Utilisation of community management strategies is an approach to governance that is based on community and organisational involvement. Communities with development projects have formed community projects management committees (CPMCs) that are encouraged to adopt the community management strategy in the planning and financing of community…

This paper reports an experiment in over 3,000 Indonesian villages designed to test the role of performance incentives in improving the efficacy of aid programs. Villages in a randomly-chosen one-third of subdistricts received a block grant to improve 12 maternal and child health and education indicators, with the size of the subsequent year's…

Decorah, Iowa (pop. 8,172 in 2000), is, in many ways, a typical small Midwestern community facing many of the same issues as most other areas such as a brain drain and a continuing struggle to find ways to stimulate the local economy. Perhaps the strengths and successes of the approaches used in Decorah can be attributed to its ability to identify…

Deadwood, South Dakota, and Central City, Black Hawk, and Cripple Creek, Colorado, legalized gambling; in South Dakota, most earnings are earmarked for historic preservation, but in Colorado, they go into the general fund. Success in job creation, investment, and tourism has been accompanied by increased social problems. (SK)

The pros and cons of rural Community Development Corporations (CDCs) are presented via a dialogue between the two authors. (JC)

Leaders of programs serving rural America need to act strategically to ensure the long-term success of their initiatives. This strategy brief describes the funding landscape of rural programs and highlights the unique challenges confronting rural program leaders. It describes the different public and private resources that can support…

Rural America is currently facing an overwhelming problem, the need for decent housing. Even though small towns and rural areas of Southern America have been undergoing drastic change over the past 2 decades, over one-half of all inadequate rural housing is located in the South. Substandard housing is, for the most part, inhabited by families with…

The purpose of this guidebook is to help elected leaders of small towns and communities stretch their investments when matching funds are required to compete for a grant or to pay for development costs above the grant award itself. The federal "small cities" Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) is used as an example throughout the…

A bibliography for both practitioners and scholars interested in industrialization of rural areas, this document is one of a series of bibliographies prepared by research Functional Networks for the Southern Rural Development Center. The more than 750 entries, many annotated, cover available research, extension, and action agency literature…

This paper examines the organization, planning, development, and staging of foot races, bicycle races, or multi-event competitions as fund raisers for public or private groups in rural areas. Local businesses often assist in sponsoring such events in order to get free advertising and make money from newcomers drawn to the event. Organizers must be…

This guide was written for small and rural government officials who have limited experience with the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program and with federal grants in general. The use of outside expertise is often necessary in projects involving public facilities, housing, and economic development, some of the principal activities which…

This publication is comprised of bibliographic citations and lists of organizations, funding resources, and journals that provide information related to arts and humanities programs in rural America. The bibliography includes 22 annotated citations of resource guides, program descriptions, government reports, and journal articles published…

"Where the money is and what you'll need to do to get it," form the central theme of this citizen's guide to rural development. Designed to assist a community leader interested in implementing a development project, the guide concentrates on the sources which most frequently fund rural community development projects, i.e., the grant and…

Nineteen Wisconsin counties were the site of the four-year Rural Development Demonstration Project, one of five such projects in the nation. Among the project's objectives were to accelerate sound economic, social, cultural and environmental development and to provide alternatives for living in non-metropolitan areas while providing greater…

The Appalachian Regional Commission was set up to promote the overall development of the Appalachian region through a phased series of public investments. This report focuses on what has been accomplished by the Commission in the 1971 fiscal year. It gives a general accounting of how funds have been used and how the program is financed. The…