DECEMBER 19 2009

This gathering is the first Annual Meeting of Literacy Volunteers on the Green. It is an opportunity for us to thank all of the volunteers, donors and other friends who have helped us during 2009, and to report on our activities in this period.

Our Executive Director Anne Maitland will give you details on the following a bit later, but here are some of the highlights of our year:

• We helped close to 200 newcomers to our region learn to speak, read and write English.
• In two intensive three-day sessions, we trained some 30 volunteers to become tutors in English as a Second Language, bringing the total number we have trained to 161 in our four years of existence.
• The FamilyRead organization lost major funding for its program but we are seeking alternative ways to continue to help residents in our area to begin to experience the joys of reading as families for the first time.
• In partnership with the Kent Center and John Pettibone schools we are helping about 25 moms and dads to learn English and communicate with their children’s teachers.
• We received our 501 [c] (3) designation from the Internal Revenue Service, enabling us to begin the process of taking full fiscal responsibility for our operations.
• LVG received welcome grants and donations from the United Way of Western Connecticut, the Kent Lions Club, Medinstill, Kent Fabrics, Infinity Wealth Management, the Cecilia Buck Taylor Law firm, Town of Kent. Lilla Fund, Quality Thrift Shop in Kent, Women’s Club of Danbury-New Fairfield, the Dyson Foundation, Rotary Club of New Milford, Walmart Foundation, St. Francis Xavier Church, First Congregational Church in New Milford, Fr. Berberich at Sacred Heart Church in Kent. Previous grants from Union Savings Bank are still being gratefully utilized, including for our Student-Tutor Recognition evenings.
• We held wonderful events to honor our students and our tutors, including evenings in Kent and New Milford that paid significant dividends in community good will.
• We strengthened our Board of Directors, adding important new members including Bob McDermott, Margaret Weiner, David Bain, Wendy Carlson, Josephine Dill. We now have a 12-person board, representing a diverse cross section of Litchfield County.
• We engaged Priscilla Mancione as our Program Coordinator.
• Honoring Anne’s wish to leave the position of Executive Director by the end of 2009, we conducted a thorough search for a successor and have engaged Jacqueline Farrell to be Executive Director starting Jan. 1, 2009.
• Although we did not have a major fund raising event in 2009, we did a Fall solicitation by mail that so far has raised nearly $10,000. Our next fund raising dinner and silent auction will be held April 30^th.

After working thousands of hours on our behalf over the past six years without compensation of any kind, Anne Maitland has decided to stop down as our Executive Director at the end of this year. LVG has been truly blessed to have had the leadership of two amazing co-founders, Rita Gauriglia and Anne Maitland. While Rita still provides significant support and service to our organization, it is Anne who has carried the majority of the weight these past few years. Deciding how to move forward without Anne at the helm has been enormously important. Our Board concluded that we would hire a part-time Executive Director and made the decision to raise the necessary funds to compensate the new person.  We advertised the position locally and received more than 30 resumes, which our Search Committee narrowed down to about half a dozen people who were on our short list. We then brought in the final two for interviews, and between these two we eventually decided on Jacqueline Farrell, well known in the area for her educational and academic skills.

Jacqui Farrell, with the guidance of Anne Maitland and others in the LVG family, will help us to continue our tremendously important work.  A dozen of our students have gone on to become U.S. Citizens. Others have started their own businesses or obtained wonderful jobs in our communities. Others are able to talk to their kids’ teachers for the first time, explain their symptoms clearly to a doctor, carry on a neighborly conversation at the supermarket…and have all the normal communication the rest of us take for granted because we learned our language as children.  For all of the work you do on behalf of LVG, our Board is thankful.

We are most thankful for one person in particular, and I want to make sure we let her know how grateful we are for her service, her friendship, her guidance and her inspiration. Anne, this is just a token. But it’s an emblem of how much we honor you and appreciate all that you’ve done for us.

Before we move on to the rest of our agenda today I want to advise the Board and others that I plan to step down from the office of President at the end of 2010. I’ve done the job for three years and I think LVG will benefit from fresh, new blood in the top board office. I hope to work with the Board to find my successor and then with that person to assure an orderly transition.  I’d like to continue to be active with LVG, just not as the Board president.

Thank you,
Allan Priaulx

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