Vermont is a place full of beauty and charm, but also realities of life, hard work and poverty. It suffers from all the ills that other places do, but there's a working knowledge of those hardships, in many cases.

Vermonters seem to have a common awareness of being in this particular place. They seem to have agreed to be identified with this place, and there is often a high sense of volunteerism, or participation.

Global and national trends; global warming, peak oil, international relations and war. Local trends;maintaining infrastructure, supporting the poor, maintaining a balance for working class and costs of services.

locally owned businesses with community service education that is complementary w/locally owned and creative economic strategies energy efficiency and environ. benign economic development development and fostering of local agriculture

These priorities should be echoed and agreed upon by different elements of our business, government, non-profit and philanthropic communities

Home, family, hard work, great friends, landscape and environment connected to people directly (like firewood and gardens), etc

Independence, town meeting and decision making in communities. Local control, small scale, and willingness to help, with a yankee stubbornness and self-reliance.

Challenges: taking care of Vermonters in the midst of global and national trends and in-state problems. Opportunities: basing plans on our assets and resources, especially those in our wider region.

To have all business,education,and government focus on community service. Programs that develop a innate sense of volunteerism and support for our neighbors throughout our lives in VT.

Montpelier should have a welcoming way of introducing newcomers to the communities' assets and events and so on.

Home. Hills trees water family and community. Strong honest congressional delegation.

Independence.

Energy and the untapped labor force in the undereducated and welfare populations

energy and food independence

St Johnsbury is a thoughtful and diverse community with a good handle on moving forward intelligently.

Vermont has been my home for 75+ years. It is a beautiful rural state.

Vermont's beauty and its rural nature.

Challenges: High living costs, youth leaving Vt, permiting process too long. Medical care controls restrict care givers and hospitals. Doctors just out of school can not afford to practice in Vt. Opportunities: Develop energy resources, such as wood chip heat, wind; hydro; plan to keep operating Vt Yankee. Manage our wood lands. Better job in training our youth in job skills.

Relax some and streamline the permitting process, promote teaching and training of our youth for a productive life. encourage new ideas, promote responsibility for each individual and their families.

For the most part, what is good for Vermont is also good for Bennington.

A state with a unique personality, apparent as soon as the border is crossed. My home; shared with everyone else connected to Vermont.

Sense of place Schedule governed by the seasons Interdependence Hard work

Crumbling infrastructure (roads, bridges, buildings.)The opportunity to invent a better way will never be a reality because it would mean doing things differently.

Consider new and better versions of everything from governance to taxation. Reach consensus on generally agreed upon outcomes and design steps to reach them instead of changing plans "midstream" when we aren't having success.

Vermont, as a state, is my community. Too many don't see the forest (state) for the trees (localities).Ideally there would be a trickle up effect, but why not use gravity and try more of a trickle down approach?

A welcome step back from the rest of our country gone mad.

Knowing (not thinking) that less is more, thinking ahead about energy issues, appreciating solitude.

Vermont's rural landscape and old school mindset leave us without many tech jobs or the atmosphere to attract young professionals. This leaves our beautiful state quaint and charming, but left behind and aging. As for opportunities, Vermonters live the old cliche, "thinking outside the box." We may be the breath of fresh air the US desperately needs, that is if anyone will listen.

Maintaining values while joining the 21st century.

Marlboro even has a four-year college, but the kids scram at graduation. It's a beautiful, special place that I will always call home, but it's not where I can work and live.

Vermont is a place where people respect and enjoy each other, let people live as they choose, and are helpful with those who have few choices. We are mostly a modest, reasonable group of people with opinions and are more positive about our State than most Americans. We think Vermont has character and we want it to stay that way.

The aging population is going to stress Vermont more than any other issue in the next decades; we do not have the resources or facilities to care adequately for aging, ill, disabled or troubled people in great numbers. Our challenge is too keep the quality of interpersonal respect, caring and tolerance when we face these issues of age and decline.

Improve education and job opportunities for the young, particularly in higher paying, technology, and education-oriented work; make certain new populations are welcomed and encouraged; communicate the character of Vermont so our new residents understand what we value here.

