conferences, webinars, online tools, and the continuing programs of its partner organizations. e-Vermont updates are posted at www.e4vt.org. Contact e- Vermont with any questions at 802-225-6091 or helen@vtrural.org. e-Vermont is not stringing cable or fiber, but is working to make better use of broadband where it is available. The 2010 communities are already seeing benefits.
e-Vermont’s partners include Digital Wish, Front Porch Forum, Vermont State Colleges, Vermont Department of Libraries, Vermont Small Business Development Center and the Snelling Center for Government. The Vermont Council on Rural Development is overseeing e-Vermont, and will bring its expertise in community organizing to help each town connect its schools, government, businesses, and nonprofit providers in new and exciting ways.
The 2010 e-communities announced last spring are Brighton, Bristol, Canaan, Cambridge, Grand Isle County, Ludlow, Middlesex, Newport, Poultney, Pownal, Sunderland-Arlington-Sandgate, and West Rutland.
Many local government entities subscribe to Front Porch Forum’s pilot in northwest Vermont. Hundreds of public officials are on board.
One municipality, a regional authority, used it this month to conduct a survey of the public and got about 300 people to complete their online questionnaire… about 1.5% of those who were asked. To the question — What’s your preferred way to hear news from us? — nearly half answered Front Porch Forum… outpacing other options, such as the newspaper. Of course, I’d expect a good response, given that they found these survey respondents through FPF. Regardless, glad to hear the results. And interested to see folks using FPF to survey Vermonters.
Sean Sheehan of the e-Vermont Community Broadband Project talks to Susan Clark of the Middlesex Town Meeting Solutions Committee about why the Committee wanted to bring Front Porch Forum to Middlesex, how many residents are using the forum, and what they’re doing with it.
A #VT couple keeps a blog with this to-do list in the margin…
- Quit our jobs
- Get rid of our stuff
- Rent out the house
- Move to Cambodia
- Make ourselves useful
- Learn something new
I think they’ve checked off most of the list! Impressive. So you can imagine my surprise when I saw this snippet from a recent posting on their blog…
We do crave some familiarity at times. Calls to and from friends and family are always fun, recent photos of people at home are a treat, and emails with news of the mundane details of life in the U.S. make a lovely start to the day while sipping coffee on the balcony. I’ve slowly signed off lots of email lists that had no relevance to my life here, but I continue to read Jericho’s Front Porch Forum and occasionally peruse the Free Press or Seven Days online.
Odd as it may seem, we’ve heard from many expats who love to use FPF to keep up with goings-on back home.
It’s a genuine privileged to witness some of the neighborliness that flows through Front Porch Forum. Here’s a note from Christine today in South Burlington to her neighborhood…
I would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to the mysterious, yet wonderful, neighbor(s) who cleared the leaves from my lawn. I returned home to find a blessing. As many know, my back is on the mend and I am so very grateful for this help. This is an amazing neighborhood with an amazing spirit. Many, many thanks. I shall pay it forward when I am able.
What is it about Australia? We get requests frequently from folks down under asking about bringing Front Porch Forum to their shores. Here’s one from today…
Have you considered extending this concept overseas? A good story always travels well. By the way, I am an American and grew up in Detroit/Grosse Pointe, MI. We used to know all our neighbours back in the 60s & early 70s. I have been living in Australia for some 17 years now and even here I try to do this with my neighbours and always introduce myself to new arrivals, but with your inspiration I would like to take it further. -Lars
Wow… Middlesex FPF is on fire! Over the first few months of Front Porch Forum being available to the good folks of this small central Vermont town, they have really put it to work. Already 300 members (out of 720 total households in town) have joined and posted 670 messages!
This is thanks, in part, to e-Vermont. Applications from other Vermont towns are welcome by Nov. 17, 2010.
But the people of Middlesex say it best. Here’s a video clip and a recent newspaper article… both worth a quick perusal.
“Helping neighbors connect”… that’s what Front Porch Forum is all about.
