About Us

Our Board

Stewarding Vermont’s land for future generations

The Vermont Land Trust’s Board of Trustees is made up of dedicated leaders who share a deep commitment to land conservation in Vermont. Representing diverse backgrounds in farming, forestry, community development, and environmental stewardship, they guide our mission with expertise and vision.

Portrait of Vermont Land Trust board member Abby Corse.

Abbie Corse

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Carolyn Gilbert

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Portrait of Vermont Land Trust board member Cherie Morse.

Cheryl Morse

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Dawn Morgan

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Fred Nelson

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Hannah Sessions

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Jess Phelps

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woman wearing orange wool hat standing in front of moss-covered tree trunk_Vermont

Jessie Estes

Executive Assistant, Board Secretary View Profile

John Kassel

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Karin Chamberlain

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Luke Briccetti

Board Fellow View Profile

Maria Young

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Meriwether Hardie

Board Vice Chair View Profile

Mike Donohue

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Paul Costello

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Ramsey Luhr

Board Treasurer View Profile

Abbie Corse

Board Member

Abbie is a co-owner and the sixth generation of The Corse Farm Dairy in Whitingham, VT. Her farm produces high quality milk for Organic Valley utilizing perennial pastures, agro-ecological methods, and solar power. The farm, almost entirely held within Vermont Land Trust easements, has been a finalist for the New England Leopold Conservation Award multiple times. Abbie holds a BA in Journalism and Global Studies from Saint Michael’s College. She also serves on the boards of NOFA-VT and NOFFP (Northeast Organic Family Farm Partnership) and was the Emerging Leader for the Vermont Agricultural Hall of Fame in 2020. Her favorite spot in Vermont is Harriman Reservoir, where she, her husband, and their three boys love to hike, boat, and spot bald eagles.

Carolyn Gilbert

Board Member

Carolyn joined the VLT board in 2022 and works for DAI Global’s environment team, which implements USAID-funded biodiversity, conservation, land tenure, and water projects around the world. She holds a BA in International Studies from Macalester College and an MSc in International Development and Humanitarian Emergencies from the London School of Economics. Carolyn is involved with the Bennington-area Young Professionals group and Unlikely Riders, a nonprofit that creates joyful and inclusive spaces for BIPOC Vermonters in mountain sports. Originally from Thetford, she spent her teenage years in Montpelier and now resides in Bennington with her husband and Bernese Mountain Dog.

Cheryl Morse

Board Member

Cherie has been a VLT board member since 2018 and served as its chair from 2021 through 2024. She is a social geographer at the University of Vermont who focuses on the relationship between people and nature in rural environments. Cherie has published research on the environmental dimensions of migration, working landscapes, and differing perceptions of place. She has been involved with girls’ lacrosse in Vermont for four decades.

Dawn Morgan

Board Member

Dawn and her husband Rick returned to Vermont in 2014 to join the family consulting business, which provides forestry, ecology, mapping, and land management services to Vermont landowners, many of whom are enrolled in the State’s Current Use Program. Her role in the business focuses on GIS mapping, forest inventory, ecological assessments, and communications with landowners. Dawn has an undergraduate degree in Geology from Beloit College in Wisconsin and a Master’s in Wetland Ecology and Conservation Planning from the University of Maine. Her other interests include growing food, creating art inspired by the natural world, exploring far northern landscapes, nordic skiing, and long-distance hiking.

Fred Nelson

Board Member

Fred has worked for 25 years to develop lasting conservation solutions rooted in community rights and interests. His career has focused on eastern and southern Africa, including living in Tanzania for over a decade, where he worked with Maasai pastoralist communities, researched the politics of conservation in Africa, and played a leading role in global networks and collaborations that span land rights, wildlife conservation, and ecotourism. He founded Maliasili in 2010 to help leading local organizations build the organizations and networks they need to deliver on their mission and achieve their goals. Fred has been a Doris Duke Conservation Fellow and Henry Arnhold Conservation Fellow. He also edited Community Rights, Conservation and Contested Land: The Politics of Natural Resource Governance in Africa.

Hannah Sessions

Board Member

Hannah was born and raised in Addison County, Vermont. She graduated from Bates College and returned to Vermont in 2000 to establish Blue Ledge Farm in Leicester with her husband, Greg. They conserved their farm with VLT and invested in an on-farm cheese enterprise in 2002. Today, Blue Ledge Farm is home to 150 dairy goats and produces artisanal goat and cow’s milk cheeses sold nationwide. Hannah is also a painter. Her muses are, of course, goats, cows, and the landscape of Vermont. She lives on the farm with her husband. They have two grown children.

Jess Phelps

Board Member

Jess has been a VLT board member since 2019. He is an attorney working as the associate counsel for the Lyme Timber Company in Hanover, New Hampshire. Jess has been an adjunct professor at Vermont Law School and Maine Law School and writes on conservation law-related topics. His favorite Vermont spot is the Norwich Grange Hall (1892), where he is working with a group of neighbors to help restore the building as a community center.