I live in two communities in Vermont, one very small, one Burlington. These issues are equally important in each. I suspect the larger towns will have an easier time managing challenge but are also more endangered in losing their Vermont character. Personally, as I get older I'd prefer to live in the small town and enjoy my neighbors and neighborhood.

A place where people have political agency and an corrupted place to live.

Do unto others, protect the landscape, balance the forces of capitalism with common sense.

To be a model for the nation/ world.

Protect our environment, Local decision making, Power of people to determine their future

This is getting harder to do in Burlington.

Convene 6-8 of Vermont's best thinkers from any walk of life. The thinkers should leave their agendas, but not their values, at the door and spend a month of intensive preparation and research, considering likely outcomes. They should collaborate for several days to develop two or three most likely scenarios and the resulting snapshot of Vermont in 5-7 years.

I was born here and appreciate the high quality of life, four seasons, and wonderful geography. Unfortunately the state has been taken over politically by trust fund utopian minded fiscal liberals who have created a socialist state. The upper middle class is being driven out of the state by high taxes.

The true Vermonters value fierce independence, freedom, and the environment. The new Vermonters (the imported trust fund liberals) value socialism and regulation cloaked as concern for the environment.

Our young people are leaving at 4x the national average due to high taxes and lack of good career opportunities with larger companies. The opportunity is to create a pro-economy political agenda and incent growth of responsible business to drive our economy and our tax base. Create an affordable lifestyle for people to thrive rather than spread entitlements.

Enhance the economy, strengthen the tax base, lower the tax burden, create opportunities for young people to thrive (18 to 35 year olds that we are among the lowest in % of population). Create affordable housing.

All of them apply in spades. Richmond is full of imported trust fund liberals and there are no good jobs and no affordable housing for 18 to 35 year olds. Why would they stay here?

Vermont means community. A place where people come together to support one another by growing and purchasing fresh, local food and other products. Vermonters also share an open voice for positive change within the State & the country. The State is like no other, and I'm proud to live here.

A sense of community and support for other Vermonters.

maintaining vibrant communities and concentrating growth in urban areas, and limiting our dependence on cars.

1. Implementing smart growth principles in community centers. 2. Focus on buying local, supporting Vermont made products. 3. Examine alternative transportation options throughout the State. 4. Examine ways to reduce carbon emissions within each household.

They are all extremely necessary throughout all of Chittenden County.

Vermont ~ beautiful to the eye, peaceful to the soul, once a farming state, a place to raise families, hard working men & women dedicated to the love of Vermont, willing to fight for it. Now, most of that is lost by outsiders coming in and bringing what they supposively wanted to leave behind. Too much gov't control, yankee pride has been stripped away Headed toward socialism.

True Vermonters are scarce. They would share all they had. Each community was like a large family getting together for a community supper, chatting, laughing. Today people keep more to themselves and values have changed.

Short changing our youth. Too many non-essential subjects being taught consequently they are not prepared for their future. The 1-10 student/teacher ratio is appauling. High costs of education is not producing better students. Grades are down standards are down. We put far too much emphasis on the buildings rather than the quality of care. Our priorities are in the wrong places.

Education where students are in the 80 - 85 percentile, jobs available for local people not "imported" ones, producing more from the land instead of importing our essentials from foreign countries. We have become concerned with tourism than meeting the needs of our people that grew up here and want to stay here. There needs to be more of a balance.

We have become a bedroom community for people working outside the area. We have no real industry here. Short of a court house, post office, a small grocery store, a bank, a couple schools, a library and a few farms left a couple bed & breakfasts that is it. There is no real revenue coming from within yet taxes continue to rise.

The way of life, quiet and content! A great place for children to be raised and values to be instilled.

The small town communities. Neighbors helping neighbors!

Keeping our children in the state for well paid careers.

