– Woman: Dave Ivan is nationally recognized for his research on successful community change. I know change can be a scary word, but it’s also very positive. He’s a frequent speaker on community success at multi-state, regional, community,

and local conferences. He’s conducted previous research on community vitality including a 2011 study entitled “Community Success in the New Economy,” and a 2012 study examining community change. His research has been recognized by the Community

Development Society as its national research award winner. He received his degrees from Michigan State, and an MBA from Penn State, and his PhD from Michigan State with a focus on community sustainability and vitality. So his keynote this morning

“Can Small Communities Be Cool?” I think, obviously, the answer is yes, but we will learn how and why we can make them cool. So without further ado. – David: So how many of you are from communities less than 5,000? Okay, majority of you.

How about less than 1,000? Wow, awesome. Anybody less than 500? What’s the population? – Woman: Unincorporated. – Okay. So . . . [chuckles]

So if you added the people up in the unincorporated area what’s that kind of total? – Woman: Well, it depends because in the summer we swell a little bit to probably about 2,000. – Okay. I think my comments today are going to really speak to you.

You know, a lot of love goes to the large cities, right? You read the media, the press, and they talk about the great things that are happening in Austin, Texas, or the great things that are happening in Boston or Seattle, and how they’re moving

into this new economy. And there’s not a lot of love for what’s happening in rural places and small towns. So the people at the Kellogg Foundation, so they have an affinity for rural America, the cereal people, and they says, “You know, Dave,

“we know that a lot of attention is going to the big cities, “but we also know, we also know, “that there’s a lot of innovation, a lot of cool things “happening in rural places across this country. ” So they provided some funding for me

to travel to 300 different communities in 22 states, including Wisconsin, and really unpack what’s happening in these communities. Now I’m a sociologist by training, so I like listening, and studying what are people doing. So I would pull into town and

spend a couple of days there visit with elected folks, visit with appointed individuals, business leaders, John Q. Public, and say, “What’s happening in your community? “What is it that perhaps others can learn from?”

And based on that we identified a series of best practices. Myself and our grad team kind of mapped this all out. And some success themes really emerge that really I’m going to visit with you here today. We’re a community of learners, okay?

And I have 90 minutes, which is a long time to visit with you today. So as I am sharing examples if there are neat things that are happening in your community that you want your peers to learn about, this is your

opportunity to brag. So I want you to kind of raise your hand, and say, “Hey, here’s what we’re doing in our community,” okay? Because I think, again, we can learn from each other, but what we found is, you know, cool communities are more than great coffee shops,

or breweries, or chic retail stores. It’s really looking at some deep pillars in terms of what made these communities successful, and we really identified five themes that were involved in helping these communities

really advance themselves. First, they had a deep commitment to entrepreneurship and innovation. We’ll talk about that. Secondly, they look at their human talent, and says, “How can we capitalize on that

“from a very strategic perspective?” Third, they looked at their place, the built environment, and says, “All right, what’s our downtown look like? “What does our housing look like? “How do we raise the bar “relative to the

quality of our place?” Fourthly, there was a strong social capital. This is kind of a hallmark of rural America I think, rural Wisconsin, you know, neighbor helping neighbor, right? You all kind of come together. What we saw in these communities

is that they did that, but they went a little further in terms of networks that really helped advance businesses and individuals. And lastly there was a commitment to “get ‘er done. ” So what I’m going to do is kind of unpack each of these.

Spend a little time, provide some case studies or examples of communities that are just doing outstanding work, but then also provide an opportunity for you to kind of share your stories as well. So what we learned about

entrepreneurial communities is that they were intentionally focused on supporting, and identifying, well, first identifying, and then supporting those entrepreneurs in their communities, okay? So it says, all right, here’s the people

that are either looking at starting enterprises, or have existing enterprises, so let’s be laser-focused in terms of how we can make it easier for them. Then, secondly, they created an ecosystem the supportive environment to help them advance their work.

This is a little different than a lot of rural places, I’ll be honest with you, because I think sometimes a culture in rural towns, and I live in a small town, by the way. Grew up in a small town, live in a small town. I think, sometimes, a culture

in rural towns is that we tend to be a little jealous if someone’s very successful, right? Or we tend to be judgmental. “What the heck is Tom doing? “Is he crazy?” Right? So what these communities did is just the opposite. They prop people up

in a very meaningful, and purposeful way. You know, there’s really lot of different components in terms of successful entrepreneurship. You know, you have to have these thick networks. That’s why entrepreneurs are flocking to Austin, and Boston,

and Seattle because they want to connect with other entrepreneurs, right? Oftentimes, in kind of a confidential way. They kind of share their challenges, or stories and solicit advice. There has to be a level of support tools.

You can see some of them here. Most entrepreneurs, there’s really three things to be successful in business. You have to have a great product or service. You have to be able to market that, and then you have to have the financial system

in place, right? Oftentimes, an entrepreneur is good at one of those. Maybe they have a great product or service. In a rare occasion they may be good at two of those, but it’s really the exception that they have skills in all three,

and that’s where we need to kind of triage our resources to be able to help them. We know, particularly, in small town America that capital can be a problem, right? Fewer banks, fewer locally owned banks. So what we have to do is say,

“All right, how can we advance this industry, “or advance this enterprise by providing different options “for them to finance their business?” The last thing what we saw in these communities repeatedly is that they drill down to the youth.

