New Democrat Update

GROWING RURAL AMERICA

Rural areas in Colorado and the rest of the nation are hurting economically. In our progressive tradition, Democrats should do something about that.

Activist government has had a long and important role in boosting rural communities, from the Homestead Act, to President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, to Presidents John F. Kennedy’s and Lyndon B. Johnson’s initiatives to revitalize Appalachia. Advocating sensible 21st century policies will help rural economies grow, reduce congestion and costs to businesses and residents in metropolitan areas, and increase the standard of living for people in both places.

First, the federal government needs to get its organizational act together. Communities are continually frustrated by an unwieldy array of programs scattered all over the place: the Rural Development Administration (U.S. Department of Agriculture), the Economic Development Administration (U.S. Department of Commerce), and the Small Cities Block Grant Program (U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development). To make matters worse, none of these agencies have made rural development a top priority and each lacks the flexibility and entrepreneurial drive needed to get the job done.

Democrats should rally around a reform proposal by Robert Atkinson, formerly of the Progressive Policy Institute and now head of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. To reform the way the federal government does business and get the "biggest bang for the buck," Atkinson has advocated creation of the Rural Prosperity Corporation (RPC).

Financed by reducing government subsidy payments to mega farms and funds transferred from existing rural development programs now scattered around various federal agencies, RPC would make performance-based challenge grants to states for economic projects. These initiatives would focus on what makes today's economy grow - workers' skills, entrepreneurial energy, access to capital for small businesses, advanced telecommunications infrastructure, and technology transfer.

For example, the RPC could help launch initiatives that boost small business’ access to capital - especially important for building entrepreneurial, growth-oriented companies in rural areas. It could help initiate innovative entrepreneurial development programs and establish small business incubators to assist start-up companies.

To increase the rural share of food system profit, the RPC could partner with states and communities and launch new value-added and high-value marketing initiatives and cooperatives that strengthen small and mid-size farms. It could also work with the National Institute of Standards and Technology's Manufacturing Extension Partnership program to help boost rural industries.

Connecting to the rest of the world’s economy requires access to high-speed telecommunication services. RPC partnerships with states could help aggregate demand for broadband, making it much more cost-effective for Internet providers to move into rural markets.

As rural America gets online and more of the economy processes information digitally, numerous economic development opportunities will open up. With the importance of physical proximity to large population centers dwindling, employers will find rural communities increasingly attractive because of their lower cost of living and higher quality of life.

Similarly, high-speed telecommunications will also make it possible to move government facilities and employment to rural areas. In addition to being an economic shot in the arm for those communities, it would save taxpayers quite a bit of money.

For example, as Atkinson explains, “The U.S. Postal Service uses telecommunications technology to allow workers in Greensboro, N.C., to view mail being sorted in real time in their Washington, D.C., central mail facility. Workers in Greensboro see an image of a letter in Washington, D.C., and manually type in the address so that a machine in the Washington facility can print a bar code on the letter. The postal service does this because costs are lower in Greensboro than in Washington.”

A large number of people in the federal and state governments are employed in similar “back office” type functions. To take just one case, it would be much more cost-effective for the Social Security Administration’s claims processing facilities and its 36 teleservice centers to be in rural regions, compared to where they are now, expensive metropolitan areas.

The RPC could also support research and development initiatives for rural-focused and job-creating technologies, like wind turbine placements. In partnership with the National Science Foundation, RPC and states could also create university-based research centers that would focus on technologies for natural resource-based products.

An RPC agenda will strongly resonate with voters because it emphasizes reforming the federal government, not merely increasing its funding. Without a reform component, the best Democratic ideas too often sound like big government. Our party must always reassure the electorate that we want to fix government, not just expand it.

CHANGING THE POLITICS

If progressives get serious about building the capacity of rural America to achieve its own economic destiny, the political benefits are sure to follow. Right here in Colorado, thanks partly to the leadership of the state's two Democratic rural heavyweights, Sen. Ken Salazar and Rep. John Salazar, our party has already been making considerable headway.

In addition to caring about the economy, the Salazars have shown that tone matters as much as substance. They have proven that Democrats can talk about tough issues like gun control and abortion without implying that no reasonable person can have a different view.

Democrats have also learned another valuable lesson from the Salazars. The GOP’s old formula of attacking progressives for lacking character and deeply-held moral convictions falls flat when Democrats embrace San Luis Valley values like patriotism, duty, respect, faith, hard work, strength, community, self-reliance, family and responsibility.

At the end of the day, many rural voters see the role of government itself as a matter of values. They, along with a large majority of the country, want a public sector that equips people to solve their own problems.

The Salazars’ leadership has already helped make a difference in denting the Republicans’ traditional rural advantage. The state GOP now controls a little more than 57 percent of county commissions, down from a whopping 75 percent just seven years ago. The number of rural Democratic legislators in the State House has also increased.

Indeed, if Democrats deliver on all of the above, they too will prosper in rural America.