How to Make a Dying Town Thrive Again
Pocket-size-Town America Is Dying. How Can We Save It?
Crumbling populations, unemployment, addiction: Readers talk well-nigh the obstacles to saving rural communities.
Rachel Fifty. Harris and
Ms. Harris and Ms. Tarchak are senior editorial assistants.
Image 
Can America's languishing rural communities reinvigorate themselves and bring jobs, infrastructure and people back to their increasingly austere landscapes? Or is information technology time to cut and run?
In " The Hard Truths of Trying to 'Save' the Rural Economy ," Eduardo Porter writes about their grim prospects. Amidst more than 1,000 comments from readers, rural Americans talked almost the harsh reality of living in, and sometimes having to leave, a small boondocks with few job prospects or a declining family farm.
Geographic and cultural stasis concerned Sil Tuppins , a reader from Tennessee: "We are leaders in opiate deaths and abuse. We continue to exist historically low educated. And our rural folk stay in their communities for a lifetime. That is a prescription for failure in a technology driven world."
" Accepting that some of these communities will dice likewise requires acknowledging the suffering that goes along with their catastrophe," wrote Betsy South, a reader in Otsego County, N.Y. "I don't know the answer, but I am absolutely certain demanding individual responsibleness isn't going to brand anything improve."
More comments from readers are beneath. They have been edited for length and clarity.
'Let it die'
I'k from Appalachia, where getting into the working class was an aspiration. I was raised "up the holler" and know the culture intimately. You lot accept no thought of the amount of anger, self-righteousness, bigotry and willful ignorance you're dealing with. I have seen a blighted small-scale town use a decadent sheriff and gauge to run off a business owned past a black man. I take been present when an entire community looked the other manner when a gay couple was burned out of their home.
They support Trump and the reason is simple: He acts but like they would if they had money. There is no saving this culture, nor should you desire to salvage it. The people who could have revitalized it have either left for amend opportunities or been run off. It's a breeding ground for hatred and despair, dying with a Bible in one arm and a heroin needle in the other. Let it dice. — Peregrinus, Erehwon
For some, at that place's nowhere else to go
I judge it took the full disaster of Donald Trump for the residuum of America to finally see the states out hither. I completely object to the defeatist tone of this article. Don't tell me that the thinkers and innovators of this keen state can't devise workable solutions for our rural areas. Moving to an urban area isn't an option for everyone. It's risky for people older than 40 to motion without an offering already in mitt. Many would be competing for low-paid jobs in a new place where they can't afford to live because of skyrocketing housing costs. People are already fleeing cities for that very reason. Please give these people some credit for seeing the obvious. It'due south not simply that they don't want to alive in the metropolis. — Madeline Conant, Midwest
I grew up on a 60-acre farm and my recollections of it are idyllic, though coin was always in short supply. Eventually, my father realized that he had to sell. He could no longer maintain it. Leaving the simply lifestyle my parents ever knew was excruciating for them and for me and my siblings. This outcome is much more than circuitous than big city folk can truly appreciate. How does one compensate for the areas of the eye and soul which will be lost forever when that concluding box of memories have been packed up and placed in the pickup truck? — Marge Keller, Midwest
Y'all don't have to become far to find opportunity
I was built-in in a tiny fundamental Illinois boondocks. When I was in tertiary grade, my parents made the decision to move to Champaign-Urbana, Sick., so that my blood brother and I would have the opportunity for a much improve education. It's ironic that minor-town and rural folk take so much pride in self-sufficiency withal won't move to improve their prospects.