They recognize that they have to plant seeds with the next generation of entrepreneurs in their communities. So I’m going to give examples of communities that I think are doing a bang-up job. Fairfield, Iowa, has

anybody been there? Mark, yeah, yeah, okay, a few of you have, it’s a little different community, right? The population probably around 8,500 people. They are perhaps the poster child of community-based

entrepreneurship. They recognize and celebrate entrepreneurs on a regular basis. Their local newspaper which is actually a weekly paper has an entrepreneurial column. You go into their high school, and they have the entrepreneurial hall of fame

right when you walk into their school. So they’re planting these seeds pretty early with kids, right? In terms of saying how important entrepreneurship is in our community. They have the most extensive mentoring program I have ever witnessed,

or been able to uncover in a community. If I want to start a business they’ll hear about it, and I’ll get a phone call and they’ll say, “Dave, we hear that you’re interested in looking at “opening a new business. “We’d like to meet you

for lunch or breakfast. ” And when I show up, if I accept their invitation they’ll be two or three other entrepreneurs from that community and they’ll say, “You know what? “We’re here to help you. “We’re here to kind of show

you where the landmines may be “in terms of starting a business in our community, “in our region. “We know that’s there’s going to be hiccups. “We’re here to be your coach, to be your mentor. “We’ll sign any confidentiality agreement

“that you’d like us to sign “’cause we know that that’s important. “The only thing we ask, “the only thing we ask is that when you are successful, “as we know you will be, you serve as a mentor to others. ” So what they have created

is this thick group, or cadre of entrepreneur mentoring entrepreneur. It’s tremendous, tremendous. And, again, I mentioned earlier that we know that capital can be a challenge in small communities. So this small town has their own angel fund,

their own venture capital fund to kind of complement the other traditional resources that are available in the community. So these are individuals in their community reaching in their pocket and investing in other enterprises. Cool stuff.

How they’ve done? Not bad, when you look at their trajectory the past few years 3,000 new jobs created, personal income has tripled. – Woman: In a town of 8,500 people? – Dave: Yeah. – Woman: Wow.

– Isn’t that amazing? Amazing, so their actual growth has been tremendous. And what they have done, actually, is position themselves in a regional perspective, so not all of that is coming from 8,500 people, right? Because 3,000 in math

doesn’t work out, but when you look at how they’re drawing people from their region, it’s incredible. Columbus, Indiana, a little bigger community outside of Indianapolis. They, too, are kind of creating this ecosystem.

I mentioned the importance of networks, and you’re going to hear me say that over and over and over again, networks matter. Entrepreneurs want to connect with other entrepreneurs. So in Columbus they have the entrepreneurs network, TEN,

where they come together. Here’s a picture of it here. Just to share stories, right? But what they’ve done is really moved all their resources online. Research shows that most people looking at starting a business will gather their information online

between 10 o’clock at night, and two o’clock in the morning, okay? That’s kind of how they’re wired, right? So for those of you that are representing the economic development sector, if your office isn’t open from 10 o’clock at night

to two o’clock in the morning, and you don’t have your resources online you need to move them online, right? Plus people like to again fly under the radar, right? They want to be able to get this information with a lot of people not

knowing what’s going on. They’re still in that information gathering stage. What I’m also impressed with what Columbus does is how they drilled down to the school level. They have a business plan competition, but it’s a very robust

business plan competition that looks at the most successful business based on viability, based on innovation. They’ve been able to incubate new businesses. I’m going to talk about Columbus a little bit this afternoon. Juneau County, Wisconsin.

Anybody here from Juneau County? Yay, yeah, wonderful. You know, what Terry Whipple has done in Juneau County is tremendous. So that’s a very rural county, and I want you to add to my story, right, okay? And so I’ve been to Juneau. Here’s a picture

when I was there. County-wide Entrepreneurship and Innovation Club. So what Terry says, he said, “Even rural places “we can help tee up that interaction, that network. ” So what he does is he brings people together

at a setting kind of in the middle of the county, and people kind of share stories. He’ll bring in a speaker to kind of provide an education, but the key, the key of what he does is connect people to people. When I was there,

Terry was kind of like an orchestra conductor, so he would have people introduce themselves, right? And as people introduced themselves he’d say, “You know what, Jane, you need to meet Tom over here “because I think that there’s some synergy

“in terms of what I’m hearing. ” Then at break it was kind of like a beehive in terms of everybody is just connecting. He’s done a marvelous job in terms of taking a very rural place. What’s the population

of Juneau County? – Man: 25,000. – 25,000 county wide, right? And helping to bring some really big city type approaches to help entrepreneurs. So, Marion, Virginia, population probably around the size of Rice Lake, about 8,500.

You know, so, I mentioned earlier that it takes really three things to run a successful business. Marion had a struggling downtown, to be honest with you, and they said, “We need to fill some of our empty storefronts.

” Because we know, you know that the downtown is really the face of the community, right? And people will judge a vitality of a community based on the health of that downtown. So what they have done is

really a small business bootcamp for aspiring entrepreneurs within targeted sectors. So what they did was they did a community survey, and they says, “You know what? “Here’s what we need in our community. “Here’s kind of the gaps “that people are

traveling elsewhere from. ” And they said, “All right, “who’s interested in opening a bakery?” I’ll just use that as an example, okay? All right, person raises their hand. “You know, I have

some baking skills. “I’d be interested in opening a bakery. ” They says, “Here’s the deal. “If you go to our small business bootcamp, “we’ll help set you up. “We’ll provide a $5,000 grant to help you get started.

“We’ll pay for your training. “Now you have to get through the training “before we give you grant. ” The result is incredible. I mean, I was there it’s been about six months. I think I counted two empty storefronts,

and it’s only because there’s some churn, right? There’s always going to be churn. So very targeted in terms of how they tried to fill their empty storefronts by wrapping around education, connecting those needs to what they hear

from the community, and then providing some resources to make it happen. Jonesville, Michigan. So they kind of are using an economic gardening approach, you know, where they’re bringing in some data. So the village is actually negotiating

rental rates for new businesses. They’re actually assisting with market data research, and they’re helping to negotiate lease arrangements. Probably some of you are saying, “Well, that’s really not what government “usually does, right?” In terms of actually

doing market research on behalf of a private sector industry. Now, you’re probably right, but in Jonestown they said, “You know what? “We all are in this together, “and if we have some resources connecting with “their libraries and other

we can help make it happen. ” They developed a retail incubator that’s been very successful. Ord, Nebraska, population about 800 people. This is in rural Nebraska. I swear I took a two track to get there.