Education, Jobs and pulling all communities together ~ working together.

a place where rural livelihoods are still possible, having space to do my own thing without a lot of people around, a variety of wild animals and plants, a place where nature still has some breathing room, a community of people who care about the land, proud of our stance on gay rights

respect for land desire to hold onto traditional livelihoods live and let live, don't interfere in others' lives self-sufficiency and independence

breaking down social and ideological divisions a class divide that people don't talk about keeping rural livelihoods viable getting everyone on board for environmental initiatives creating small scale local economies, more self-sufficiency

economic justice - better jobs and better work conditions conserving the working landscape improving environmental health strengthen communities

My community has a long way to go. Very divided, bedroom community. I'd like to see more engagement here across ideological and political and class divides. I wish our town had more of a center and had more viable businesses. I wish there was work for me nearby.

A New England state that offered varied seasons with wonderful, local characters to entertain us all while remaining self supporting individuals. Today it means, high taxes, too much government, poor education, social services that are out of control run by people who moved here to have the old Vermont and changed it.

True Vermonters appreciate individuality. They are kind to their neighbors, tend to their own business, invest countless hours in their community and never gossip.

The need to clearly define what is productivity - not attending a meeting - and reducing all groups - government, non profits etc. that are funded by tax dollars to ones that can demonstrate how the funds are used and that the funds provide benefits which are not duplicated in other programs and reach lots of citizens.

<To make Vermont a State where all can live and work with a decent income. Giving money to the poor hasn't worked. Find a way to bring back pride to the poor, provide them with the same education the 'good' people get and reduce government so new businesses will offer reasonable jobs.

Our community has approximately twice the state average for free and reduced lunches - in a self study more than twice the state average of 8th graders ours stated they use alcohol - the social services provided in our community run up $100,000s of thousands of dollars of expenses every year and for what - the systems aren't working and they need to be repaired.

Historic downtowns & village centers as centers of business; locally grown products; quality public schools; clean mountains, fields, lakes,& rivers; open & green space free of billboards; limited strip mall development & sprawl; snow

A commitment to much of the above & independence.

Challenges - sprawl; keeping downtowns/village centers vibrant & diverse; retaining small & quality schools; childcare for infants/toddlers/pre-schoolers; elder care; informing tourists about places of interest without billboards. Opportunities - the many places of interest in VT, farmers markets, downtown businesses, 3rd stories of buildings to put back in use; small schools.

Think of ways to diversify the state's reliance on tourism for its revenue while trying to boost tourism (from residents within the state & out of state); focus not on new housing construction but rehabilitating older homes & helping elders find ways to live & age in home (either their current home or a smaller home/apartment); retaining ag land & find ways to put land back into work.

<Montpelier does a great job keeping its downtown vibrant. Luckily it's geography prevents a lot of sprawl, but it could do a better job encouraging the use of 3rd floors as housing. Hopefully the voters will continue to approve school budgets to keep and improve the quality of its schools. A preshool would be great too!

A state of great natural beauty, rich heritage, and ideals of both tolerance and community spirit that are sometimes in conflict. Huge potential for developing solutions that could be replicated elsewhere. Small enough that each person matters. Big ideas.

Many Vermonters share an optimitstic hands-on attitude that insists that problems are fixable, and that we are the ones to fix them- if we could only agree on how...but for many, basic survival is taking up most of our energy and time, so their voices aren't often heard.

Life is keeping families so busy, and funding issues are keeping non-profits so busy, that there isn't enough communication between different groups and organizations.We're small enough to make it work- we could be a model for larger places.

Communication between groups and with the community at large is the key- we can't afford to waste resources by re-inventing the wheel in each program or town. The larger issues are all related- let's take a broader, community-wide approach to solving them.

If we could create better means for communicating across Franklin and Grand Isle counties, we could accomplish so much more- the economy, the environment, health, education, youth and age- these should not be worked on as though they were separate issues

An independant way of life, with an opportunity, to live life to it's fullest.

Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness

To many on line forums and not enought country picnics.

Support The Families of middle income america, the back bone of any economy.

School Choice, real choice for everyone, for any school. To include free college to our citizens. Mass transportation around the towns we live in, from small busses to trains. County wide government supporting county wide highways and roads.

Need economical power and facilities for industry in Franklin County, and to find the right industry. If raw materials could be brought in and product shipped out, we would have a better quality of life with a shorter commute for labor. This has been happening to some extent with Enosburg Industrial Park, but to no avail so far.

