“Fear is among the biggest barriers to inter-municipal cooperation and collaboration. But it is not the biggest. The number one spot, in my opinion, goes to “ego.”
Making a Plan for Succession
Volunteer departments tend to have a higher proportion of firefighters over the age of 50, and in some rural areas it is not uncommon to find volunteers in their 60s or 70s. About one-third of small-town firefighters are 50 or older.
The Four-day Work Week: An Experiment Worth Trying?
This summer, the community of South Portland, Maine, is embarking on an experiment that rethinks the notion of the work week. For six months, civic employees in the city of 26,000 will work four days a week.
“We’re having a hard time filling certain positions in the city and some employees have mentioned, ‘Gee, it would be great if we had a little bit more flexibility in our schedule,’” the city’s manager Scott Morelli told a local CBS news outlet. “A three-day weekend, right? Everyone has more time to spend with friends and family, get errands done on Friday, make appointments.”
Renewable Energy Projects For Small Communities: Think Aggregation, Not Aggravation
Americans rarely give a second thought to Canada but that changed in June of 2023 – for all the wrong reasons. Canada’s record-breaking wildfires – that have forced more than 155,000 people from...
Have An Opinion ? Maybe Keep It To Yourself
In early 2015, a group of unvaccinated children visiting Disneyland in California triggered an outbreak of measles that spread to about 150 cases across eight states, as well as into Canada and...
Clichés and Courage: Ditch the One, Embrace the Other
At an event in Kansas a short time ago, I witnessed one of the most courageous moments of my life. Not from a police officer or paramedic or firefighter – but from a random audience member in a...
Small Town Newspapers: Big Time Trouble
It is called the news desert: areas of North America that no longer have a local newspaper. And the desert is growing, swallowing up larger and larger swaths of the continent as newspapers shut...
The “Tradition Trap”: It’s Time to Toss Out Old Ways That Aren’t Working
I have a friend who once shared a story about family traditions that I found humorous and endearing but realized it came with an inadvertent cautionary tale. She said that one Christmas she was...
Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo: Add a Little Disney Magic to Attract Immigrants to Your Community
Our rural towns could learn something from Disneyland. It might be a theme park but it’s also a community of sorts. Like all of Disney's parks, it is filled with different places, cultures, and...
Community Building: The importance of childcare to your community
Community Building: You might never have heard of Benson, Minnesota, a pretty little town of 3,200 on the banks of the Chippewa River. But there are Bensons scattered across North America, small...