charles w. fluharty president and ceo rural policy research institute

Charles W. FluhartyPresident and CEO

Rural Policy Research Institute

I. Rethinking the Rural/Urban Dichotomy

II. A Spatial Poverty Prism: Revisiting the Place/Person Dialectic in Poverty Policy

III. Challenging Poverty Policy Orthodoxy: Building an Asset-based, New Governance and Innovation Centered, Livable Communities Commitment

IV. What Must the Church Do Now? Called to Serve, but…

V. Final Reflections

I. Rethinking the Rural/Urban Dichotomy

While metropolitan areas account for over 80 percent of the total population, they account for only 25.7 percent of total land area.

A metropolitan focus for place-based programs ignores critical linkages with three-quarters of the U.S. natural resource base, and the 20 percent of the population which steward these national treasures.

OMB designations of Core Based Statistical Areas are based on urban centers and the commuting relationship with those centers

“Metropolitan” doesn’t equate with “urban,” and “nonmetropolitan doesn’t equate with “rural.”

Most “rural” people live in “metropolitan” counties – 51 percent.

However, the precise definition of rural and urban does not work well for policy targeting

Difficult to find a good middle ground that describes the continuum

60% of nonmetropolitan residents live in micropolitan areas, which include a regional center of 10,000 to 49,999 people.

These areas are logical hubs for the emergence of national regional innovation strategies, encompassing workforce, eco-system, health and human services, and retail service infrastructures.

5 states account for 25 percent of all rural people

o Texas 3,647,755o North Carolina 3,202,234o Pennsylvania 2,819,963o Ohio 2,572,905o Michigan 2,518,919

The “most rural” states only account for 6.7% of rural population

o Vermont (61.8% rural) 376,277o Maine (59.8% rural) 762,331o West Virginia (53.9% rural) 974,967o Mississippi (51.2% rural) 1,456,098

o South Dakota (48.1% rural) 362,908

Source: Office of Management and Budget andU.S. Census BureauAlaska & Hawaii are not to scale

Core Based Statistical Area Classifications, 2008

Metropolitan

Micropolitan

Noncore

CBSA Classification

Micropolitan Counties, November 2008686 Counties in 574 Micropolitan Areas

Source: Office of Management and Budget; and U.S. Census Bureau

Micropolitan Counties and Urban Clusters (population under 50,000)

Source: Office of Management and Budget; and U.S. Census Bureau

48.8 million people live in nonmetropolitan counties +40.5 million people live in metro counties outside urbanized areas 89.3 million “rural” people

Urbanized Area Small Urban Rural Total

Metropolitan 192,064,228 10,338,988 30,176,724 232,579,940

Micropolitan 255,305 14,976,437 14,299,972 29,531,714

Noncore 18,588 4,704,763 14,586,901 19,310,252

Total 192,338,121 30,020,188 59,063,597 281,421,906

Distribution of Population

note: Urban and Rural Population figures from Census 2000; CBSA status for the December 2005 Classifications

II. A Spatial Poverty Prism: Revisiting the

Place / Person Dialectic in Poverty Policy

High Poverty Counties (rates over 20%), 2008

Metropolitan (93)

Micropolitan (148)

Noncore (357)

CBSA Classification

Counties2003geo.shp123No Data

States2003geo.shp

Counties2003geo.shp123No Data

States2003geo.shp

Counties2003geo.shp123No Data

States2003geo.shp

Sources: U.S. Census Bureau Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates for 2008; Office of Management and Budget Core Based Statistical Area Classifications November 2008 Alaska and Hawaii are not to scale

Poverty in Nonmetropolitan Counties, 2008

Less than half of U.S. rate (6.6%)

6.6% to 13.2%

13.3% - 26.4%

More than twice the U.S. rate (26.5%+)

Poverty At or Under U.S. Rate (13.2%)

Poverty Above the U.S. Rate of 13.2%Sources: U.S. Census Bureau Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates for 2008; Office of Management and Budget Core Based Statistical Area Classifications November 2008 Alaska and Hawaii are not to scale

Counties2003geo.shp3.1 - 6.56.6 - 13.213.3 - 26.426.5 - 54.4No Data

States2003geo.shp

Counties2003geo.shp3.1 - 6.56.6 - 13.213.3 - 26.426.5 - 54.4No Data

States2003geo.shp

Counties2003geo.shp3.1 - 6.56.6 - 13.213.3 - 26.426.5 - 54.4No Data

States2003geo.shp

Metropolitan Areas 12.6%

Micropolitan Areas 15.6%

Noncore Areas 16.8%

Urban 13.8%

Rural 11.0%

Source: American Community Survey, 2006-2008

Metropolitan Areas 12.9%

In Principal Cities 17.4%

Outside Principal Cities 9.6%

Micropolitan Areas 15.6%

In Principal Cities 20.2%

Outside Principal Cities 13.5%

Noncore Areas 16.8%

Micropolitan principal cities have the highest poverty rates

Source: American Community Survey, 2006-2008

Source: American Community Survey, 2006-2008

0.0

5.0

10.0

15.0

20.0

25.0

Metro Principal City

Metro Outside City

Micro Principal City

Micro Outside City Noncore

Overall Poverty Rates

Metropolitan Areas 34.7%

In Principal Cities 39.9%

Outside Principal Cities 30.0%

Micropolitan Areas 45.0%

In Principal Cities 49.2%

Outside Principal Cities 41.8%

Noncore Areas 48.3%

Micropolitan principal cities have the highest poverty rates

Source: American Community Survey, 2006-2008

0.0

10.0

20.0

30.0

40.0

50.0

60.0

Metro Principal City

Metro Outside City

Micro Principal City

Micro Outside City Noncore

Poverty -Female Householders with Children

Source: American Community Survey, 2006-2008

III. Challenging Poverty Policy Orthodoxy: Building

an Asset-based, New Governance and Innovation

Centered, Livable Communities Commitment

What are the principal policy goals of poverty policies and programs?

