About the Action Team

The Local Support and Community Action Team will interface with local groups to learn what is being done on the ground in communities and what can be replicated and shared statewide. The team will also identify gaps in recovery efforts to ensure equitable distribution of resources, especially in rural areas and underserved populations.

The Local Support and Community Action Team will learn from businesses, non-profits and community members about their needs and ideas for recovery. It will use what it learns in three ways:

1. Build recommendations to the Governor, the Agency of Commerce and Community Development, and in some cases for Legislative Action;

2. Share best practices and strategies for recovery between and among communities throughout Vermont; and

3. Frame and implement efforts with a variety of partners to directly spur community and business recovery

Simply put, this Team will serve to gather information about local initiatives, validate and vet those efforts and provide strategies to maximize our response for the benefit of all Vermonters. Toward these ends it will advance short-term, middle-term, and long-term recovery efforts.

To advance Short Term Recovery the Team will:

• Gather best practices and help communities share and replicate them.

• Survey and take formal and informal input from statewide, regional and local organizations and leaders on needs, gaps, and opportunities that can be addressed to spur local recovery.

• Work to help coordinate efforts to support communities across all levels from local to regional and statewide organizations.

• Reach out to ensure that the voices of all Vermonters are heard and included in recovery planning, including rural regions and marginalized and vulnerable Vermonters.

• Work products:

  • • Develop a provisional report to the Governor on needs and proposed action by early May.

    • Develop a comprehensive list of community programs and resources to address needs and connect communities to learn and replicate by mid-May.

To advance Middle Term Recovery the Team will:

• Develop online or in person community, municipal or regional community engagement strategies to assist local residents in framing and implementing local recovery plans with the support, technical assistance and links to resources of the panoply of state, federal, non-profit and philanthropic agencies in Vermont.

• Provide technical assistance moving from mitigation to recovery.

• Evaluate system and sector needs to respond to gaps in basic human needs such as:

  • • Childcare

    • Food access

    • Housing

    • Transportation

    • Resiliency in health care

    • Basic human connection

• Evaluate and share best practices and policies to boost important sectors and advance key issues such as:

  • • Local agriculture

    • Main Street businesses

    • Equity

    • Sustainable practice

    • And other business and service sectors to promote local solutions, and to add up and share best practices and/or recommendations for state action.

• Connect with local, regional and statewide Resource Providers to engage with them in collective action to advance sector recovery.

• Work products:

  • • Report on local solutions, building resiliency in communities.

    • Develop a Resource guide to support communities in need with protocols and practical approaches.

To advance Long Term Recovery the Team will:

• Evaluate and consider action around infrastructure, including opportunities to advance solutions to support community and economic recovery and development in areas such as:

  • • Broadband

    • K-College/Certificate/Training education

    • Shoring up essential non-profits and community organizations

    • Public health infrastructure

    • Food security

• Consider lessons learned from the pandemic that address Vermont’s long-term economic progress and resilience including economic and energy re-localization opportunities for potential action and/or recommendations.

• Work product:

  • • Develop final report on local solutions, to serve as a framework for recovery and community resiliency.

• State Liaison: Josh Hanford, Commissioner, Department of Housing & Community Development

• Taskforce Lead: Paul Costello, Executive Director, Vermont Council on Rural Development

• Maura Collins, Executive Director, Vermont Housing Finance Agency

• Xusana Davis, Executive Director, Vermont Office of Racial Equity

• Catherine Dimitruk, Executive Director, Northwest Regional Planning Commission

• Oliver Olsen, Director, Workday, Londonderry

• Nick Richardson, President, Vermont Land Trust

• Dr. Jude Smith Rachele, CEO, Abundant Sun

• Lisa Sullivan, Owner, Bartleby’s Bookstore, Wilmington

• Ed Vilandrie, Founder, Altman Vilandrie & Company, Co-Owner Kingdom Taproom, Peacham

• Sarah Waring, Vice President, Vermont Community Foundation

• Richard Amore, ACCD Planning and Outreach Manager

• Chris Cochran, ACCD Community Planning and Revitalization Director

• Paul Dragon, AHS, Director of Field Services

• Jacob Hemmerick, ACCD Planning and Policy Manager

• Gary Holloway, ACCD VT Downtown Program Director

• Jenna Koloski, VCRD Community and Policy Manager

• Jenni Lavoie, ACCD Administration