Bordertown

Libby is the Montpelier / Roxbury School District’s superintendent. Prior to that, she was Director of Curriculum and Instruction at Franklin Northwest Supervisory Union. She also has experience as a consultant, adjunct professor, teacher development coordinator, co-principal, principal, and teacher. She holds master’s degrees from Michigan State University and Columbia University’s Teachers College and a bachelor’s degree from Hobart and William Smith Colleges. She resides in Jericho with her family.

Michele Braun is the Executive Director of the Friends of the Winooski River. Michele has a Master of Science in Natural Resources Planning from the University of Vermont. She has worked as an environmental policy analyst, responsible for managing projects, designing and facilitating multi-stakeholder meetings and workshops for city and state governments, US EPA, watershed organizations, environmental health associations, and multi-partner collaborative environmental planning projects.

William Alexander writes fantasy, science fiction, and other unrealisms for young readers. His novels include Goblin Secrets, Ghoulish Song, Ambassador and Nomad. His latest novels are the companion set A Properly Unhaunted Place and A Festival of Ghosts. He currently serves as the faculty chair of the Vermont College of Fine Arts in the program in Writing for Children and Young Adults.

Jim Birmingham is the Food Service Director of the Montpelier Roxbury School District. He is a graduate of Johnson State College and attended culinary school at Le Cordon Blue, London, UK. He is an American Culinary Federation Certified Executive Chef who spent several years working in resort hotel kitchens around Stowe, VT and more than a decade as a Chef Instructor at New England Culinary Institute in Essex and Montpelier. Jim lives in Waterbury with his wife and two teenage sons. He enjoys gardening, hiking and is an avid alpine and backcountry skier.

Walt Poleman is a Senior Lecturer and Director of the Ecological Planning Program at the University of Vermont. He specializes in natural history, place-based landscape analysis, and education for sustainability. He teaches courses in natural history and human ecology, landscape inventory and assessment, and conservation science.

Ryan Geary is the owner the of The Hive, and co-owner of Rabble-Rouser. He works in a variety of mediums and disciplines, including wood carving, furniture making and painting, but his preferred art form and main focus over the past 5 years has been 2D and 3D collage.

Janice Walrefen co-creates AllTogetherNow!, Community Arts Center in East Montpelier, with Ellen Leonard. Together they teach summer camp and produce our community seasonal pageants, parades and puppet shows. Janice has her Art Tiles clay studio, classroom, puppets and shares community gardens at AllTogetherNow! Ellen is the director of the awesome preschool at AllTogetherNow! and teaches family music classes. Their mission is to be an inspiration and model for sustainable living and celebration.

Matthew Binginot is a designer producer, and lover of all forms of media creativity. He is especially drawn towards photography, music, film and graphic design. When not producing his own media art, he teaches a program called Digital Media Arts at the Central Vermont Career Center. Every day he inspires young artist to be creative and show them new ways to practice their passion.

Chuck Collins is a Senior Policy Analyst for the Institute for Policy Studies. He is the author of many books including "Born on Third Base", "The Community Resilience Reader" and "Is inequality in America irreversible?". He is the co-editor of the "Inequality.org" website. Chuck has dedicated his life to understanding the basis of economic inequality in the US, and has pioneered countless efforts to connect investors, business leaders, and one-percenters to the common wealth of their place in the world. He is an organizing force behind "Patriotic Millionaires", a united network of high-net worth Americans, business leaders and investors who are united in their concern about the destabilizing concentration of wealth and power in America. Chuck’s story of wealth inequality is a first hand account…His great grandfather was the meat-packer, Oscar Mayer and Chuck grew up with the inherited wealth from his family fortune. He realized in his mid-twenties that the “mountain of privilege” that had defined his life so far…did not resonate with him…and he gave away his inheritance, to several foundations that funded “change, not charity”. He has been advocating for solutions to the ever-increasing wealth inequality in our country ever since. And as Chuck describes, "you can’t have community without real need and vulnerability". He speaks of the “invitation home” to wealthy people in our country...to bring their wealth back to community and invest in place and people. Chuck proposes that, “People are waiting to be invited to something bigger than consumption….and that is community”.

Christine Hanna is the Executive Director of YES Media. She grew up in Virginia, received her bachelors degree in economics from UVA and her MBA from the University of Washington. She spent the early part of her career swept up in the dot.com revolution. She ultimately entered the non-profit arena and founded Go Next Door in Seattle, a web-based network dedicated to supporting local businessess and building community. After that, she went on to cofound the Seattle Good Business Network in 2010. Christine and her colleagues grew the organization from a small startup to an influential Seattle player, strengthening the region's locally owned retail, manufacturing and food sectors. She is a passionate advocate for a sustainable, inclusive local economy, with a great track record for putting that passion into action. Christine joined YES in March 2017 and says the role couldn't be a better fit.