It’s a very rural place with very poor signage. So this is a ranching area, and as in much of agricultural sectors, you know, farmers pass, and then the kids who may be in larger cities. In this case, in Omaha, or Lincoln, or in other places,

that ranch is sold. That money goes to the kids, and it’s lost from the community forever, right? So what small town, Ord, Nebraska, population 1,200 people has done it says, “You know what? “We’d like a wealth transfer plan.

” And they had eyeball to eyeball conversations with their entire community and says, “You know, if you love this community, “if you want this community “to be here for your grandchildren,

“and your grandchildren’s grandchildren, “would you consider as you put together “your estate planning efforts, “committing 5% of your estate to the community?” Just 5%, so this small town of 1,200 people now has I’ll call it a

war chest, an endowment in excess of $10 million, $10 million. And they’re very strategic. So, you know, every time you have that kind of an endowment, that kind of community foundation you get a lot of requests, right?

But they said, “You know what? “We have to be very strategic in terms of “what we’re going to fund. ” So it’s all about enhancing the long-term vitality, and I’ll talk about some of the entrepreneurship programs they’re doing a little later.

Tremendously successful. So my last example is Westphalia, Michigan, population 500 people, so my friend from the unincorporated area. So this is a very rural place not far from, actually, where I live. This is an ag community,

a one church town. Everyone tends to be of the same religion, happens to be Catholic. So a few years ago when this building became vacant downtown, the church actually took a lease on it, and then they went to the

youth group, and said, “Guess what, kids? “We just leased a building on behalf of our parish, “and we’re going to give it to you. “And we want you as our youth group “to figure out what to do with it.

“Now we want you to say within a certain lane, obviously, “in terms of the type of businesses, “but we’re not going to really be here to hover, “or to helicopter over you, “but rather what we’re going to do “is just provide you with

mentors,” which they did. So the kids came up with this shop. You can see it’s called The Ark. It’s kind of like an ice cream, sandwich, pizza community hangout. It is right downtown. It filled an empty storefront. It is the gathering place

for youth in the community. If you go there after school at like three o’clock, there’s a line out the door. And what a wonderful lesson for the kids, right? What a wonderful lesson for these kids to say “You know what? My community believes in me.

“My community trusts me to run this business, “which has now been in operation for about eight years, “and my community wants me to be successful. ” We’re teaching entrepreneurship experiences for these kids. Great story.

So before I go onto the next theme, are there anybody whose doing some really cool stuff relative to entrepreneurship in your community, yes? – Audience: [mumbles] – Caleb, where’s Caleb? So at Viroqua, so you guys did a holiday pop-up shop,

which other communities have done, great thing. So it fills an empty storefront, right? It gets people downtown for the holidays because there’s now all of a sudden some variety. It also plants a seed in terms of saying,

“Okay, this kind of went pretty good for me. “Maybe I want to move “to a more permanent storefront, right?” Anything else to add? – Caleb: Not really, no. – Great, no, but I think that is awesome, and we’ve seen other

communities do that. I think it is a tremendous tool in terms of trying to push any button we can push to try to help emerging entrepreneurs kind of get started, right? One of the big things is inventory so you can kind of

manage your inventory. Short-term test, you have low overhead, right? That’s a key, you know, sometimes people just need some help, right? And to know that you care as a community, that you care that you’re here to help them.

Now, some people, again, they’re going to want to fly under the radar, right? ‘Cause if they’re not successful, particularly in small towns, you know, that is kind of like a scarlet B that, you know, gosh, we

weren’t successful, and people kind of look at you differently. Thanks for sharing that. So, yeah, I do want to do a shout out to Mark Lange. Mark, stand up. So Mark is a friend and a colleague at University of Wisconsin.

He runs a unit called the business intelligence? What’s it called, Mark? – Mark: The Institute for Business and Entrepreneurship. – Institute for Business and Entrepreneurship. The work that they’re doing from a data-driven perspective is really, really powerful.

Again, he’s a thought partner to us as we try to look at different programs at Michigan State. He’s a wonderful resource. So, again, I would encourage you to hunt him down. So I’m going to kind of like pivot to our next success theme.

So the second thing we saw in these communities was really an investment in their human talent beyond entrepreneurship, and that’s really from a broad perspective. We know that human capital, your talent that you have is important.

So looking at workforce infrastructure, and how can we advance the skills of the people that we have in the community? You know, so they’re looking at really the communities that we’ve studied, a variety of things.

They want to look at connectivity, right? An important piece of that. The educational system not only K-12, but how can we connect perhaps with community colleges, or four year institutions in a strategic manner? Medical facilities is

absolutely critical. I’ve talked to some folks here representing the healthcare sector. That’s an important ingredient in terms of looking at that human capital, right? Downtowns, I mentioned this earlier. It’s the face of a community,

but you have to also look at affordable housing, and then in this new paradigm renewable energy has gotten tremendous amount of interest. So these are the things as you look at the younger generation, the millennials, or others,

in terms of what they feel is important. When they look at a community that these are some things that they check off. That, okay, “How are we doing in these areas “if I want to raise my family? “If I want to take root in this community?”

So one of the large communities we visited. Yes, go ahead. – Woman: I would respectfully suggest the list that you have end with that. – Oh, absolutely, absolutely, thank you because I think that that’s

a part of it, absolutely. Yeah, I accept that as a friendly amendment, yeah. So Dubuque, Iowa, big town, right? Bigger town, not a small community, but we went to Dubuque because I think they have an interesting story.

