He lives with his partner Rhonda and their three children in East Montpelier and began work as Executive Director of Another Way at the end of August. Recently he has worked to end homelessness in Central Vermont through his work as Chair of the Montpelier Homelessness Task Force. He also has worked in journalism and property development. He worked for Speaker of the House Gaye Symington and for candidates for statewide office and in community development for the city of Montpelier. In 2006 he returned to the east coast and received a masters at the Kennedy School of Government and returned to Vermont to start a family. He worked as a teacher, cook and carpenter and worked in video production before becoming involved with the American Civil Liberties Union where he advocated on behalf of the homeless, on racial profiling, and on prison reform and abolition in the California Legislative arena.

After attending Otter Valley UHS he headed to California for college where he studied studio art and English. Ken Russell grew up in Brandon Vermont, one of seven children. His skill set and lived experience make him a perfect fit for VPS where he can continue his passion for widening the safety net through viable community-based services and advocacy projects for the peer network. Most recently Karim developed and ran the newly formed Crisis Peer Services program for Community Care Network in Rutland.

Karim founded Life Intervention Team (LIT) in New York, an organization created to intervene in lives of at-risk youth by bringing them through different life experiences that helped cultivate their lives and mind set through education, civic engagement, economic development, team building activities, and mental health education. Previously, he managed and supervised a team of credible messengers that dealt with at-risk youth around gun violence, mediation, life choices, and hospital and shooting responses. As a lead mentor for Community Connections for Youth (CCFY), Karim was a member of a team that identified young men and women living in and around New York, Harlem, that had direct or indirect issues with violence resulting in court involvement or circumstances with law enforcement. Karim Chapman comes to VPS with more than ten years of experience at the grass roots and advocacy levels of building and developing programs among our most vulnerable populations. We are excited about the possibilities for transformative change by providing empowering connections throughout the statewide peer network.вЂќ вЂ“ Pathways Vermont Executive Director, Hilary Melton вЂњThis is a great opportunity to help shift the paradigm around mental health services utilizing the collective voices of Vermonters with shared experiences. Goals of the initiative include, creating a steering committee, evaluating statewide peer workforce needs, facilitating awareness and participation by providing resources and information to peer support workers, and ensuring the availability of peer support worker training. The Peer Workforce Development Initiative grant was developed by DMH to help the state build and maintain an infrastructure for a statewide mental health peer workforce. Pathways Vermont was awarded a grant for a Peer Workforce Development Initiative (PWDI) by The Department of Mental Health (DMH) in early 2020. We are dedicated to ensuring that all Vermonters are in a position to lead healthy and meaningful lives in their community. Pathways Vermont is a leader in the stateвЂ™s peer workforce movement and is working to greatly improve consistency, infrastructure, communication, and resource sharing among the peer-workforce community.

Gomez peer community