The Rutland Regional Planning Commission (RRPC) and the Rutland Farm and Food Link (RAFFL) have been selected to host AmeriCorps VISTA positions. For the next year, Monika Ganguly-Kiefner, a recent graduate of Green Mountain College in Poultney, will be working for RRPC and Jenn Simons, who graduated from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 2012, will join the RAFFL staff. Both women graduated with 4.0 GPAs and were in their schools’ honor programs.
Ganguly-Kiefner will be working to ensure that RRPC regional programs designed to alleviate poverty are reaching low-income residents in the Rutland Region. She will be working on building healthy communities projects as part of a Vermont Health Department grant. Ganguly-Kiefner says, “I’m excited that my work at the RRPC creating healthy lifestyles and increased mixed-use road development will ultimately help the region becoming a stronger community – for all residents.”
Simons will be working to help low-income individuals find affordable fresh local food as well as learn how to incorporate more nutritious ingredients into the food they buy. Simons, who has been a farm and greenhouse apprentice in Nebraska, will be responsible for building RAFFL’s Glean Team program’s volunteer base. RAFFL director Tara Kelly says, “Jenn is bringing great, positive energy and skills that will increase the amount of fresh, nutritional food we “glean” from area farms and distribute to Rutland area residents who are struggling to make ends meet. She will also further develop our systems for this program extending her contribution well beyond her one-year term of service.”
AmeriCorps VISTA is the national service program designed specifically to fight poverty. Founded as Volunteers in Service to America in 1965 and incorporated into the AmeriCorps network of programs in 1993, VISTA has been on the front lines in the fight against poverty in America for more than 40 years.