Investment in Our Communities: Policy Recommendations

National policymakers have the power to help level the playing field for rural communities. There are concrete actions that can help public officials and the private sector recognize the lasting value of investing in rural America.

The National Rural Assembly urges the Administration and Congress to make developing rural communities a priority starting with these specific steps:

Recommendations:

• Organize a White House Summit on our changing rural communities. Involve top elected and appointed officials and private investors, including entrepreneurs and lenders, as well as philanthropists. Listen and learn from those engaged in developing and investing in rural communities.
• Name and staff a knowledgeable and powerful rural advocate in the White House charged with continuing public and private investor learning, coordinating relevant federal programs to maximize comprehensive impact, and fostering increased private sector investment.
• Examine elevating the rural development mission and functions currently in USDA by creating a separate Department of Rural Development.
• Increase and coordinate an array of federal resources to support comprehensive asset-based development that leverages stepped-up private monies, drawing on lessons from rural Empowerment Zones.
• Emphasize investment in basic physical infrastructure, including affordable ownership and rental housing; water, sewer, utility, and transportation systems; increased broadband access; and alternative energy technology.
• Fund and finance development using proven strategies and programs in concert with knowledgeable partners and investors, including national and regional intermediaries with demonstrated capacity.
• Foster local nonprofit development capacity, entrepreneurial skills, ventures, and regional cooperation.
• Develop initiatives to ensure public and private investment in environmentally sustainable development, including alternative energy, working landscapes, through stewardship of existing assets like farms, fisheries, and forests, as well as conservation.
• Expand the universe of financial institutions covered by the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), and take specific measures to encourage financial institutions to step up rural investing.
• Continue to assess CRA covered institutions’ performance in meeting rural credit needs, particularly in poor and underserved communities.
• Amend the federal budget process to measure and track rural impact, and direct the Congressional Budget Office to create and apply a "rural impact" scoring process to relevant legislation.
• Build on the challenge U.S. Senator Max Baucus made to private foundations to double rural giving and insure rural representation on boards and staffs.
• Sponsor legislation, similar to the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, requiring private foundations to geo-code their activities, reporting results in annual 990 information returns filed with the Internal Revenue Service.
• Enact legislation providing seed capital for rural community foundations with representative boards of directors and staffs and strong commitments to supporting community development.