LGBT Foundation Launches Community-Building Website
www.vtgayguide.com contains commerce, resources, blogs, even a family album

There’s a new website in town, or rather in the state–one that aspires to become the virtual kitchen table for Vermont’s lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgender citizens and out-of-state visitors: Vermont Gay Guide.

The Samara Foundation of Vermont, a community foundation dedicated to the well-being of Vermont’s LGBT community, created the site in response to business professionals and non-profit organization leaders who felt the lack of a single source for LGBT people to get and give information.

“We refer to Vermont’s LGBT community,” explained Samara President Suzanne Stofflet, “But in reality, it doesn’t exist. There are regional LGBT communities, some of which are very strong, but nothing that knits them all together. We are a rural state with many isolated people.”

As anyone who has made the drive between Burlington and Brattleboro will tell you, creating a state-wide anything in Vermont is a seriously difficult task, Stofflet admits. “Our only chance to create one big LGBT Vermont family was to do it virtually, online.”

“The site IS like a well-used kitchen table,” admits Liz Batsford, Samara’s Gay Guide manager. “It’s strewn with all kinds of things you might need or want: listings of LGBT and LGBT-friendly businesses, non-profit resources, stories, classified ads, events, blogs, even a family album where you can post a photo of your civil union, new baby, promotion-anything you want to celebrate with your fellow- LGBT Vermonters.”

The site has a long way to ‘grow,’ says Batsford, “We’ve had early support from dozens of brave business owners who believe in the Gay Guide and have invested in it with us. But to be a complete success, we need complete participation. It’s a huge undertaking, but if many, many of us all lift at the same time-we can raise it up-and then it will begin to have a life of it own. We need LGBT folks from every corner of Vermont to participate: visit the site often, post on the blogs, patronize the businesses, and join the family.”

Batsford explains that the variety of businesses and organizations that have come on board surprised the Gay Guide sales team. “We were thinking ‘B&B’s and restaurants’-and we have those. But visitors will also find adoption agencies, an upscale retirement community, therapists, realtors, attorneys, a spa, the list expands every week!”

Denise Vignoe of Spruce Mortgage of South Burlington is thrilled with the Gay Guide’s potential. “Several times in the past good people have tried to bring LGBT businesses together. The efforts were always met with enthusiasm from the business community, but something was lacking. I think the fact that this is operated by Samara, as a mission-driven venture, will be the key to its success,” she says, “I’m just thrilled to see it take off.”

“The moment I learned about the Gay Guide, I was on board,” claims artist Sean Callahan of Dog Tired Studios in Vergennes. “I mean, these are my people-I have to be in it,” he remarks.

Getting into the commercial website business is a first for the seventeen-year-old Samara Foundation, which has traditionally limited its activities to giving grants and scholarships, and using conventional avenues to raise public awareness of LGBT issues, according to Stofflet.

“Then about three years ago, the Foundation’s Board of Directors decided to explore additional ways to be relevant to Vermont’s LGBT community. So when it became apparent that what needed to be done was to connect the entire LGBT community together-we decided to take on the challenge,” says Stofflet. “Plus, our name ’samara,’ means the winged fruit of the maple tree-which to us stands for growth, new life and vitality.”

Readers can learn more about the Samara Foundation of Vermont at www.samarafoundation.org and the Vermont Gay Guide at www.vtgayguide.com.