What Would It Look Like If Rural America Really Mattered?
This is the third in our continuing series of articles about successes in rural America — this time sharing Elkader, Iowa’s story
If rural communities mattered as much as they should, not more, not less, but just as much as they deserve, there would be a wholesale shift in how rural economic development gets done in rural America. Donelle Eller’s recent Des Moines Register article (Businesses help spark rural revitalization – Iowa’s Rural Economy: Increased Investment Brings Optimism, June 10, 2007) discusses at length the progress that Elkader, a community of 1,500 in Northeast Iowa, has had with rural revitalization.
Eller reports that Elkader has attracted new residents and businesses from across the nation.
The town has focused economic development efforts on entrepreneurs looking to start-up small businesses – such as Chris Kavars and Les Davis who are partners in a high-tech start-up; Adam Pollack who brought a light manufacturing business to Elkader from California; and Frederique Boudouani and Brian Bruening, who moved from Boston to take over a local, landmark restaurant.
Elkader has also invested in the culture and aesthetics of the community, like the 2004 refurbishment of their Opera House. And Elkader benefits from (and invests in) infrastructure that supports entrepreneurial development – good highways, high speed Internet access, and a technically skilled workforce. They did not do it alone or overnight, but in partnership over the years with the State of Iowa and Clayton County.
What I find most encouraging in communities like Elkader is that once people begin to see the potential in entrepreneurial development, they look farther and wider for more opportunities. Chris Kavars and Andy Pollack, for example, have enrolled in the Iowa Farm Bureau’s Renew Rural Iowa program, which offers training, business planning, and mentoring programs to rural entrepreneurs.
There are proven strategies that work in rural America, in places like Elkader with the courage and vision to fight the trends and create their own future. But those communities also need public policies that support local initiative, not undermine it.
This is why the Center for Rural Affairs has spent so much time and effort working on the 2007 farm bill. We want to ensure that Congress closes loopholes in farm program payment limits to stop the unlimited subsidies that large, aggressively expanding operations use to drive their smaller neighbors out of business, to the economic detriment of rural communities.
Moreover, the savings from payment limits could be invested in rural development programs that also provide training, mentoring, and other entrepreneurial development services, like the Rural Entrepreneurs and Microenterprise Assistance Program that will almost certainly be included in the 2007 farm bill.
Investing in entrepreneurial development is a down payment on a future for communities like Elkader, a future with thriving family farms and ranches and vibrant rural communities. Another example of what it would look like if rural really mattered.
Visit Elkader, Iowa on the web: http://www.elkader-iowa.com
Contact: John Crabtree, 402.687.2103 x 1010 or johnc@cfra.org for details.
If rural communities mattered as much as they should, not more, not less, but just as much as they deserve, there would be a wholesale shift in how rural economic development gets done in rural America. Donelle Eller’s recent Des Moines Register article (Businesses help spark rural revitalization – Iowa’s Rural Economy: Increased Investment Brings Optimism, June 10, 2007) discusses at length the progress that Elkader, a community of 1,500 in Northeast Iowa, has had with rural revitalization.
Eller reports that Elkader has attracted new residents and businesses from across the nation.
The town has focused economic development efforts on entrepreneurs looking to start-up small businesses – such as Chris Kavars and Les Davis who are partners in a high-tech start-up; Adam Pollack who brought a light manufacturing business to Elkader from California; and Frederique Boudouani and Brian Bruening, who moved from Boston to take over a local, landmark restaurant.
Elkader has also invested in the culture and aesthetics of the community, like the 2004 refurbishment of their Opera House. And Elkader benefits from (and invests in) infrastructure that supports entrepreneurial development – good highways, high speed Internet access, and a technically skilled workforce. They did not do it alone or overnight, but in partnership over the years with the State of Iowa and Clayton County.
What I find most encouraging in communities like Elkader is that once people begin to see the potential in entrepreneurial development, they look farther and wider for more opportunities. Chris Kavars and Andy Pollack, for example, have enrolled in the Iowa Farm Bureau’s Renew Rural Iowa program, which offers training, business planning, and mentoring programs to rural entrepreneurs.
There are proven strategies that work in rural America, in places like Elkader with the courage and vision to fight the trends and create their own future. But those communities also need public policies that support local initiative, not undermine it.
This is why the Center for Rural Affairs has spent so much time and effort working on the 2007 farm bill. We want to ensure that Congress closes loopholes in farm program payment limits to stop the unlimited subsidies that large, aggressively expanding operations use to drive their smaller neighbors out of business, to the economic detriment of rural communities.
Moreover, the savings from payment limits could be invested in rural development programs that also provide training, mentoring, and other entrepreneurial development services, like the Rural Entrepreneurs and Microenterprise Assistance Program that will almost certainly be included in the 2007 farm bill.
Investing in entrepreneurial development is a down payment on a future for communities like Elkader, a future with thriving family farms and ranches and vibrant rural communities. Another example of what it would look like if rural really mattered.
Visit Elkader, Iowa on the web: http://www.elkader-iowa.com
Contact: John Crabtree, 402.687.2103 x 1010 or johnc@cfra.org for details.
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