Kind of like Janesville, here in Wisconsin, Dubuque has changed their trajectory. If you look back in the ’80s, Dubuque was a struggling, struggling community. I mean, I think that there was an article in the Des Moines Register

that was shown to me that referred to Dubuque as the armpit of the Midwest. Not a very flattering portrayal, right? Not a place you want to play, live, and work, right? But today if you go to Dubuque it’s tremendous in terms of what they’ve done,

so we spent some time kind of studying them. They shared with me how they’re engaging young university talent. I said, “Well, that’s interesting, “because you really don’t have “a university in Dubuque per se.

” They do have a private liberal arts school. They have a community college that’s nearby. UW has as part of the UW system just north in La Crosse, right? – Man: Platteville. – Platteville, thank you. So what they have said

is, “What we’re doing “is we want to connect with the region. ” So they drew a circle 60 miles around Dubuque. And then through their Chamber they established a Young Professional College Chapter

in many of these small communities because they said, “We’re going to be the regional hub. “So we want to connect with “the young individuals across our region. ” Research shows, Research shows that if you have

a positive internship experience you’re more likely to pick that company, and, therefore, that community as a future place to work and live, right? It makes sense, it’s intuitive. So what Dubuque has said is, “All right, “we’re going to take a deep

dive on this internship thing, “and we’re going to be very good at it. ” So they’ve established the Internship Academy. So if you’re a freshman at these schools that they’ve connected with they says, “You know what?

“We’ll give you a shadow. “We’ll assign someone that you can kind of “follow along with the day, “kind of dip your toe in the water “to know what this sector is all about. “If you’re a sophomore, we’ll provide you a mentor.

“Someone that you can call, “and they’re going to call you “and check in on you occasionally “to find out how your career is projecting. “They may invite you to tag along “to different meetings, right? “So that you can, again, build

your young career network, “and if you’re a junior, senior we promise you a meaningful, “paid internship “in the companies in our community. “And we’ve identified a few sectors that we know “based on their location quotients,

“or based on essentially their strength in our community, “that represent great potential, “and if you’re within those sectors “we have a loan forgiveness program. ” Very strategic in terms of how they’re trying to get youth

to come to their community. They have a video I’m going to show in just a second that really changes the narrative in terms of what people think about this community. When I spoke to the mayor he said, “You know what? “The next five years may

define the next 50 in Dubuque “because the world is changing so fast, “and we have to be light on our feet, “and we have to be able to respond to issues “in a very meaningful manner. ” I will tell you that

Dubuque is not that diverse. Seriously, they’re pretty Wonder Bread, like many Midwest communities, but they recognize that the younger generation appreciates diversity at perhaps the most of any population sector. Many of them go to universities they have diverse settings,

so they’re exposed to that, and they like being around diverse people, so they’ve really capitalized on that, absolutely. Someone else had something, yeah? – Man: Yeah, is it youthful? – Youthful, demographically, Dubuque is not that young,

but they’re clearly changing the narrative on what people think. Birds of a similar feather flock together, right? And so what they’re trying to say is, “You know what? “We’ve got a growing, young professional group here. “So if you’re coming

from Chicago, or if you’re coming from “Saint Louis, Madison, whatever the case may be, “you don’t have to leave back your peers, “your peeps of your generation, “we have that in our community. ” Any other observations?

– Man: How big is Dubuque? – Dubuque is about 60,000, so it was the second largest community we studied, but we were struck by some of the things that they’re doing that we said, “You know, that could be instructional “even for small communities. ”

Let me give you a story of another community, very different from Dubuque, Iowa. Sparta, North Carolina. So if you look where Caldwell County is in that thing, Sparta is like in the middle of that. This is a very small town,

probably around 4,700, 4,800 people. This is a one horse town in terms of an economic engine. There is a Martin Marietta plant there that employs in the plant about 1,200 people, and then there’s these ancillary suppliers,

and those type of things. So if Martin Marietta ever left Sparta, North Carolina, it would be a body blow. It would really kill that community. So the leaders of this community said, “You know what? “We’ve hitched on

to this company. “How do we make sure that they’re here for the long-term?” So they kind of put together a delegation, and they made an appointment, get this, with the CEO of Martin Marietta. They only had about 20 minutes on his schedule.

So they flew there and said, “Mr. CEO, let me tell you about our community. “As you may know you have a facility “that employs over 1,000 people in our small town. “If you ever chose to relocate that work,

“it would devastate our entire region. “Can you make a commitment “as we look at making some investments in our community “that you’re going to be here for the long-term?” You know what he said? “No way, no way. ”

He says, “We’re a publicly-traded company. “I’m beholden to the stockholders, “and we have to do business “where it makes sense for us to do business. “Now, as long as your plant continues to perform well, “surely we’ll do business,

“but this is a competitive world and we will do business “where it makes sense for us to do business. ” So, obviously, they were very disappointed, but on their plane ride back they really reflected on what he said, and says,

“How can we make sure that we are the best company “in terms of our efficiency, in terms of our productivity, “in terms of our innovation of the Martin Marietta system?” The problem is in this part of rural western North Carolina there’s no universities that they can kind of hitch onto.

There is a community college in a county just north of them, so what they did was they worked with this community college to develop a training program on advanced material logistics. Then they had eyeball to eyeball conversations with the workers in the plants and they says,

“We want you to take some additional “professional development classes. “We’re going to bring some to our community. “You may have to travel to the community college for others, “but we’re going to raise the bar

“relative to our training. “Our own workforce development effort “here in our community. ” It’s been successful, tremendously successful. Their productivity increased about 12%, and the company added new jobs,

but what it also did was it changed the culture among the relatives and– among the, what I would say the people who live in that whole region who don’t really value, to be honest with you, and this is not a disparaging comment,

but don’t value the importance of continuing learning. So for those residents it’s kind of planted a seed, and says, you know what? It’s not just about graduating from high school, and going to work at the plant. It’s about continually learning new things.

