United Valley Interfaith Project

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Our Issue Campaigns

UVIP is currently focused to two issues, Transportation and Housing. As we grow, the issues we work on will change. Over time, new issues will arise from the process of building relationships and listening to one another’s hopes and dreams for all in our region.

The Transportation Issue Team is currently focused on enhancing transportation access to Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital in Lebanon, coordinating non-emergency medical transportation across Sullivan and Grafton counties in New Hampshire, and advocating for higher and more sustainable support for public transit generally.

The Housing Issue Team is currently focused on the creation of warming shelters for homeless people on very cold winter nights in Claremont and elsewhere across the region.

Transportation Issue Team

The centralizing of jobs and services in one part of our region has increased the importance and impact of transportation priorities, especially on older people and people of limited means. The stresses of the economic downturn and the need to lessen our collective carbon footprint have added to this importance. UVIP Leaders have worked to increase access to public transportation and in doing so have become a critical voice in the larger discussion around transportation policy and its connection to the issues of medical care, development, jobs, commerce, and environmental and public health. UVIP’s work on transportation is based on a commitment to justice, and the belief that transportation policy should address the social and economic challenges facing people in our region.

With its formation in the spring of 2008, the work of the Transportation Issue Team has exemplified the need, purpose, and potential of community organizing. After a series of research actions to better understand the transportation challenges faced by our communities, the team organized to win public transportation to Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital in Lebanon, NH. On May 17th, 2009 over two hundred people attended a public action where UVIP Leaders won a commitment from fifteen public officials to improve public transportation access to the hospital and to solve the problem of a dangerous pedestrian underpass. The Upper Valley Lake Sunapee Regional Planning Commission responded with bringing together the stakeholders to develop a proposal to solve the problem. UVIP played a key role in ensuring that the commission’s proposal would benefit people most in need of public transportation. In the summer of 2010, a proposal was issued that included a new bus route to the hospital and the creation of pedestrian-safe access at the dangerous underpass. By the autumn of 2010, UVIP Leaders had won commitment from the hospital to fund part of the new bus route. The team continues to work to ensure public transportation access to the hospital. Through this campaign, UVIP Leaders have come to represent a needed community voice on the various transportation priorities in the region and have demonstrated the success of collective action in working for justice.


Transportation Issue Team Acomplishments

  • Built relationships with the region’s public bus providers, the Regional Planning Commission, Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital, state agencies, city officials and transportation and medical care advocacy groups.

  • Conducted UVIP’s first Public Action to win public bus service to Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital.

  • Played a key role in finding solutions to win public bus service and to ensure the needs of the community are addressed by decision makers who will implement these solutions.

  • Represent the community voice on the Regional Coordinating Councils working to improve effectiveness of transportation for Medicaid patients and others in Sullivan, Coos and Grafton Counties.

  • Testified at various public meetings in support of increased funding for public transportation, including the 2010 Sullivan County budget hearings.
    Serve on the steering committee to plan bus service connecting Claremont and Lebanon.

  • Won commitment from Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital to fund a portion of a new public bus route connecting the hospital campus to downtown Lebanon and Centerra Center.

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Housing Issue Team

Over the last two years, the economic downturn, and the reduction in social services have contributed to the complex challenges related to housing in our region.

These challenges range from homelessness to a lack of affordable housing to residential development patterns. UVIP Leaders have focused our work on challenges faced by people in the community and in our member groups. We strive to identify and understand the issues related to these challenges, and to organize to win solutions that address these challenges and ensure greater justice for all people.

The 2008 Issues Assembly resulted in the convening of the Housing Issue Team. The team conducted a series of research actions to identify an issue to work on and to understand our capacity to organize and win on housing issues. The team decided to work on the lack of funding for low-income weatherization programs and the lack of emergency cold-weather shelter for homeless people. Throughout 2009, the team conducted extensive research and developed relationships with allies to increase stable funding of weatherization programs for low income people. In 2010, the team organized for the establishment of an emergency cold-weather shelter in the Claremont area. The team convened a group of Claremont churches to commit to opening a shelter and won support from Claremont city officials. This work continues and in the process of organizing on these issues, UVIP Leaders have developed their leadership skills, engaged public officials on policy concerns, and built meaningful relationships.


Housing Issue Team Accomplishments

  • Developed relationships with affordable housing advocates in Vermont and New Hampshire and became members of the Vermont Affordable Housing Coalition and Housing Action New Hampshire.

  • Organized a Vermont housing forum focused on the negative impact of proposed cuts in housing and homelessness prevention programs and urged Vermont legislators to oppose these cuts.

  • Testified before the New Hampshire State Legislature in favor of a bill to strengthen the ability of municipalities to enforce housing code violations of out-of-state owned properties.

  • Participated in Vermont Affordable Housing Coalition’s legislative day of action to encourage state legislators to address the increasing need for affordable housing.

  • Researched low income weatherization programs in both states and organized to develop consensus for increased and stable funding of a New Hampshire program to weatherize over 16,000 homes on current waiting list.

  • Convened a working group of six Claremont area churches committed to establishing a cold-weather emergency shelter and to win support from city officials to open a shelter.

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