Alex Chernomazov and his wife Ella are the co-founders of Greenspark, an Interactive Sustainability Park in development on Route 100 in Waterbury Center, Vermont. Their mission is to inspire local and global communities to adapt current green technologies through interactive hands-on experiences. Alex and Ella’s goal at Greenspark is to make it easy for our guests to experience all aspects of sustainable living – renewable energy, green building and pollution-free transportation – in one place.

Joseph Kiefer grew up on a small-diversified family farm in the Hudson Valley of New York State. As the oldest son of six kids his farm chores with cows, pigs, sheep, chickens and a mean old rooster, taught him much about caring for the land and being a farmer. He received his M.A. in Social Ecology from the Institute for Social Ecology in Plainfield Vermont in 1980. In 1982 he was asked to be part of a Community Task Force on Hunger with the Central Vermont Community Action Council in Barre, Vermont. As a result of this quiet crisis he started a Garden Science / Hunger Education Program with local schools. At the Main Street Middle school a Garden Lab of raised bed gardens, small fruits, fruit trees and a compost was set up with a bed dedicated for the Emergency Food Pantry. This Task Force quickly learned that this dramatic increase in demand for emergency food was being experienced around the state and decided to investigate starting a Food bank for the state. In 1986 Joseph Co-founded the Vermont Food bank. In 1985-86 he served on the Governor’s Task Force on Hunger attending six regional hearings around the state. Upon completion of these projects he cofounded Food Works with a mission to address the root causes of childhood hunger by starting school gardens and food education programs. In 1997 Food Works teamed up with Shelburne Farms and NOFA (Northeast Organic Farming Association) to start VT FEED (food education every day). In 2006 Food Works helped launch the first Food Bank farm in Vermont growing exclusively for emergency feeding sites in the state. At Food Works Joseph was the Director of Education and offered professional development courses and workshops to teachers, food service staff and community organizers on how to grow, process, cook and store locally grown foods. He has taught at California Polytechnic University at Pomona, California, Trinity College, Goddard College, The Union Institute, The College of St. Joseph and Johnson State College and Castelton University all in Vermont. He is a co-author of “Digging Deeper” A comprehensive Guide to School and Community Gardening and “Living Traditions” Teaching Local History Using State and National Learning Standards. Joseph now works as a Food Justice Consultant working with the Good Food Good Medicine Program at Highgate Housing and Green Acres Housing, the Vermont Community Garden Network as well as the Vermont Rural Partnership. He serves on the Boards of Just Basics Inc. in Montpelier and Highgate Housing in Barre Vermont, as well as on the cross cutting Food Access Team of the Vermont Farm to Plate Group. He lives with his wife Amy and their two dogs Chester and Molly on the White Dove Herbal Sanctuary in East Montpelier.

Soil4Climate, a nonprofit organization, advocates for soil restoration as a climate solution. They promote regenerative land management practices to capture atmospheric carbon and encourage collaboration with the larger body of climate activism. Uniting “drawdown” strategies with emissions reduction, divestment from fossil fuels, a price on carbon, and climate justice advocacy, together creates a powerful alliance. Soil4Climate is inspired by the work of Allan Savory which is summarized nicely in his TedTalk as "if we do what I am showing you here, we can take enough carbon out of the atmosphere and safely store it in the grassland soils for thousands of years, and if we just do that on about half the world's grasslands that I've shown you, we can take us back to pre-industrial levels, while feeding people. I can think of almost nothing that offers more hope for our planet, for your children, and their children, and all of humanity." Seth Itzkan is co-founder of Soil4Climate and President of Planet-TECH Associates. Jesse McDougall owns and operates Studio Hill, LLC on Pullman Farm with his wife Caroline - their family’s fourth-generation farm in Shaftsbury, Eric Becker Is Chief Investment Officer at Clean Yield Asset Management, and Karl Thidemann is a co-founder of Soil4Climate and a Strategic Planner for Planet-TECH Associates.

Keith Morris owns & operates Willing Crossing Farm in Johnson Vermont along with his partner Kori Gelinas, growing one of the most diverse collections of fruit and nut trees in the northeast as well as bees, herbs and apothocary. Keith is also the founder of Prospect Rock Permaculture, Vermont’s longest running Permaculture Institute and a co-founding board member of the Permaculture Institute of the Northeast (P.I.N.E.). He has been instrumental in bringing Permaculture to the northeast and teaching at the university level - including the University of Vermont, Sterling College, Saint Michaels College, Paul Smiths College and the Yestermororw Design Build School in the Waitsfield, Vermont.