Jessie Estes

Executive Assistant, Board Secretary

Jessie joined VLT in January of 2022 as the Executive Assistant to the President and Corporate Secretary for the Board of Trustees. Before coming onboard at VLT, Jessie worked as Director of Operations for a small meadery in St. Albans, and previously as Manager of Youth & Family Initiatives at the Vermont Foodbank. She earned a Master’s Degree in Organizational Development from Prescott College in the Fall of 2021. In her spare time, Jessie is an enthusiastic home baker who is always planning her next baking project.

Email
(802) 272-7036

John Kassel

Board Member

John has been a board member since 2023. A retired attorney, he has been a commercial and environmental litigator, criminal prosecutor, and cofounder of a mission-driven private law firm. He has also led nonprofit and government agencies and served on several boards in the environmental, healthcare, and social services fields. He now enjoys being a grandpa and doing almost anything outdoors, especially making maple syrup.

Karin Chamberlain

Board Member

Karin’s career in sustainable investing has taken her from farming to finance to the financing of farming. She oversees the research and implementation of Clean Yield Asset Management’s alternative and community investments. She previously worked for KLD Research & Analytics and served as a livestock production volunteer with the U.S. Peace Corps in Ecuador. Karin holds a BA in international relations from Kenyon College and an MALD in economics and environmental policy from The Fletcher School at Tufts University. She also serves on the board of Vermont Electric Power Company and is a guest lecturer on sustainable business and investing. Since moving to a 50-acre farm in the Upper Valley, she enjoys hiking and biking in the summer, telemark skiing and Nordic speed skating in the winter, and CrossFit year-round.

Luke Briccetti

Board Fellow

Luke joined the board as a non-voting fellow in 2023 as part of a VLT partnership with UVM’s Rubenstein School of Natural Resources (RSENR). He is a PhD student at RSENR and the Gund Institute for Environment, where he studies how land management decision-making evolves in response to global climate change. Luke holds an MS in Natural Resources from SUNY Plattsburgh and previously worked in land use and water quality planning at the Northwest Regional Planning Commission in St. Albans. Luke’s favorite spot in Vermont, no matter the season, is the Missisquoi National Wildlife Refuge, with either a paddle or a fishing rod in his hands.

Maria Young

Board Member

Maria is in her third term on VLT’s board. She is the Executive Director of NorthWoods Stewardship Center, a conservation and education organization in the Northeast Kingdom. The 1,500-acre campus is conserved with Vermont Land Trust and offers public trails and education opportunities. She has long been captivated by NorthWoods’ mission to connect people and place, an endeavor that defines her work and her time outside of work. Maria grew up on a dairy farm in West Glover, attended Middlebury College, and spent many years in the Rocky Mountain West. She is the president of the Northeast Kingdom Backcountry Coalition and, in and out of work, seeks to contribute to community and conservation.

Meriwether Hardie

Board Vice Chair

Meriwether is in her second term on the VLT board and currently serves as its vice chair. Her background is in agriculture and sustainable rural community development. For the past nine years, she has served as the president of an organization that works across the US to design, implement, and manage regenerative land use projects, many of which focus on food systems and working agriculture landscapes. Meriwether grew up in Vermont and still has many family and friends in the farming and forestry communities in the Green Mountain State, although today she calls Boulder, Colorado home. This year (2025), she is currently taking a sabbatical to rest, get more time outside, and take on a writing project that has been gathering dust on the back shelf!

Mike Donohue

Board Chair

Mike is the chair of VLT’s board of trustees. He is an all-around outdoorsperson and employee owner at Outdoor Gear Exchange in Burlington. When not helping others get geared up or mentoring coworkers, he can be found outside hiking, biking, climbing, skiing, and paddling. He is also on the Board of Vermont Huts Association and Richmond Mountain Trails and is on the Richmond Trails Committee.

Paul Costello

Board Member

Paul served as the executive director of the Vermont Council on Rural Development from 2000 to 2021, where he facilitated rural development policy at the local, regional, and state levels, including initiating and leading more than a dozen major rural policy council efforts. He has built significant programs to advance the digital economy, climate economy, working landscapes, and community leadership development in the state. Paul attended UVM before earning a PhD in intellectual history at McGill. He has served on boards ranging from corrections education to cooperatives, philanthropies, libraries, and Governor’s commissions, including co-chairing the Climate Action Team and chairing the Local Support and Community Action Team of the Vermont Covid-19 Recovery Task Force. He is the past president of the national community development association, Partners for Rural America.

Ramsey Luhr

Board Treasurer

Ramsey co-founded Maple Capital Management in 2004, a Registered Investment Advisory firm headquartered in Montpelier with over $2 billion in assets under management. Before this, he served as Vice President & Portfolio Manager for NL Capital Management’s Private Client Group. He has also held positions at Concord International Investments, Citibank, and Smith Barney in New York. Ramsey has a BA in International Relations from Trinity College. Before joining VLT’s board, he served on the board of directors of the Institute for Sustainable Communities and the Vermont River Conservancy. An avid cyclist and skier, he is passionate about preserving the environment he has come to call home. He lives in Montpelier.

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