Our Route 105 is loaded with commuters going somewhere else to work. How many are going just to St. Albans, Georgia, or Swanton I don't know. It would be nice if more industry could come to northeast Franklin County to use some of the labor force. A 2-hour ride on each end of the work day doesn't seem very enjoyable to me.

Vermont has become a state where most of the politically active population envy wealth and spend their time trying to arrange to get a piece of what they didn't earn.

I have no idea - Most politically active Vermonters have no values worth sharing.

The challenge is to provide an easy to understand, level playing field that will allow Vermonters to quickly and without "red tape" exploit economic opportunities.

Working together is less important than achieveing something on your own - Togetherness is the problem - not the solution.

It is irrelevent to talk about us - Vermont should be rebuilt on its history of individual self-sufficiency. We talk a lot but most Vermonters will wait for someone else to do something and the obstacles in place for the "doers" are not worth the effort to overcome.

"A faux 19th century agricultural theme park for wealthy strangers." Martin Harris

Hmm. Not many. There are two strongly conflicting cultures and sets of values here: loony left and sober realism. The kids, always perceptive and creative, used to label members of these two cultures "preps and rednecks."

The lunatics are in charge of the asylum here--leftist ideology trumps application of common sense to find practical approaches to difficult problems: we are in ecomonic and demographic crash mode, but the lefties don't seem concerned; too busy impeaching the president, encouraging sexual deviance, etc.

Lower taxes, jobs and homes for young families.

Weybridge is a classic retirement home for rich lefties from elsewhere. God help us.

Vermont means ancient rolling hill, waving hay, judging the seasons by the shape of the cornfields, the occassional whiff of dairy-cow, fishing, hiking, friends and family.

We value the land, our neighbors, our democratic rights, and the Green Mountain Boys.

Flatlanders.

We need to think-out our environmental initiatives better. Cow-Power increases factory farming, CFLs contain Mercury and Ethanol will raise the price of land beyond what the richest woodchuck could afford. We need to grow sustainably, re-organize around town centers, support our local farmers and keep our state's values intact.

Pawlet is a brilliant town, with gorgeous natural resources, well-run farms, smiling neighbors and an up-beat little downtown. Supporting local goods is easy at Mach's general store, where local products abound.

Vermont is a relatively safe place to be and it is beautiful. I could not move because I've gotten used to having most of the same civil rights as everyone else and it would be extremely difficult to give that up.

I'm not sure we are homogeneous enough to answer. Values I hope we share are honesty, doing your share, live and let live.

Roads, sewers, water treatment, energy resources. How do we respect freedom of religion when some people's religion deny others freedom If IBM can self insure, why not Vermont. If we taxed fairly, would rich folks leave? What effect? Small businesses benefit all.

Renewable energy. Protect our water supply. Fair taxation. Education reform.

Our sewers are a mess. We don't know what's in our water since we drink what we urinate. Energy and food costs are through the roof. Our community does not support the school.

Vermont means HOME to me. I was born and raised here, and I'm fiercely proud of our state for so many reasons. Vermont and Vermonters have such a tradition of independent thinking and open-mindedness. Vermont means small town warmth at its best.

I believe Vermonters share a common value around preserving the quality of life in our state. I believe Vermonters hold "independent spirit" as a common value and take pride in our state's often quirky record in this arena. For the most part, I think Vermonters share a common value around the dignity and worth of all humans, and appreciating the value of diversity.

Challenges for Vermont include the everpresent loom of sprawl, and the increasing environmental and energy demands it represents. A central challenge this state faces is that our young people graduate and move elsewhere, while people moving into Vermont tend to be past the age of entering the workforce in an entrylevel or journeyman level, creating workforce issues.

I would see our priorities as maintaining that historical focus on preserving quality of life and what makes Vermont special and unique, restricting development on natural lands, moving forward and then keeping pace with technological growth, and continuing a focus on small businesses and specialty agriculture.

I believe my community tries hard on a number of these values and challenges that I mention in my thoughts. My community works hard for a vibrant downtown, preservation of natural lands, and encouragement of small business.

They value individual liberty and social responsibility for a diverse community. They also value the environment and participatory government and a rich cultural life.