But, as is becoming increasingly obvious, FPF is used in other ways too. Local businesses, city employees, colleges and hospitals, charities and others use FPF every day to communicate with their communities.
Some local public officials enjoy wide access to FPF across many neighborhood forums. This can create a heavy load of neighborhood-level conversation for them to keep up with… but a surprisingly high number do just that. This just in from one State Rep…
FPF has made such a difference in creating a sense of neighborhoods. It does make more work and takes up more of our time, just like email actually, but its value way outweighs its demands, for me. I can’t tell you how many people during my door-knocking thanked me for my postings. Without FPF, I’d be hard-pressed to communicate with constituents. So, really, a BIG thanks to all of you.
What are the boundaries of discussion for an online forum? In each neighborhood/town Front Porch Forum, the members who participate decide what to talk about by the nature of what they post. With the Nov. 2 election, politics has moved front and center in many FPF neighborhoods recently. This pleases some folks and troubles other. Here’s a typical exchange… this time from Hinesburg this week…
We thought Front Porch Forum was designed to trade information with neighbors, not to serve as one more place for people to post political editorials. Len’s piece in today’s forum, while well written, was out of place. Statewide and local election coverage is available through a plethora of channels and we did not sign up for FPF to be lectured at or editorialized to. We signed up to learn what our neighbors needed, and to share what we needed. Is this what we can expect from FPF? It is bad enough that the candidates invade our homes with phone calls at all hours without regard to whether or not we want to hear what they have to say.
And a neighbor countered with…
I would contend that FPF is exactly the place for an open discussion about all issues facing our community including political ones. Why would a person read an editorial or a political post if it disturbs them? I would suggest averting your eyes until you can scroll down to the next post. I for one enjoy knowing different perspectives from my neighbors, including where the next garage sale will be and why certain politicians might be or might not be good for our town…
Good points all around. Regardless, experience shows that, a day or two after the election, FPF will return to neighborly postings about lost cats, babysitters, car break-ins, helping neighbors in need, etc.
Ken Picard wrote a good piece about e-Vermont for Seven Days this week…
E-Vermont’s mission is to help rural schools, businesses and municipalities make the most of the new digital tools at their disposal. Funded largely through a $2.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce, the project is also supported by a coalition of local philanthropists, businesses and nonprofit organizations.
In May, 12 Vermont communities were selected from more than 40 that applied to receive technical and educational assistance in maximizing their broadband usage. Over the next few weeks, more towns across the state will line up to be considered for the next round of assistance.
They’ll be vying for 12 open spots that come with a variety of free services, including new computers for their elementary schools, training and consulting services for small businesses, web-design instruction for town governments and a host of other community-building tools.
“Community building”… that’s where Front Porch Forum comes in. We’re a proud e-Vermont partner. In fact, FPF is now available in 50 Vermont towns, thanks in part to e-Vermont. Anyone wanting FPF in their Vermont town should apply for the second round of e-Vermont awards by Nov. 17, 2010.
Over the last few months, e-Vermont convened a series of meetings in each e-Vermont town to create a list of town-specific priorities.
Many of the goals spelled out in the town plans use 21st-century technologies, such as email, Facebook, Nixle and Front Porch Forum, to reinforce old-fashioned Vermont values: connecting young people with elders; helping Vermonters stay in touch with friends and family out of state; finding new ways to increase civic participation; and helping Vermonters identify neighbors who live alone, are disabled or need someone to check on them periodically.
Another common theme that emerged from all the town plans is a desire to use the Internet to create a stronger local identity. For example, the 3600 residents of Pownal actually live in three separate villages — Pownal, Pownal Center and North Pownal — that are several miles apart.
One of Pownal’s goals is to use… Front Porch Forum to boost community cohesion and spark livelier dialogue among its residents. The framers of Pownal’s plan say this could be an especially useful tool as plans move forward to convert the former Green Mountain Race Track in Pownal into a renewable energy park.
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