Rural Policy Initiatives

About the Small Towns Initiative

Challenges : Earlier work : Data : Goals : Strategies

The Small Towns Initiative is helping hard-pressed small towns create new economic opportunities. Its strategies include improving the capacity of local communities to plan and implement initiatives, stimulating job-creating investments and developing public policy recommendations. The Rural Center launched the initiative November 4, 2005, at its annual Rural Partners Forum.

Challenging times for small towns

The Small Towns Initiative grew out of the recognition that North Carolina’s smallest places serve a major role in the economic, social and cultural well being of the state as a whole. Even with the rapid growth of urban centers, North Carolina remains a state of small towns: 476 towns have populations of fewer than 10,000 people. These small towns account for 86 percent of the state's municipalities. It's also noteworthy that 226 towns have populations of fewer than 1,000. The great majority of small towns are located in the state’s 85 rural counties.

Together these small towns contain tremendous assets. Nearly one million people have chosen to live, work, raise their families and retire in the state’s small towns, and thousands more live in nearby rural communities. Small towns account for more than 1,300 square miles of land area and have an assessed private property value of more than $83 billion. Many serve as hubs of commerce, springboards of entrepreneurship, distribution centers and seats of government. They provide outlets for recreation and give focus to civic and cultural life. Small towns pull together and help define what it is to be a community.

Yet, North Carolina’s small towns have suffered serious economic blows in recent years. Many lost their economic base as manufacturing plants closed, the number of small farms declined, and locally owned businesses, including main street stores, disappeared. Hurricanes, floods and winter storms destroyed homes and businesses, and state budget shortfalls led to additional loss of revenues. The hardest hit small towns have seen their tax bases erode, making it difficult to provide basic services and nearly impossible to plan for new growth and development.

As a result of these combined pressures, the future of many small towns appears bleak.

Rural Center's earlier work with small towns

For two decades, the Rural Center has worked with North Carolina's small towns to increase their capacity to meet economic challenges through investments in water and sewer infrastructure, business capital, information technology, leadership development, workforce training, strategic planning and community-based organizations.

In recent years, the center also led the Sustainable Communities Initiative, an outgrowth of work by the N.C. Rural Prosperity Task Force. Between 2000 and 2005, Sustainable Communities funneled assistance to distressed rural communities in three ways:

Development of data on small towns

As a further step, the Rural Center sought to create an accurate and comprehensive picture of the state of Small Town, N.C. Toward that end, the center:

This research, summarized in the State of Small Towns section of this website and in the Small Towns Fact Book, was the focus of the 2005 Rural Partners Forum. Its findings show the great diversity of North Carolina's small towns. Many towns near urban centers or in retirement or resort areas are prospering. Their greatest challenges lie in trying to manage growth, build capacity ahead of the demand for services and retain community cohesion. Elsewhere, especially in rural communities, the picture is starkly different. There, storefronts sit vacant, and factories lie idle. Nearly a third of small towns lost population between 1970 and 2000.

Goals of the initiative

The Small Towns Initiative focuses on this second group of towns, the ones challenged by economic hardship and natural disasters. It recognizes that each town possesses unique needs and assets and that strategies for recovery must be tailored to meet those needs and the desires of local people. Its goals are to:

A broad-based strategy for revitalization

The Small Towns Initiative is committed to bringing greater prosperity and better quality of life to North Carolina's small towns. This comprehensive agenda encompasses seven strategies.

Policy leadership

The Rural Center joined with key community and economic development leaders to establish the Small Towns Action Council, which advised the center on the initiative and developed public policy recommendations for federal, state and local action to support economic development in North Carolina’s small towns. These recommendations became the Small Towns Action Agenda.

Partnership development

The Rural Center convened the Partnership for Small Towns to improve the delivery of services and resources to North Carolina’s small towns. The partnership provides a forum for sharing information, identifying gaps in services to small towns and developing joint programs and projects. It is composed of federal, state and local agencies, nonprofit organizations, educational institutions, community and economic development professionals and researchers.

Research and information

The initiative built a research foundation to provide small town leaders, service providers and policy makers with information about the social and economic well being of small towns and the challenges of economic transitions.

The Small Towns Fact Book, published in 2005, summarizes social and economic data about small towns, along with the results of focus groups held with small town leaders statewide. This material currently can be found on the State of small towns section of this website or may be ordered in its print version.

A web-based resoruce, Small Towns Data Profiles, provide demographic information on each of North Carolina's small tonws, along with indicators of economic and social well-being.

The Small Towns Resource Directory includes information about technical assistance, training, publications, research and other services available from federal, state, nonprofit and local resource agencies and organizations. The directory may be obtained in its print version and is available online.

Six small towns are featured in a 30-minute video that highlights innovative strategies for economic development.

The center and the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Government also have developed case studies documenting some of the best practices in North Carolina and in other states. The report Small Towns, Big Ideas describes the strategies implemented in 45 of these towns.

Education and training

The initiative created leadership training opportunities to local government officials and other community leaders to help them manage the demands of economic transition in their small towns. Additional workshops addressed issues of specific small town interest.

As a partner in this effort, the UNC School of Government developed a training program for local officials on strategies for leading economic development efforts in their communities. This program included a one-day core workshop focusing on approaches that have proven successful for economic renewal in distressed towns throughout the country. The Rural Center provided scholarships for 135 local elected officials for the pilot training program, conducted on March 10, 2006, at the UNC School of Government in Chapel Hill.

Each spring, the Rural Center offers its Rural Economic Development Institute, a nine-day leadership development program focusing on comprehensive economic development strategies and the skills necessary to effect change in rural communities. The 2008 session was tailored to the specific needs of small towns.

Community investments

Building Reuse and Restoration

The Rural Center's Building Reuse and Restoration Grants Program is designed to spur economic activity and job creation by assisting in the productive reuse of vacant buildings in small towns, with priority on towns with populations of fewer than 5,000.

N.C. STEP

At the heart of the Small Towns Initiative, the North Carolina Small Towns Economic Prosperity (NC STEP) Demonstration Program is testing ways to encourage small town revitalization through services, educational opportunities and grants. It is made possible by $11.9 million in legislative appropriations.

A total of 45 communities have enrolled in the program thus far. Twenty demonstration sites were selected in 2006 as part of the initial three-year demonstration (phase 1). The 20 sites represented 33 communities. Of these 33 communities, 15 were individual demonstration sites, and 18 participated in one of five clusters of cooperating communities. In 2008, 12 more towns were selected for a two-year demonstration (phase 2). Two of those towns joined existing demonstration clusters. The others are operating as individual demonstration sites.

The program has three primary goals: 1) to support economic recovery and revitalization in small towns adversely affected by structural changes in the economy or recent natural disasters; 2) to test a comprehensive model of technical assistance and grantmaking to aid in revitalization efforts; and 3) to provide information vital to the development of public policies that support long-term investment in the economic vitality of North Carolina’s small towns.

Each N.C. STEP site is eligible for:

For information on the demonstration sites and further details of the program, visit the N.C. STEP section of this website.

Resource development

The Rural Center is investigating ways to ensure that small town initiatives have the best chances for long-term success. Development of the Small Towns Action Agenda was part of that effort.

In future action, the Rural Center is investigating steps it can take to develop financial resource pools for long-term, strategic investment in small town revitalization in rural North Carolina. Financial tools may include seed funds, project grants, loans and grant/loan combinations for economic development projects.