Trevor Newman is an amateur pomologist, avid gardener, student and teacher of regenerative design and all-around plant geek. He owns and operates TerraNu Nursery, an edible and useful plant company based in Clarkston, MI. He also owns and operates an edible landscaping firm called Roots To Fruits Ecological Design. In addition, Trevor is the founder and purveyor of The Fruit Nut a media project dedicated to promoting ecologically sound and economically viable practices. He is a teacher and lecturer - and passionately works to raise awareness about locally and ecologically grown food and has been involved for many years in developing southeast Michigan’s local food culture.

The Good Foot Project – “We left everything in Los Angeles and started down the road to sustainability. This is our Story.” On April 28th, 2013 Anastasia King and JC Jarris began a year-long expedition, by RV, across the USA visiting low-impact organic farms and eco-villages to learn best practices in sustainable farming, construction, energy, water and waste management. This trip is to educate and prepare them for establishing their own sustainable, low-impact, eco-retreat and training center.

James Maroney is an American Art Dealer and former Organic Dairy Farmer. He has a Master’s degree in Environmental Law and Policy from the Vermont Law School, and is a passionate advocate for water quality, often focusing his attention on Vermont Dairy. James puts forth a compelling argument to transition the entire Vermont Diary industry to organic. He also gives us a glimpse into his life as an Art Dealer, and provides a succinct history of the evolution of U.S. Industrial Agriculture.

Lisa Mase, of Harmonized Cookery is a whole foods cooking educator, food writer, translator, and herbalist, living between Italy, Vermont and New Mexico. LIke many people she imagines a time where people relied on their neighbor and food and medicine came right from the local region. Unlike many people, Lisa lived this life as a young girl growing up in the mountains of northern Italy. In a thoughtful and practical way, Lisa explains the role food plays in our individual health, community resiliency and cultural heritage.

Chris Shanks is a Co-Director at Project Bona Fide located on Isla de Ometepe in Nicaragua. He is a multi-talented teacher, organizer, permaculture enthusiast, and design visionary. A graduate of the University of Vermont, Chris is fascinated with living systems and whole systems design. When not working in the non-profit or design world he can be found masquerading as a builder, a mason, as a decent plumber, as a poor electrician, as a sailor, as a fanatic for bamboo, as a lover of palms, as a permaculturalist with a rock/tree climbing habit, and as an avid motorcyclist.

Jon Erickson is Professor of Ecological Economics and Interim Dean at the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources at the University of Vermont. He teaches both undergraduate and graduate courses in ecological economics (EE); leads an international service-learning program in the Dominican Republic focused on human rights and health in migrant communities; co-supervises a graduate certificate program in EE; and leads a research program on both the theoretical development of EE and applied work on human and ecosystem health, rural livelihoods, regional sustainable development, land and biodiversity conservation, watershed planning, forest management, climate change policy, and renewable energy technology. He has published extensively on these topics in journals such as Science, Ecological Economics, Land Economics, Climatic Change, Bioscience, Energy Policy, and Landscape and Urban Planning. Dr. Erickson’s work on problem-based learning in EE was published with Josh Farley and Herman Daly in a workbook with Island Press (2005), and recognized by University of Vermont’s inaugural service-learning award. His most recent co-edited book on The Great Conservation Experiment: Voices from the Adirondack Park was published by Syracuse University Press in July 2009. He is also president of the U.S. Society for Ecological Economics, past president of the Adirondack Research Consortium (ARC), past board member of the International Society for Ecological Economics, and currently serves as board member of the ARC, trustee of the Conservation and Research Foundation, executive editor of the Adirondack Journal of Environmental Studies, and editorial board member of Environmental Policy and Governance and Ecological Economics Reviews.

Angella Gibbons, Founder and Director of EarthWalk, has been connecting groups of children to the Earth for 25 years. She was the founder and director of Lotus Lake Discovery Center in Williamstown, VT. from 1993-2003, creating and leading environmental and adventure based school programs for over 15,000 students, teachers, and community members. Angella led the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum Summer Kayak Building Expedition Program for teens, from 1998-2004. Her experiences also include teaching 1st and 2nd grade, and 7th and 8th grade science in CostaRica. Her certifications and coursework include: B.A. from UVM (1983), expeditions with the National Outdoor Leadership School and Outward Bound, and certification in Wildlife Tracking. Angella is a certified lifeguard and Wilderness First Responder.

