About YSCVT

Overview

The Youth Safety Council of Vermont helps young drivers make responsible choices behind the wheel, and our statewide presentations and resources empower students, schools, and communities to make Vermont’s roads safer.

“Teenagers need to realize their own risk of taking their life for a text, or even worse, someone else’s.”

— Williamstown Middle High School student at a YSC Turn Off Texting demonstration

Our sponsors

AT&T created the ‘It Can Wait‘ campaign to focus on educating people – especially teens – about the dangers of texting and driving. The message is simple, yet vital: When it comes to texting and driving, it can wait. No message is so urgent that it is worth diverting attention from the road and risking lives in the process. The world’s largest telecommunications company “has spent tens of millions of dollars to encourage people not to use its products and services — at least not when they are behind the wheel.” They’ve allied with their competitors, Sprint Corp., T-Mobile US Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc., to promote this message and create the national ‘Drive 4 Pledges Day,’ investing in marketing and nationwide events that get young drivers to pledge to not text and drive. AT&T’s goal is to save lives and make texting and driving as unacceptable as drinking and driving.

Vermont Governor’s Highway Safety Program (GHSP) awards federal highway safety grant funds to local, state and not-for-profit agencies for projects to improve highway safety and reduce deaths and serious injuries due to crashes. The staff of the GHSP manage the state highway safety program by reviewing and monitoring grant programs, coordinating special programs such as the Child Passenger Safety or the Drug Recognition Expert (DRE) police officer programs, and by providing guidance and oversight to state and local agencies. The GHSP also works closely within a network of state and local agencies, non-profit organizations and private-sector partners to deliver quality traffic safety projects, services, and information across the state.

Vermont Insurance Agents Association is a statewide trade association representing nearly 100 independent insurance agencies in Vermont, with more than 900 employees.
VIAA member independent insurance agents represent more than one insurance company, and as a result, can offer clients a wider choice of auto, home, business, life and employee benefits. Founded in 1906, VIAA’s mission is to be an advocate for independent insurance agents and to satisfy the professional needs of its members. VIAA is affiliated with the Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers of America.

TO SUPPORT YSCVT

If your business or foundation would like to support the work of YSCVT, please contact James Lockridge, Executive Director, at (802) 881-9050 or via email.

Our Turn Off Texting Program

The Youth Safety Council of Vermont presents an eye-opening educational program, Turn Off Texting, that travels to schools throughout the state, creating first-hand experiences of the dangers of texting while driving. Students navigate a golf cart through a course of traffic cones, then drive the course a second time while texting. Their errors – the cones that they run into while texting  (pedestrians! parked cars!) make the dangers of texting and driving plain to understand. The YSC Turn Off Texting program is free to schools throughout Vermont, thanks in part to funding from the Governor’s Highway Safety Program and generous sponsors. For more information, visit turnofftexting.com or contact James Lockridge, YSCVT Executive Director, (802) 881-9050, or via email.

The Vermont Highway Safety Alliance

The YSC also participates on the Vermont Highway Safety Alliance; our President has been a board member and our Executive Director has chaired a VHSA focus group and task force. The VHSA is a non-profit organization formed in 2012 that brings together highway safety stakeholders from all over Vermont. This includes State Agencies such as VTrans, Dept. of Health, Agency of Education, Dept. Motor Vehicles, Governor’s Highway Safety Program, and law enforcement, as well as federal partners, insurance companies (Cooperative Insurance, Co.), and nonprofits such as AAA, AARP, and the Bicycle and Pedestrian Coalition. The VHSA board meets once a month and publishes Vermont’s Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP), the State’s over-arching highway safety plan which includes the Supplement, its road map for implementation.

The SHSP is a federal requirement calling for the development of a highway safety plan by working through a partnership of the “4 Es,” consisting of Education, Engineering, Enforcement, and Emergency Medical Services.

Our Staff & Board

Executive Director: James Lockridge

Turn Off Texting Presenter: Paul Burroughs

Board Members:
Abby Beerman, Injury Prevention Coordinator, UVM Medical Center, YSCVT Secretary
Kevin Geno, Rutland County Sheriff’s Office, YSCVT President
Heather Gray, Vermont State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs Department
Randy Odell, Odell Insurance Agency, YSCVT Treasurer
Renee Porter, Co-operative Insurance Companies
Terrell Titus, Titus Insurance Agency
Lindsay Townsend, VT Driver & Traffic Safety Education Association

Past Board Members:
Skip Allen
Stephanie Busch, Vermont Emergency Medical Services for Children Program Coordinator, VT Department of Health
Madeleine (Maddie) Cave, 802CARS.com
Greg Eaton, Primer Piper Eggleston & CramerMary Eversole, Executive Director, VT Insurance Agents Association
Norman James
Chrissy Keating, UVM Medical Center, YSCVT Secretary
Mike Mandracchia, The Richards Group
Ken Millman, Spike Advertising
Sgt. Aimee Nolan, VT State Police
Joseph Normandy, VT Independent Agents Association
Lt. Garry Scott, VT State Police
Michelle Shambo, National Bank of Middlebury
Herb Sinkinson, VT Agency of Human ServicesJeff Vigne
Tanya Wells, Vermont Department of Health
Tom Williams, AAA of Northern New England
Aimee Ziter