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Town Tries to Reach Voters With Podcast
Add an iPod to Norman Rockwell's iconic image of Vermont's town meetings.
For more than 60 years, Rockwell's 1943 painting has symbolized the annual gatherings of residents to decide community business. It shows older people listening intently as a young Lincolnesque man speaks his mind.
An update may be in order: The town of Shelburne is using a podcast to communicate with its voters about school funding that will be voted on at Tuesday's town meeting.
Greg Thweatt, 42, a technology educator at the Shelburne schools, designed the podcast for the many people who missed earlier informational meetings on why budgets are rising.
"I see a lot of people, including parents, in the local gym with MP3 players," he said of his decision to use the latest technology.
Thweatt gathered together the school board chairman and the town's two principals to record a podcast on the budget and then he posted it on the school district's Web site for people to download in sections whenever they wished.
As of Monday, 71 people in the town of 6,000 had accessed the podcast since it was posted.
"My guess is that it's not going to be a top 10 hit," Thweatt said.
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On The Net:
Town of Shelburne: http://www.scsvt.org