We want to offer our gratitude to everyone who reached out to share their town listserv stories and to share their feedback when we announced our decision to step back from hosting the town-based listservs. Over the past few months, we’ve gotten to hear from many subscribers about their experiences, primarily positive but also including some challenges. Hearing directly from our Upper Valley neighbors is always incredibly valuable.
While there are some details behind our decision that we are unable to share, we can share that in this moment the combination of factors including financial, staff capacity, and legal risk means that it is time for us to step back. Vital Communities’ role in a project often shifts depending on what is needed. Sometimes this means being a project lead, other times it means being a partner, and sometimes it means stepping back so that others with the right expertise and resources can carry the work forward.
When we initially shared the upcoming change, we identified Front Porch Forum as an alternative community-focused online gathering spot that would allow continuity for community connection, albeit with a different look and some changes in posting processes. It was important to us that communities had another space to connect and Front Porch Forum was able to cover the 38 communities with town listservs, as well as the other communities in our service area.
Now, there is also a dedicated group of current and past list managers creating a new organization, UVLists, to host the town-based listservs going forward. Vital Communities is reviewing the MOU that this group has shared with us, and we will continue the active town-based listservs while they establish this new entity and as we clarify a transition process. We hope you’ll join us in thanking the list managers, past and present, who volunteer their time and energy to support this resource.
Stepping back from the town-based listservs allows Vital Communities’ staff to focus on the three Upper Valley-wide listservs (Events, Goods, and Services-Plus), nine topic-focused listservs (e.g. Leadership Upper Valley Alums), and our full program portfolio, including work on housing, transportation, food systems resilience, climate & energy, and civic engagement & leadership. Each of these program areas contributes to advancing Vital Communities’ mission to engage Upper Valley people, organizations, and communities to create equitable solutions to our region’s challenges, with a focus on those disproportionately impacted by them. You can learn more about the great work our team is doing at https://vitalcommunities.org/.
We will continue to share updates regarding the town-based listservs as details are available.
Published 9/3/2026