BRATTLEBORO-David and Shirley Emery of Vernon were named the Brattleboro Region Chamber of Commerce’s Community People of the Year at the Chamber’s annual awards night Sept. 24 at the Brattleboro Country Club.
The Emerys, grade-school sweethearts who’ve been married 53 years, were a natural choice for the Chamber’s honors.
Called “two people who’ve never really been off duty,” by Chamber Board Member Steve Wolf, the Emerys have offered many decades of service to the community in ways big and small.
David spent 37 years with the Brattleboro Fire Department, starting out as a firefighter and retiring as fire chief. After a brief stint with the Windham County Sheriff’s Department, he now serves as Vernon’s emergency management director and a justice of the peace.
Shirley raised three children and worked as a medical assistant. She led a Daisy Girl Scout troop, served on the Brattleboro Union High School Booster Club, and volunteered with the Safe Kids Buckle Up campaign, teaching parents how to install child car seats.
Together, the Emerys have been stalwart supporters of Brattleboro Little League. They serve on the board of directors. David is an umpire and helps maintain the field, while Shirley helps run the field’s snack bar during the season.
They’ve also taken their community service on the road, as they regularly ride with the Red Knights International Firefighters Motorcycle Club, raising money to help people undergoing cancer treatment.
They rarely missed a school event or ball game involving their kids, and they are regularly seen at the school events and ball games of their eight grandchildren.
“And in between all that,” said Wolf, the Emerys can be counted upon for “driving a neighbor to an urgent appointment, dropping off a get-well flower arrangement, or lugging a rug shampoo machine over to help a friend.”
“Try calling some evening, and you might just catch [David] helping his grandson make homemade fudge for his girlfriend,” Wolf continued. “That’s just who they are, showing up over and over again for their family, for their neighbors, and for their community.”
“It’s an honor, actually, to be here among all of you folks,” David Emery said at the ceremony. “It‘s an honor to have been bestowed with this plaque.
“I have to tell you, though, that there’s a lot of people out in this community that are deserving of this award as well, and they certainly need to be recognized at some point,” he continued. “But they know that they give everything they have, and we just do it because it’s love. It’s something that we want to do.”
Other Chamber awards
Gabriel Erde-Cohen, founder and CEO of We Clean Heat Pumps in Putney, was named Entrepreneur of the Year. Chamber Board Member Connie Burton said Erde-Cohen described himself as “someone who became an entrepreneur because he’s a terrible employee.”
In 2016, his family asked him to work cleaning heat pumps in conjunction with their solar and HVAC company. Erde-Cohen turned them down, but ultimately took them up on their offer in 2018. He soon discovered he liked the work, which was increasingly in demand as more Vermont homeowners adopted heat pumps as their primary heating source.
“This entrepreneur quickly recognized that if his family’s installation company was struggling to keep up with maintenance [requests], other installers around the state probably [were] too,” said Burton.
His company went statewide by the end of its first year, and it now serves customers in 13 states, performing more than 10,000 cleanings a year.
“Growth is meaningful to me when it creates more useful work, more opportunity for people, and better care for our communities,” Erde-Cohen said in a news release.
This year’s Chamber Member of the Year award went to the Downtown Brattleboro Alliance (DBA), which was recognized for believing in “community, commerce, and creativity in equal measure,” according to Chamber Board Treasurer Chris Stoner.
“They are always innovating and iterating,” said Stoner, citing initiatives such as Gallery Walk, the Bloom flower program, and its newly launched Vacant to Vibrant initiative to fill empty storefronts with art and pop-up shops.
“The DBA cares deeply about the economic and cultural future of Brattleboro,” said Kate Trzaskos, the organization’s executive director, in a news release. “We market downtown Brattleboro as a destination, amplify the work of others, and love to facilitate community development projects.”
The Chamber also celebrated anniversaries of their members, including one year for Halo Hollow, 10 years for Community Asylum Seekers Project and Southern Vermont Solar, 20 years for Jasmine Healing Arts, 25 years for DCwebpro, 35 years for Landmark Trust USA, 40 years for Vermont Country Deli, 50 years for River Gallery School, 120 years for the Chamber itself, and 150 years for the Brattleboro Reformer.
This News item by Randolph T. Holhut was written for The Commons.