The rapidly rising cost of health care is driving the costs of government services which is putting pressure on both individuals and local busineses. The lack of gubernatoral leadership in addressing the problems of the state out of a false sense of 'affordability' is imperiling the enviroment, the infrastructure, the economy and responsible development in the State.

Health care for all the election of a progressive minded governor who is proactive and not a roadblock to creative solutions to our problems.

Burlington needs to elect another progressive person to the State Legislature to help achieve enough votes to override the Governor's veto of any solution that might work. Solving the health care crisis will alleviate the pressure on city government's lack of financial resources to deal with a range of postponed problems

"Vermont's State/Local Tax Burden Highest in the Nation During the past three decades Vermont's state and local tax burden has consistently ranked among the nation's highest. Estimated at 14.1% of income, Vermont’s state and local taxes are currently the highest in the nation, well above the national average of 11.0%."(http://www.taxfoundation.org/research/topic/62.html)

Independence - fine - but not in fragmenting the state's education "system" into far too many tiny school systems with inadequate resources and low teacher salaries.

Challenge: rising fuel costs, plus low tax base, make Vermont one of the most expensive states as far as basic living costs. Fewer tourists, second homes, retirees. Opportunities: got to realize potential income sources of the landscape and geography.

Increasing tax base, lowering fuel costs, standardizing educational cost and delivery structures across the state.

I live in Burlington: very high city and state taxes, and fuel costs during the winter. Yet, the school system doesn't even pay for an earned doctorate.

Rugged, independent, beautiful, progressive, democratic,creative, innovative, resourceful, but politically dysfunctional

Years ago I would have said "community" but I think interest in "community" has weakened significantly. We have become much more polarized and and partisan, with the result that we don't get the best and brightest to enage in community and politics.

We have a huge problem with the separation between the haves and the have nots, even in Vermont. Similarly, we have not figured out how to build community among native Vermonters and newcomers, with both groups largely suspicious of each other.

One of the most divisive issues in Vermont and nationally is the whole pro choice vs pro life debate. We need leadership that works to bring the two sides together by working on the underlying issue - preventing unwanted pregnancies in the first place.

Our community has lacked good leadership for years, in both the municipal arena and education. For some reason we have been unable to attract the strong leaders in the community into public service and other forms of civic engagement. I attribute most of the problem to rampant partisanship, a lack of civil discourse, over regulation and undue public scrutiny

I came to Vermont to earn my living connected to the woods. I have seen my neighborhood swamped by people who are opposed to almost every element of earning a living from our woodlands. I no longer know what Vermont means.

As people try to control how I use my land, what kind of business I run on my own land, how much water I can use, even what temperature I can store the hot water in my own home, whether I can get cell phone service, whether a road can be straightened, I have come to doubt whether we do share any values whatsoever.

If the basic creativity of our own people could be unleashed and set free from the dead hand of the past which so many people among "the brightest and the best" now support; if the genius of Vermonters could be released, I think Vermont has a very bright future.

First is to reduce the taxes which drain capital from young entrepreneurs precisely when they most need it, and secondly eliminate the endless regulatory second guessing which constantly cripples innovation and development of human capital.

Eden is burdened by lousy regulation, lousy infrastructure, lousy tax policy, and lousy government policies. Fifty years ago two thirds of the population were employed in town. Today, absent the school, only about 5% is. That change resulted from deliberate government policies at all levels -- and it has destroyed Eden as a community.

A place that is concerned about the environment and where I can live with my partner in the hope of someday soon being able to MARRY.

Open mindedness when educated to social issues

Keeping younger people here due to lack of competitive jobs. Integrating people of color into communities. Making Gay marriage legal

Work toward making state GREEN, pass legislature for GAY marriage

Great quality of life...great community spirit...

independence

aging population, taxes too high for size of economic population, not enough rental properties everyone forced to own a home so that property taxes are too high and a prebate rebate system is required

work on bringing industries here that cn work in a green and friendly manner....train our students for those green jobs...get rid of our teachers union...NEA there is no place for it here in a state our size.

we need our state roads better maintained for starters....the state construction budget needs to be better funded to keep pace with aging schools, the state needs to fund the health services sector so the education budget is not forced to carry their burden under the "education" umbrella