The Vermont Climate Economy Model Communities Program, which ran from 2017-21, was a year-long community engagement process that helped communities build and implement priority actions that increase economic vitality and affordability in a time of climate change. The ultimate goal was to model rapid change by implementing energy efficiency, transportation system transformation, renewable energy generation, working lands development, and entrepreneurship and business incubation to spur economic progress. The Model Communities Program, a partnership with VCRD, Efficiency Vermont, Vermont utilities, and others, provided concentrated services in two communities annually.
Learn more about projects launched in the reports for communities that participated: Pownal, Middlebury, Randolph, Swanton, Marshfield/Plainfield, Dorset, and Rochester.
In 2022, this program was reinvisioned to support more communities annually and renamed the Climate Economy Resilient Communities program.
Thanks to VLITE, Jane’s Trust Foundation, the High Meadows Fund, the Sustainable Future Fund of the Vermont Community Foundation, the Bay and Paul Foundations, the Oakland Foundation, and VCRD members for supporting the program.