Continually learning new things. So that’s the new narrative that they’ve embedded in their community and their region. That’s about human development, and that’s how this small town is advancing themself. What we also saw in many communities is really strong social capital.

The communities were engaged in guiding their future. Networks, I talk about networks, networks, networks. Networks that bond the community, but also link them with other communities. They’re reaching out to the young adults

much like Dubuque is in terms of engaging them to be a part of their community. And beyond the young adults they’re drilling down to the youth of the community, in terms of establishing a strong relationship with them, and getting them to believe in their community,

and provide help. So, sometimes, it’s easy things. So, Coopersville, Michigan, population about 2,800 people, west Michigan. So when you drive into Coopersville you have these signs here. It salutes a local non-profit. It salutes a local

business person. It salutes a local educator. They change these awardees every quarter, and then at the end of the year they have a community potluck where they bring the 12 winners from the year, and they say thank you. Thank you for all that you’ve

done for the community. So I happened to talk to Terry Quaker. He happens to own a hardware downtown. Terry said, “This hardware has been in my family for years. ” He said, “This little gesture “in terms of putting my name,

“in terms of welcoming and how they’re honoring me “meant so much to me. “More than any other honor that we’ve gotten. ” Now he feels really a part of the community. So, again, sometimes it’s the simple things

that communities can do in terms of engaging individuals in a different way. Pella, Iowa, who’s been to Pella before? Great town, right? When you think of Pella, a couple industries come to mind, right? The easy one is

the windows, right? Pella Windows. The other one is in the ag sector. You may be familiar with Vermeer Manufacturing, great ag forage equipment. So both Pella Windows and Vermeer Manufacturing they try to attract talent

from across the country. They need engineers. They need quality control individuals. They need human resource professionals, accountants. They need young talent, okay? And as I talked to people in that community particularly at both

companies they says, “You know what, Dave? “We’ll get people here “to take their first job out of college, “and then about a year and a half or less they leave. ” So they had a serious retention issue,

which was hurting tremendously the productivity of these communities. So what they developed was a whole campaign called Positively Pella. Now, if you go to Pella, and I’m sure many of you have been there, beautiful town, right?

It’s kind of a tourist destination. People are very nice and they wave at you, and it celebrates their Dutch heritage, but when you kind of unpack it a little bit, and what the community learned as they kind of held a

mirror up to themselves is, “Yeah, we’re nice, we’ll smile and wave to people “that Minnesota nice people approach, “but unless you were born in this community, “or go to one of our faith churches, “you’re really not a part

of the community, right?” At least that’s what the younger generation felt. It’s not that people weren’t nice, but they never really felt a part of the fabric of the community. So what this Positive Pella campaign

was really designed to is say, “All right, we have these young individuals “coming into our community. “How do we weave them into our community fabric? “How do we help them to integrate?” And it’s been very successful. It’s kind of using the old

Welcome Wagon approach, but in a 21st century model in terms of providing essentially a concierge to help people navigate the community. If they have a family, and we talked about child care, helping them find child care options,

a variety of different things, very successful. It’s what it’s done is strengthening the social bond in new residents. And then I did a follow-up conversation with both the HR director at Pella Windows and Vermeer. They said their retention

rates have improved markedly, and they’re really very pleased with the results. So, again, as you look at your small towns, think about what are we doing to welcome newcomers? What are we doing to welcome newcomers? ‘Cause that’s important.

I remember a story and I don’t know the name of the town, but it was an individual who shared this with me from North Dakota. A young family was moving into this community. The lady bought a house and this was like in March-ish. She couldn’t wait to

move to the community because she wanted to start a garden. The house that she bought had enough space for her to start a garden. Her last place didn’t have that opportunity, which was a little disappointing because by the time they

closed on their other place, and moved to the community it would be already July, and they wouldn’t be able to have a garden, but next year they can get one. So when she moved in the community she closed, and the moving van arrived to their home.

She was just struck because the community planted a garden for her. Isn’t that cool? You know, they listened. They listened in terms of what was important to her and said, “You know what? “What’s it going to cost us? “Some seeds, right?

“We want her to be part of our fabric of our community. ” So she truly felt welcomed from that perspective in her community. You know, I think the key to young professional engagement is really having this third place

for individuals to hang out. You know, we have our work, we have our home, and then we have this place we hang out, right? It varies community to community, coffee shop, the diner downtown, whatever the case may be. Young professionals

want to congregate with other young professionals, so this becomes a key factor. A Young Professional Organization, a YPO is crucial. If you don’t have one, I don’t care the size of your community, start one. Again, birds of a similar feather flock together.

They want to connect with other young professionals, and are we providing opportunities for them to offer their voice in community decision-making? So often in rural places, the leadership is the same leadership that’s been in place for 15, 20 years.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing. I don’t want to make it sound like that’s a bad thing, but people sometimes feels that there’s not a pathway for them to contribute to the conversation of what’s happening in that community.

I think one of the best examples of a community that has taken a very different approach is Thinkers and Drinkers out of Youngstown, Ohio. Interesting thing, right? So they get together at an adult drinking establishment. You have a few of

those in Wisconsin. Diverse group of people, right? People that perhaps expand your network a little bit. They come together and they throw ideas in a hat, pull an idea out of the hat, and have a conversation in terms of how can we improve

this in our community? They really kind of put legs under it, right? So it doesn’t stop there. So what Thinkers and Drinkers does is then they’ll work with the system. So if it’s looking at recreational opportunities

they’ll go to the Park and Rec Commission at the city, and talk about how this idea kind of emerged, and what can we do to help bring this to action? So it provides a pathway for people to plug into their community. So I happened to visit with

them, great conversation, and they were talking about in their early stages how they went to a Chamber meeting at Youngstown. So Youngstown is a little bigger town. I don’t know if anybody’s been there, but if you know the

history of Youngstown it’s got quite the industrial heritage. It’s not far from Pittsburgh. It’s about an hour from Pittsburgh, and much like Pittsburgh, its roots are in the steel industry. And back in the day when the

steel industry was humming, back in the ’70s and early ’80s, Youngstown was very prosperous because those were great paying jobs, a lot of taxable income coming into the community. So Thinkers and Drinkers were at the Chamber. Now, to be kind here,

the Chamber is perhaps a more mature sector of the Youngstown community, okay? If you get my drift. And the conversation at the Chamber luncheon was the good old days. Remember back when those steel plants were running, and how easy it was.