Immigrants make huge and frequently unsafe journeys to improve their chances and those of their children. You don't have to move to the biggest cities. There are many small and midsize cities that offer much meliorate educational activity and job opportunities. It'southward scary, but you owe it to your kids to exist brave and do it. — BA, Milwaukee
Sioux County, Nebraska, may never exist a tech hub, but why not brand an endeavor in Columbus, Ohio? Tech companies merits H1-B visas are disquisitional to their success. Then make the visas geographically dependent. If 43,500 visas are to be given out, grant 100 to each Congressional District rather than giving them all to the firms in Silicon Valley or New York. Give tech a reason to set up facilities in places other than the usual. — Jim South., Cleveland
'Lots of little' can brand big modify
In the 1930s the regime began implementing economic policies intended to move people off farms and into manufacturing, such as mines and timber mills. Small-town factories kept rural areas adrift for a while just were among the kickoff to shut in the '70s and '80s. At the aforementioned time, the farms kept getting bigger. We are seeing the culmination of all that now.
How to fix information technology? Change economical policy to favor small and midsize farms and factories, and invest in rural infrastructure, especially high-speed internet. Plenty of folk would happily trade in the expensive, crowded cities. — RB, Rhode Isle
The author fails to sympathize the power of lots of footling. I come up from farm country and we were able to support the growth of IBM only fine. Why? We were resilient and hardworking. We are a community of people, each with many skills. Don't exist jerks. Spread the peanut butter already. — cleverclue, Yellow Springs, Ohio
Recruit tech companies? Let's starting time with internet access
I live in Winthrop, Me., a minor town of 6,000. Maine has suffered the way other rural areas have, with the same results: opioid addiction, an aging population, low-wage jobs. Statewide, affordable high-speed broadband net connection would be a huge help, allowing people to telecommute or offset up their own small businesses. What has non worked is luring big businesses in with tax breaks. Been at that place, done that, and most of them left. — Laurie Graves, Maine
Tech industries and manufacturers now look at the quality of life, not but tax breaks, when scouting locations. If yous were trying to recruit computer geniuses, would yous choice a town with no recreation, movies, stores (beyond Dollar General), restaurants (except McDonald's), outdoor recreation, and where alcoholism and drugs are the major source of entertainment? Is this the kind of identify y'all'd want to live, work and enhance kids? — Linda, Oklahoma
I was able to render to my small-town roots once the net became reliable. I am able to wing to major clients in big cities when needed, but live on a working crop farm. Telecommuting is on the rise. I work for large banks where nosotros thrive on briefing calls, fifty-fifty when nosotros're in the aforementioned city or buildings. People do not have to be in the same room to work together. — Waino, Mich.
Wide open spaces have room for growth
This article came out during the aforementioned week that the Natural Resource Defense Council posted its latest assay of rural job growth in the wind and solar sectors. While there are no easy answers in the hard-hit rural areas, the growth of clean-free energy jobs is a rare new opportunity and I'm excited to see solar job training opportunities expanding beyond our region. — Andre Delattre, Chicago
A bison commons would not be a stretch. Ecological restoration is an urgent need across vast stretches of rural America that have suffered from poor country apply, extraction industries, invasive species, loss of native biodiversity and a blighting of the rural landscape. In that location are huge opportunities for employment in restoration: native plant and seed nurseries, stewardship of nature preserves, creation of native pollinator habitats, hunting properties, sustainable farming and outdoor recreation facilities are but some. All it takes is a vision to 'Make America Beautiful Again.' And, of course, a reassessment of our values as a nation.
How to pay? Consider where all the wealth extracted from rural America has gone. Your mutual fund index portfolios would not be a bad place to start searching. — Lou Nelms, Stonemason City, Ill.
The reply is not i size fits all
I live in a very small town (population iii,300) in a very rural county (population 7,000) in extremely eastern Idaho. Y'all want to help communities like mine? Come talk to us. Nosotros know the reply to economical development for each of our communities and it is not ane size fits all. Don't wait that whatever the policymakers in Washington come up upward with volition piece of work. — Iron Jenny, Idaho
Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook , Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram .
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/22/opinion/rural-america-economy-revive.html
0 Response to "How to Make a Dying Town Thrive Again"
Post a Comment