Who are the constituencies of each, and how are they benefited by public investments?

Since almost all poor urban and rural people have similar indicators of need, why have these constituencies historically failed to unite?

“ What policy framework will best integrate rural and urban initiatives and programs, to advantage both constituencies, their communities and regions, and enhance their children’s potential to thrive there in the 21st century?”

“Intermediaries are people and institutions that add value to the world indirectly, by connecting and supporting – i.e., by enabling others to be more effective. Intermediaries may act as facilitators, educators, capacity builders, social investors, performance managers, coalition builders, and organizers of new groups.”

Xavier de Souza Briggs

The Art and Science of Community Problem-Solving Project

Kennedy School, Harvard University, June, 2003.

Will public sector champion(s) step forward?

Will institutional innovator(s) accept the challenge of building new intermediary structures?

Will new constituencies arise to jointly support these innovative leaders and institutions?

Interdependence of governmental and non-governmental organizations (central government’s role reducing over time)

Now more coordination; facilitation; negotiation through multiple policy networks:

Diverse, overlapping, integrated

Comprised of government, private sector, nonprofit and associational actors

All Actors Bring Unique:

Power bases

Roles, responsibilities

Values, skills, organizational resources

Rethinking core missions

Redefining roles and responsibilities

Creating a renaissanced leadership cadre, who become change agents.

Engaging and supporting the “border crossers!”

Redefining “we” and “they,” with special attention to diversity, cultural and social inclusion.

The recession, and the lagging economic recovery which will only slowly come to central city and rural areas.

Federal ARRA funds are gone next year.

State and local governments are already operating under historic budget deficits,

While human services needs expand exponentially.

The comity within our public discourse, and the tempering center of our body politic, both continue to erode.

Specific Actions Requested(Before OMB Budget Submission)

1. Identify 3 to 5 programs or initiatives:

• Outcomes

• Indicators

• Options for Improving

Coordination/Effectiveness

• Knowledge-Building Strategies

2. Principles for Place Policy• Clear, measurable, and carefully evaluated goals

should guide investment and regulation:

• Economic Competitiveness

• Environmental Sustainability

• Community Health and Access to Opportunity

• Safety and Security

• Change comes from the community level and often through partnership; complex problems require flexible, integrated solutions.

• Many important challenges demand a regional approach.

“…Many important challenges demand a regional

approach. The Nation is increasingly a conglomeration of

regional economies and ecosystems that should be

approached as such. Federal investments should promote

planning and collaboration across jurisdictional boundaries.

Given the forces reshaping smaller communities, it is

particularly important that rural development programs be

coordinated with broader regional initiatives. Programs in

neighboring zones and within larger regions – some of

which connect rural communities to metropolitan regions –

should complement each other. Federal programs should

reflect better the Nation’s economic and social diversity,

both in rural and metropolitan areas. To the extent

possible, programs should allow for communities to identify

distinct needs and address them in appropriate, strategic

ways…”

1. Greater attention to asset-based development, much more broadly defined.

2. The building of regional frameworks, appropriately configured, of sufficient scale to leverage these geographies and bridge these constituencies. (While we need rural and urban responses, their intersection is the future of enlightened public policy.)

3. As the Federal role reduces over time, greater attention to new governance / new intermediary support by the public sector.

4. Regional innovation policies which specifically target mutually beneficial competitive advantage, that rural and urban areas share. (i.e., Regional food systems, bio-energy compacts, natural resource-based / sustainability assets, “workshed” / “watershed” approaches, etc.)

5. Attention to the importance of working landscapes:

Arts / heritage / culture

Natural resources / tourism

Bio-energy / biofuels, entrepreneurial agriculture

6. Incentives to bridge innovation / entrepreneurship support systems, from urban to rural expression

7. Opportunities to address spatial mismatch issues in workforce / training across broader geographies, via “place-based” community / technical college collaborations, both sister schools and research universities.

8. Innovative funding approaches which enhance collaboration across state and local governments, particularly in cross-sectoral, regional experimentation.

Henry David Thoreau

IV. What Must the Church Do Now?

Called to Serve,

but……………

Lewis CarrollAlice’s Adventures in Wonderland

Charles Darwin

Goethe

Stanislaus Lezcynski

V. Final Reflections

“What lies behind us, and what lies before us

are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.”

--Ralph Waldo Emerson

Charles W. Fluhartycfluharty@rupri.org President and CEO

Rural Policy Research Institute214 Middlebush HallUniversity of MissouriColumbia, MO 65211

(573) 882-0316http://www.rupri.org/