We woke up making money, all right? We just woke up making money. If we could just hit the reset button, and kind of go back to those days where everyone had great jobs. And the folks at Thinkers and Drinkers said,

“Stop it, stop it. “We weren’t even born when those companies “got up and left our community, “and as long as we continue to talk about the past, “and where we’ve been, “we’re never going to pivot the conversation to the future, “and where we need to

head, so just stop it. ” You know, I contend that communities tend to move in the direction of the conversation. So if people are pissing and moaning downtown about whatever at your community, that sets the narrative, right?

That sets the narrative for your community. And you’re all leaders in this room. So it becomes incumbent upon you to set that positive tone. Much like Thinkers and Drinkers is changing the conversation in Youngstown you’re going to have to say,

“Okay, how do we talk about the positive things “that are happening in our community? “How do we correct some of the misinformation “in our community that kind of emerges through gossip? “How do we set the tone “that things are good

in our community, “and we’re a good place to live?” Right? And doing that will change the trajectory of your community I believe. I really think it’s foundational in terms of how can you set a positive tone.

What we also saw in many of these communities was their engagement extends to youth. Oftentimes, this really looks at arts and culture. Arts and culture is a wonderful venue, and vehicle to engage youth in a variety of

different levels. Looking at heritage. The key is to kind of create a positive memory with youth. There’s research that shows that there’s a few touchpoints in a person’s life. Usually around second or third grade, and, again, around

10th and 11th grade. If a young child or young student during high school has a positive experience at that point in their life, they’re more likely to boomerang back to that experience. So to translate it from a community

involvement perspective, they’re more likely to perhaps consider your community as a place to come back to. Then the other thing we saw was that these communities really provide authentic opportunities for youth to become engaged. So, Bothel, Washington,

population probably around 6, 7,000 people. They have banners that celebrate youth, and you can see them right there. They change them every three or four years. I’ve led a focus group at the school, and the kids said,

“Did you see my picture at 3rd and Elm?” They absolutely knew where their picture was on those banners in their downtown. The interesting thing if you look at these it’s kind of hard to see it was raining in

Washington, go figure. It’s a picture of a skateboarder, right? Now how many of you have pictures of skateboarders in your downtown? I’m going to to guess zero. Usually we have signs that say, “No skateboarding here,” right?

And I get it, I understand, you know, they’re kind of zipping around the sidewalk that can be a nuisance, but Bothel says, “You know what? “This is what kids enjoy so we want to celebrate it. “We still don’t encourage them to be downtown,

“but we want to celebrate it “because when we put up a ‘no skateboarding here’ sign “we might as well put up a sign that says ‘no fun here. ‘” So they’re all about changing the narrative. Dowagiac, Michigan has what’s called a Fine Arts Festival

where they bring in topnotch entertainment to their community. Here’s the kicker. If you’re going to perform at our Fine Arts Festival, you’re required by contract to spend time in our school system. Do we have any jazz fans here?

You’ve heard of the Neville Brothers, Art and Charles Neville? So, here’s Charles Neville here, jamming with the high school jazz band. So I ask you how cool is it for that young gentleman there, or those two young ladies to be jamming with

Charles Neville, internationally known jazz musician. They’re going to remember that for the rest of their life, right? Creating those positive memories. Jonesville, Michigan, I talked about them earlier.

This is a community that is really hitting on a lot of different levels, so they’re always surveying people, always asking, “What is it that we can provide you “from a community, including different age groups?” A few years ago, they

asked their third graders “What is it that the community can do for you?” Typical third grade response, “You know what? “We’d love to have a rock wall. ” Sounds like third graders, right? What does the community do?

It built it, it’s not that big friends. It’s like from here to that wall. They built it in a park, but I mentioned that they’re always doing every few years these surveys and kind of taking a pulse of the community, and they had these

extraordinarily high survey results from middle school students, and think, “All right, we either have a surveying response, “or error going on here, or something’s up. ” So they did a focus group and says,

“All right, what’s happening here? “Why are you rating us so high?” You know what these kids said? “Back in elementary school, we asked for a rock wall, “and you built it. ” You know, we tend to discount the youth voice, right?

We don’t provide authentic opportunities for them to tell us as a community what’s important. Jonesville gets it. They know if they have a chance in hell of these kids coming back to their community, that they have to

listen to them, and act upon what they hear. So I provide a simple idea to your community. You don’t have to even use disposable cameras now with digital cameras now, and ask children to take pictures of what they like, and dislike in their community.

This is photovoice. It’s a commonly used approach, and present these pictures at a future planning commission, city commission meeting, whatever the case may be. You’ll be astounded at what you hear. I do a lot of community coaching,

and we did this with a group in a community in Michigan. Caro, Michigan, population is probably around 3,800 people. And I remember as if it were yesterday a beautiful young lady, she was a senior in high school, and she actually had tears in her eyes.

