Conversations with advisory board members – Part 1

Community and Economic Development – Blog by UNC School of Government

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Conversations with advisory board members – Part 1

By CED Guest Author

Published September 15, 2009

Over the next few months I will be posting notes from conversations with advisory board members for the Rural Center project.  The notes will not name names, but will, we hope, give everyone an idea of what others are saying, keep you informed, and spark other thoughts and discussions.  Here are the notes from the first conversation –

– The research and report should offer an array of practices that can speak to a broad group of leaders, such as political, government and nonprofit/community leaders.
– Consider questions like – Where does leadership come from?  What is the best source of leadership for a program?
– Finding strategies first and then developing criteria to narrow down the list of strategies may be a more effective way to go about the research
– It is important to find promising practices related to engaging immigrant populations; referenced a case study out of Minnesota of work with Latino farmworkers
– Suggestions for organizations or contacts –
1.  Nancy Stark at CFED –
* Work in the Central Appalachian region – affordable housing work involving manufactured housing; work with Frontier Housing and partner Clayton Homes in KY; tactic of
putting housing on slab so not a mobile home, homes also energy efficient
* Self-employment tax initiative – work with VITA on providing tax services to the self-employed/small business owners who could then be linked with other resources; VITA
as initial contact for connection with other resources; VITA does not typically provide tax assistance to small business owners
2. Regi Haslett-Marroquin at Rural Enterprise Center – Northfield, MN; rural area but not high poverty; work with the Latino immigrant, white, and native populations; small
business development for Latino agricultural business; trying to put into place systems to help with asset building among the Latino population; helped to start a free-range,
organic poultry co-op
3. Community foundation work in Nebraska (Nebraska Community Foundation) – funds, endowments being used and set up more strategically around business development