Charlie Watt is the owner and operator of Home Coming Seeds, an open-pollinated seed farm specializing in vegetable, flower and herb seeds with a focus on bioregional adaptation.

Charlie was hired in May of 2023 to manage the Montpelier Community Feast Farm, a no-till farm run by the Parks and Trees Department in collaboration with Montpelier's Community Services Department. They grow fresh, healthy produce for food-insecure neighbors in Montpelier.

The Feast Farm was located at the convergence of the Winooski River and the Stevens Branch between Barre and Montpelier Vermont. Two month after Charlie was hired, on July 10 & 11, 2023 over 12 inches of rain fell, causing the river to crest approximately 21.29 feet. The Feast Farm, as well as much of the infrastructure, businesses, landscapes and homes of central Vermont were permanently impacted.

Over the next year, straddled with decreasing resources and increasing hydrological pressure, the Parks Department was still able to serve as first response to the flood disaster (as a key partner in Montpelier’s central flood response hub), organize community events to build relationships and increase capacity, AND reestablish their farm at a new, city-owned location, a couple hundred feet above the flood plain on Country Club Road. I was amazed to see how quickly they established their farm and organized conversation abouit potential reuse of this location

Charlie has moved onto the next chapter in his life, which is a farm-based seed company called Home Coming Seeds. a seed company located in Northfield Vermont. Charlie and his family have made quick progress establishing the initial growing area, constructing support structures around the farm, launching the company and preparing to launch their catalog in 2026.

Energy is still gathering around the Country Club Road Property and a recent design excercisse generated a varity of visions which you can review at Vision Montpelier.

Music for this Podcast - "Grandfather Mountain" by Railroad Earth.

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Born and raised in New Jersey, Karen Hatcher spent much of her career, managing nonprofit organizations. She made her way to New England about 13 years ago and lives with her husband Mark who is a luthier. Since the flood of July 10th 2024, Karen, along with Michael Zahner, has been managing fundraising and grant coordination for disaster recovery in the town of Plainfield. An an October 9th, 2024 "Bridge" Article, Plainfield Select Board chair Karl Bissex introduced Karen as the "master of pulling together a team of people who can get money.”

"My life was never a straight line" Karen describes, "I just love how there's such synchronicity...in terms of all you've done in your life, and all the experiences you've had can come into play and can actually serve where you are".

Bordertown is an ecomedia project coming to you from the upper Winooski watershed in central Vermont. Our goal is to serve as an instrument for relationship building and communication, and to encourage the conversation around resiliency, equity and justice. Our intention is to celebrate life and community - and to help create conditions for all life to thrive.

Music for this Podcast - "Blues Highway" by Railroad Earth.

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Meg Mott has been called a Constitutional Wrangler, whose stated mission is “teach ordinary citizens how to think through the various constitutional issues in a specific controversy”. Meg is a writer, teacher and the town moderator of Putney, Vermont. She uses dynamic and innovative strategies to help people find a common language.

After twenty years of teaching political theory and constitutional law to Marlboro College undergraduates, Meg has taken her love of argument to the general public. Her award-winning series Debating Our Rights on the first ten amendments, brings civil discussions on contentious issues to public libraries and colleges.

In 2008, after moving to Putney, Vermont, Meg received an invitation to run for town meeting moderator, and gaveled in her first gathering in 2015. She has been the town moderator ever since.

“I was once very suspicious of Robert’s Rules of Order,” said Meg, who recalled living in a yurt as her wife built their goat farm. “Was it just patriarchy or white supremacy or heteronormativity? I had all my big words. I came to realize that communities were lost if they stopped listening to each other,” she said in a recent interview. “In these times, we need to be more careful that we do not engage in viewpoint discrimination.” (VT Digger, 2/28/24)

Meg credits her interest in argument/discourse to Clarence Darrow, a first amendment and due process attorney. She recalls that Darrow helped her understand that “if you want people to do a better job at ruling themselves, they better have some pretty strong principles, and everybody’s going to want to give up on those principles”. She realized that our constitutional structure is critical to helping people govern themselves.

Meg is a collaborator with the Ecological Planning Laboratory at the University of Vermont. The Ecological Planning Laboratory helps communities tackle vital projects on their land, offering long-term support in partnership with UVM Extension and the Field Naturalist graduate program. The EPL work emphasizes social-ecological health at the watershed scale.

Bordertown is an ecomedia project coming to you from the upper Winooski watershed in central Vermont. Our goal is to serve as an instrument for relationship building and communication, and to encourage the conversation around resiliency, equity and justice. Our intention is to celebrate life and community - and to help create conditions for all life to thrive.

Music for this Podcast - "Adding My Voice" by Railroad Earth.

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