She said, “You know, I love my community. “I love my classmates. “I love my family. “I wish I could stay here, “but there’s really no future for me here. “I’m going to have to move. ” And she showed picture after

picture of empty storefronts in their downtown. So to her, those empty storefronts were sending a message of no future for me in my community. I don’t see a pathway for me to take root in my hometown. So we had to devise a strategy in terms of trying to provide

some type of way to activate those downtowns. We actually connected with the arts program in the high school, and really did a rotating art display throughout, until we could get some businesses in there. That allows you to kind of tap into a different perspective

from the kids, so easy to do. So, how do communities involve youth? Now, really if we look at our engagement it’s really at three levels. We either do things to youth, we do things for youth, or we do things with youth. And oftentimes, we’re over here,

and telling them what they can’t do, right? Or we focus on the stars and ignore other youth. Because sometimes if you look at the research, it’s not necessarily your A students that are going to stay in the community,

so how do we reach out to others so that they feel connected to the community? Or we recruit ’em for a trash cleanup, and that’s their engagement piece. True story, so this is my son who is now older. So when he was in high school

we tried to instill the importance of volunteering, so he was part of a club called Good Wins, and they did little community service projects. He got a call on a Sunday afternoon, they’re going to do a trash pickup in the community.

He said, “Yeah, I’ll be there. ” When he hung up the phone he says, “You know, Dad, I think oftentimes the only thing “my community wants from me is to pick up trash. ” So we have to be

careful in terms of what we ask them to do, right? Because the messages may be mixed, so what we can do as we move down this continuum, and saying how do we engage them in different ways so that they’re part of the decision making, right?

So that they’re part of the discovery. Remember back in Westphalia, Michigan, in terms of how the kids are running that business downtown. So they’re part of this. So there’s a lot of different strategies in terms of looking at

creating hope in youth, and retaining youth. I think as you look at rural places, and I’m sure rural Wisconsin falls in this, we’ve seen some brain drain, right? We see kids leave and they don’t come back,

so what can we do to perhaps try to retain them in our community? So I think one is to create career and economic choices that are appealing to youth. What that means is how are we introducing the youth to those opportunities that exist in the community?

So some of these pictures here are from the youth entrepreneurship program back in that small town in northern Nebraska. So, again, they have this huge endowment that continues to grow. They have funded an extensive

youth entrepreneurship program that starts at the youngest age, goes all the way through high school. Three of their downtown businesses are a direct result of this program, so they’ve kind of planted a seed in terms of

the opportunities that exist in the community. Secondly, involve community cultures that are embracing of youth and the younger generation, you know, that place attachment. So if you have a community festival, and many communities do, right?

We often celebrate our heritage, our culture, so, in addition, perhaps to the fiddlers that we have every year, we provide an opportunity for local garage bands to perform, and it’s not Sunday at nine o’clock in the morning, right? So we honor their

genre of music. We honor their taste, and we do so in a very respectful manner as these young kids are jamming out there. Lastly, focus your development efforts on those who want to stay and/or return to their hometown.

So these are pictures from Brookfield, Missouri, population 1,200 people. So Brookfield, like many rural places, was facing a pretty dramatic youth migration. So they says, “You know what? “We need to tell the kids a different story.

” So at their high school graduation, you can see it right there, they give each graduating senior a gift. In that box is a mailbox, and in that mailbox is a letter from the community written and already

put in a mailbox. I’m going to kind of paraphrase it. “Dear Sue, We’re so proud of you. “We’re proud of all that you’ve accomplished in your life “thus far here in Brookfield. “All that the contributions you’ve made

“to making our community a better place. “We know that you may be venturing off to go to college, “or to gain additional education; we wish you well. “We want you to learn more, meet new friends, “explore the world, “but always remember,

“always remember that Brookfield is your hometown, “and as a reminder, “we already have a mailbox with your name on it. ” Wow, what a powerful message, right? What a powerful message. Oftentimes, the narrative is

there’s nothing for you here. You’ve got to get out of Dodge. You’ve got to go someplace else. Brookfield gets it. They know if these kids are going to boomerang back to their community they have to say, “Yeah, we want you to leave, but we want you to come back,

“and as a reminder, we have a mailbox with your name on it. ” Pretty powerful stuff, right? In fact, at this little high school open house Sam Thudium has his mailbox proudly displaying the cards that he receives. So the other piece is

quality of place, right? It matters in terms of what our built environment looks like. You know, it’s more of this. This happens to be Manistee, Michigan, population about 6,000 people, really robust downtown and less of this,

which can be any place, any town, U. S. A. You know, we’ve become so commoditized that we really don’t need to put names on businesses. You know, we know that this is KFC.

We know that this is Pizza Hut, right? But really what it’s all about is creating a place that people want to connect with, that people want to live in. Rebecca Ryan, she’s in Wisconsin, lives in Madison, her and I have had

an opportunity to share information. She says, “You know, this next generation is the first. “The first to identify more strongly with their community “than their employers. ” More strongly identify with their community

than their employers. So think about all this stuff that we’ve talked about thus far. So what are we doing to make sure that we’re creating that place attachment with this next generation in our community?

So we’ve done some research at Michigan State. We surveyed about 40,000 graduates over a course of 4 1/2 years at Michigan State, and some other institutions, one in Ann Arbor, and other places and asking them,

“All right, what is it that you’re looking for “in terms of a future place?” They says, “Okay, here’s what we’re looking for “if we move to Chicago, or Minneapolis. ” About 35% of them says, “You know what?