Amy Seidl is a practiced ecologist, activist and author who writes with a lucid and passionate eye about the state of life itself in the age of global warming. By drawing on her 20-year career studying ecology, evolution, and butterflies across the North American continent, she illuminates the historical significance and the everyday impacts of global warming upon the 21st century landscape. A passionate speaker on contemporary environmental issues, Amy frequently keynotes and lectures on climate change, renewable energy, local food systems, and the emerging field of sustainability science. Her research in ecological systems and alternative energy makes her a sought-after lecturer on global warming and she emphasizes the need to innovate and build new physical infrastructures that do not rely on fossil fuels.

Elizabeth Courtney began her career as a printmaker and ceramicist. After moving to Vermont in 1974, she developed an interest in land use issues. In 1979, she enrolled in the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and graduated in 1982 with a Master’s Degree in Landscape Architecture, she returned to Vermont to practice land use planning. Madeleine Kunin appointed her to the Vermont Environmental Board in 1985 where she served three governors over nine years and was chair from 1990 to 1994. She is a 1995 Harvard Loeb Fellow in Advanced Environmental Studies. She served on the Vermont Law School Board of Trustees from 1995-2004. Elizabeth was the Executive Director of the Vermont Natural Resources Council from 1997 to 2011 and the Legacy Project Director from 2011 to 2012, during which time she authored, with Eric Zencey, Greening Vermont: The Search for a Sustainable State.

Ben Graham is an architectural designer by trade with a B.Arch from the Rhode Island School of Design. He is also a third generation woodworker and housebuilder, learning homebuilding first-hand from his grandfather. He is a partner in New Frameworks, the Natural Design Build company located in Burlington, Vermont. Ben has been at the front of developing the natural building movement in Vermont and the Northeast since 2000 as a professional contractor and an organizer for the Network of Natural Builders in the Northeast. His advocacy work has brought him attention in books, newspapers, TV and conferences.

Today will be an interview with Ben Falk of Whole Systems Design. Ben developed Whole Systems Design as a land-based response to biological and cultural extinction and the increasing separation between people and elemental things. Life as a designer, builder, ecologist, tree-tender, and backcountry traveler continually informs Ben’s integrative approach to developing landscapes and buildings. His home landscape and the WSD studio site in Vermont's Mad River Valley serve as a proving ground for the innovative land developments featured in the projects of Whole Systems Design. Ben has studied architecture and landscape architecture at the graduate level and holds a master’s degree in land-use planning and design. He has taught design courses at the University of Vermont and Harvard’s Arnold Arboretum as well as on permaculture design, microclimate design, and design for climate change. He recently served on the Board of Directors at the Yestermorrow Design-Build School and teaches there from time to time. Ben latest book, The Resilient Farm and Homestead can be purchased on his website.

Tom is an award-winning high school teacher, leading sustainability educator, prominent local food activist, and most recently the founding executive director of the Center for Sustainable Systems. He is a chief architect of a model of service learning that integrates curriculum through a school greenhouse and gardens that provide food for the school system’s lunch program, using soil derived from the cafeteria food scraps.

This week our guest is Bennett Shapiro of Madtch Sound. If you go to a live music event in this area, you are bound to see Bennett, walking around with his magic tablet, making things sound good. We talk to Bennett about his journey as a sound engineer, the music scene in central Vermont and his ideas about integrating our live podcast into the Rabble-Rouser Chocolate Factory and Community Center.

This episode is a conversation about how the Bordertown podcast aligns with the Rabble Rouser creative vision. Our guest is the founder of Nutty Steph’s and one of the visionary’s behind Rabble Rouser, Jaquelyn Rieke. She will provide background on the formation of the Rabble Rouser, collaboratively-owned Chocolate Factory and Community Center, and discuss the creative vision. Vic Guadagno will discuss ecomedia and the goals of the Bordertown Podcast. Music Director Rob Meehan discusses our musical ideas, and offers insight as a long-time advocate for food justice.

In this episode we join the Rabble Rouser community at their launch party. We hear from Jaquelyn Rieke (aka Nutty Steph), the visionary behind this undertaking. We also hear from Bill Kaplan, forward thinking landlord with a strong commitment to community. We speak with just a few of the folks behind the building renovation, architect Tolya Stonorov, woodworker Eyrich Stauffer painter/artist Hans Stewart. We chat briefly with Montpelier Alive’s Dan Groberg and wrap up with a chat with owner of the Hive, and now Rabble Rousers, Ryan Geary. This episode represents a new format for the Bordertown podcast as we are recording live, in a public setting. This is the first of a long-discussed format, in hopes to better achieve our goal of creating conditions for relationships building and enriching communication in our region.