Conversations with advisory board members – Part 4

Community and Economic Development – Blog by UNC School of Government

https://ced.sog.unc.edu

Conversations with advisory board members – Part 4

By CED Guest Author

Published September 15, 2009

Notes from the fourth conversation –

– There are not really any community wealth building or individual asset building strategies that are not anti-poverty strategies
– Stay in regular contact with the Rural Center
– UNC-TV produced a documentary called “NC Rising” and they are doing town hall meetings as follow-up to the documentary – may be useful to attend some of the town hall meetings
– Talk with people at RUPRI, Center for Rural Strategies (Dee Davis), Carsey, Ford Foundation (Wayne Fawbush)
– The Kellogg Foundation has been involved in rural work – Rural People, Rural Policy program; has list of organizations they are working with on their website
– Need to consider short term vs. long term results – look at the sustainability of projects/strategies
– Need to look at new and innovative ideas – we need to know what new things are happening, not the old strategies that everyone knows about
– Rural American and NC are confronting a variety of issues – macroeconomic issues; a new political regime that is showing interest in them; issues seemingly unrelated to rural areas
– New issues means there may not be evidence to back up any new initiatives
– Economic development is about responding to context – communities continually change and are in flux
– Talk with Joe James in SC, doing new energy economy and health care work in rural areas
– Talk with Bill Bishop at The Daily Yonder