“I may start out at a large city, “but I can sometimes see myself “coming back to a smaller town, “and here’s what’s important to me in a smaller town. ” So, you know, look at this list, and what are some of those things that are listed

that are present in your community? In fact, I would venture to say that most of these things are part of your community, right? So we need to make sure that we accentuate that the youth as they look at a future place to reside in,

and to connect with. It’s really all about place making. It’s really all about place making in our communities, and it’s building on our unique history, our unique culture, and our assets that we have to foster community

pride, right? It’s not about Disneyfying our community, but what is it that we have from an authentic perspective that connects with people? Hopefully, as we do that we increase social interaction, right? We provide

opportunities for people to connect with other people, okay? Go back to that “Why Dubuque” video, right? All those social interactions that they’re seeking. Teddy Roosevelt had a great quote, he says, “Do what you can with what

you have, where you are. ” So it’s not about looking at the community down the road, and saying “What can we take from them, “and integrate in our community?” But rather “What is it that we can build on in our community

“to make it better?” Finally, repeatedly what we saw in these communities was a commitment to “get er done,” to quote the great philosopher Larry the Cable Guy. [audience chuckling] You know what? We repeatedly saw in

these communities, they have their setbacks just like every community does. They had grants that they were hoping for that didn’t come to fruition, but they also have a wherewithal that says, “You know what? “There’s going to be times that we get knocked down,

“and we’re just going to kind of pick ourselves up, “and get at it again. “And we’re going to be very purposeful in terms of “trying to make our community better. ” So, again, remember that slide in terms of

setting that positive narrative in terms of how we can make our community better. So one of the communities we went to was Tecumseh, Michigan, population around 6,500 people. So their community surveys talked about the importance of a nicer restaurant, a fine dining establishment.

They didn’t have one. They had a pizza house that did gourmet pizzas, but they really didn’t have a place where people could go out on a nice date so to speak. So they worked to actually bring in a chef. Get this, first they know

an important ingredient to run in a restaurant in today’s environment is a liquor license, right? From an economic perspective. They didn’t have one. Michigan allows you to trade with other communities, so they made a trade with their town,

we call them townships in Michigan, to essentially have a liquor license to be able to help tee up this new dinner establishment, or dining establishment. And then they formed a community committee, and they sent out an RFB,

and they had invited chefs, and talked about what this was going to be, and how this would be a chef-owned restaurant, and they had chefs prepare tasting menus, and the community selected the chef based on how that menu, and the price points

associated with that would kind of resonate with the community because they wanted to be successful, right? They want to make sure that this effort is successful. The result is the Evans Street grill. It was the best new

restaurant in Michigan according to AAA. Argonia, Kansas, small town, western Kansas, population about 1,000 people. A few years ago their one and only grocery store closed when the owner retired. They didn’t have a transition plan in place.

I don’t know if you’ve been to western Kansas, but the towns are few and far between. Now 60 miles is a long drive to get a gallon of milk to the next grocery store. So what the community did was they rallied together through the mayor who

is very visionary, and built a convenience store/grocery store on the edge of town, there’s a picture of it right here. It’s really more of a convenience store, gas station, but it provides enough of the essentials that people can

kind of stay home, and boy, they create a lot of goodwill. People felt good about this effort because it was the community coming together. The mayor kind of capitalized on that and says, “All right, what’s

the next problem? “We’re bleeding population. “We have to get people to move in our community. ” The problem is that housing is very limited to virtually non-existent. So what he did was he brought together a group of builders

from across the region. The city or the town actually owned property, connected it to the sewer system, and they are pursuing a housing development on the edge of town. You can see a house right there that they’ll offer

at cost, at cost, to new people moving into the community, so that 1,400 square foot ranch because that’s what they build in Kansas, can be bought for about $54,000. And if you enroll kids in our school district we’ll pay your closing costs.

So, Argonia, Kansas is not a cool community, I’ll be honest. This is a community that is struggling, struggling mightily, but they’re putting up a heck of a fight, and the mayor is doing whatever he can do, push whatever button he can push to make sure that

this town survives, and I give him a lot of credit. Repeatedly, what we saw in communities is that leadership piece, right? That leadership piece. They’re not waiting for things to happen to them. They’re being more proactive. They’re learning from others,

and thank you everyone for sharing your stories. They’re learning from others and say “How can we apply those lessons to our community?” But there is a cautionary note. I want to give you a cautionary note. How many of you have

rented a car before? Virtually everyone, so just a quick question. Do you wash that rental car before you take it back? Has anybody done that? [laughter] Nobody, never washed, you did? – [Woman] Oh, yeah, [mumbles] – Okay, so one person

out of about 80-ish. Why don’t the others of you wash your rental cars? What’s that? – [Man] It’s included in the contract. – It’s included in the contract. You don’t own it, right? It’s not ours, you know, that’s theirs.

And I think we have to think of that from a community perspective. People don’t work for goals that they don’t own. And I think sometimes in a community we’re asking our volunteers, we’re asking our community leaders

to wash their rental cars. We’re asking them to wash their rental cars. What Argonia did was there was a lot of goodwill, a lot of social capital when they built that grocery store. The community was all in on the next project. So that’s what I

think is important. As you look at your to-do list in advancing your community, make sure you’re engaging your community so that you’re not asking them to wash your rental car, right? Pretty important stuff. I think it’s important that you know your community.

Know what’s important to them. Know what issues are at the top of their mind, and then as leaders you have an opportunity to say, “Okay, here’s our to-do list. “Here’s the things that we need to get at. ” So, you know, if your

community is telling you that it was sick, you act upon it, right? Before you end up on a tombstone. And, yes, I did find this picture as I was out. . . It’s a long story, so.

[audience laughs] It’s only when we have hope and vision that we really get true community change. We have to create hope in our communities, and when we marry that hope with a vision, and that’s the

leadership piece, right? That’s the leadership piece. That’s when we could truly get positive change in our communities, but I think as leaders, sometimes we have to lead from behind, right? And we have to make sure that there’s low walls

for the amazing Maisies in our community who are doing great things, right? So we don’t need necessarily to drive the bus, but we need to help them be successful as well, and that’s again part of leadership.

So what can we learn? One, we have to create quality places to live. We have to welcome entrepreneurs. We had a great conversation about that. We need to support education and lifelong learning. Promote community engagement,

and, hopefully, that community engagement involves youth. We have to establish a can-do attitude. Again, that may mean, sometimes, you’re setting the table for that. Sometimes, it’s stepping back, and letting people like Maisie DeVore take the lead,

but it’s creating that hope in our community to empower others. So with that I thank you so much for your attention. Thank you for the opportunity. [applause]