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Executive Summary The community plan outlines how Miner County will effectively identify, build, and utilize the resources of the community to achieve its vision of becoming a stable, cooperating community that creates and sustains quality life opportunities for all who live or work in Miner County through inclusive and informed decision-making.
Miner County knows that to achieve its vision it must both ensure that the community survives and that poverty be reduced. If it simply stabilizes the population, it may not be "creating and sustaining quality life opportunities for all"; if it simply reduces poverty, it may not halt population decline, ultimately forcing people to move on in search of opportunity elsewhere. Each is necessary but not sufficient to reach the community's vision; therefore, the community's strategies must both ensure stability and reduce poverty. Miner County's vision, goals, objectives, and activities portray the strategic intent of an inclusive community with an emphasis on quality of life with citizen participation, cooperation, and trust as the means to build community wealth-economic, social, financial, and human-throughout the county. Striving to think long term and to use their limited resources most effectively, the community created strategies that have intertwining economic, social, and environmental dimensions based on critical issue areas. These strategies are designed to address underlying causes of poverty and decline rather than symptoms. The Planning Process As a small, isolated agricultural community, Miner County felt at the mercy of forces beyond its control, such as new global markets and low commodity prices. While the changing global economy is a definite reality with certain implications for farmers and agriculturally dependent communities, seeing decline as inevitable and completely out of local control only exacerbates that decline. Based on some educational efforts spearheaded by the high school, community members began focusing on their internal resources-what they had and could do themselves to revitalize. One step the community made was to focus on bringing the county together-enlarging their scale-to work on revitalization cooperatively. Community members also realized that decisions could no longer be made by small groups of people isolated behind closed doors. They decided to set an example and include as much community participation as possible in decision-making throughout their community revitalization efforts. Gathering broad community input to determine critical issues and potential solutions is only part of successfully halting the downward spiral of decline. Financial resources and strategic thinking-looking at underlying causes and facts versus perceptions-also are needed to sustain Miner County and reduce poverty. Building momentum and support. With support from the Northwest Area Foundation, the volunteers (whose number grew from 20 to over 100) spearheading revitalization efforts filed to become a nonprofit, hired paid staff, and opened an office in the county seat on Main Street. They built relationships within and among the towns through small projects that showed success could be achieved. And they created committees to research the critical issues and potential solutions offered by community members through meetings, individual interviews, and word of mouth. Becoming strategic. The new nonprofit also worked to develop a 10-year partnership with Northwest Area Foundation by creating a strategic community plan. Members of its strategic planning team realized that the first step was to learn the difference between perceptions of what was happening and the factual underlying causes of decline in Miner County. The next step was to develop solutions that addressed underlying causes rather than symptoms of decline. The Northwest Area Foundation, with the assistance of key consultants chosen by the community, helped the community create new frameworks for strategic decision-making and problem-solving through the translation of data into information on which to base decisions and take advantage of opportunities. While it was an arduous process of reciprocally working with a strategy planning team and various representatives of the larger community, it was critical in creating the strategic ability of Miner County to proactively analyze different futures, rather than react to present situations as understood solely by perceptions. In agreement with the new direction of the Foundation, Miner County has departed from a typical, linear community plan, which is assumed to remain constant and emphasizes program output. Instead, Miner County is committed to an ongoing cycle of learning and capacity building that will enable it to adapt to and craft a future in a dynamic environment rather than simply react to it. Miner County's vision, goals, objectives, and activities, therefore, provide the strategic direction for the community to create feasible, sustainable change measured by progress towards its end goals:
Before the community embarked on a strategic planning process they had a long list of perceived critical issues and an even longer, somewhat random list of activities. Now, after a year of careful analysis and learning, the community has a deliberate list of eleven activities, which together form an interconnected, effective use of resources from which to eventually achieve the community's vision. It is the four strategies that link the community's initial eleven activities to the vision.
Linkage to poverty reduction. Poverty will be reduced increasing income among those in poverty through expanding the export economy, economic diversification and job creation. Assets will be increased through access to more affordable housing and daycare. A significant portion of programs to increase economic activity and affordable housing and services will be targeted to benefit low-income community members. Initial activities under this strategy: Linkage to poverty reduction. Poverty will be reduced among those most in need by increasing their access to credit and their accumulation of assets. A significant portion of programs to develop and expand financial assets will be targeted to benefit those living in poverty. Initial activities under this strategy. Linkage to poverty reduction. The community's efforts to reduce poverty will be more effective by building social and human capacity to make informed and strategic decisions. The strategy will also build the skills and knowledge of those in the lowest economic quartile to participate in the mainstream economy and society. A significant portion of programs to develop and nourish human and social assets will be targeted to benefit those living in poverty. Initial activities under this strategy. Linkage to poverty reduction. Poverty will be reduced among the lowest-income residents and workers by increasing their assets through homeownership and by targeting low-income, underemployed community members for training and employment in the construction trades, which will be in greater demand with increased housing construction and renovation. Access to affordable housing and to housing that is not in need of major repairs can improve quality of life among those in the lowest economic quartile through reducing the cost of living. A significant portion of programs to create and maintain affordable life-cycle housing will be targeted to benefit those living in poverty. Initial activities under this strategy. Budget The community estimates that fulfilling these strategies will cost an estimated $18 million, including: $2.4 million for strategy 1 (Achieving economic activity that builds wealth for all through expanding the export economy, job creation, diversifying the economy, and reducing the cost of living) $1 million for strategy 2 (Developing and expanding financial assets in the community through asset creation, debt reduction, and local investment opportunities) $1.2 million for strategy 3 (Developing and nourishing human and social assets in the community through shared community learning, inclusive and informed decision-making, and effectively utilizing resources) $1.1 million for strategy 4 (Creating and maintaining affordable life-cycle housing through housing construction and rehabilitation of property) $0.1 million for learning and evaluation These funds would be used to reduce poverty among low-income community members through improving their economic status and increasing their participation in decision-making in sustainable ways. They would also be used to stabilize the population base by creating living-wage employment, high-quality affordable housing and services, and amenities that would attract youth who have left and newcomers to Miner County. The community will measure annually benchmarks focused on stabilizing the community and reducing poverty. Community Learning and Evaluation MCCR will create an inclusive Learning and Evaluation Team to evaluate progress in implementing the plan and achieving measurable results. It will coordinate the gathering of and analyze and share benchmark measures collected by local high school students through the school's Rural Challenge program. The Learning and Evaluation Team will make recommendations to MCCR's Board of Directors for revisions to the plan. The team will also share progress reports and lessons learned with outside funders. The team will provide information to MCCR's staff and Outreach Committee, which will develop communications materials for the public. Community Decision-Making MCCR's Board of Directors will make decisions regarding the release of funds to MCCR committees for different strategies, with advice from the Learning and Evaluation Team. MCCR committees will make decisions regarding the release of funds to activity work groups for implementation activities. The activity work groups formed by MCCR to carry out an activity will approve funding for implementation of different elements of the activity. | |||
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(605)
772-5153 • 109 North Main Street • Howard, SD 57349 •
mccr@alliancecom.net |