Council of Rural Initiatives Fall 2010 Newsletter

For new readers, CRI is the direct successor to the Wisconsin Academy’s Future of Farming and Rural Life in Wisconsin (FOF) study, published in October 2007.  CRI exists primarily to foster implementation of recommendations from the FOF final report toward a more sustainable, diverse and economically viable future for rural Wisconsin.  CRI’s efforts are concentrated in the three top priorities identified by FOF: Rural Health Care (focusing on oral health); Rural Labor Issues (immigration reform and embracing diversity); and the many faces of Community Sustainability.

In the very long interval since the last CRI Newsletter, there have been many developments, changes and initiatives.  So, let’s dive right in.

CRI Updates

Board Changes

CRI has welcomed several new board members over the past few months, including:

Paul Dietmann, Director, Farm Center, Division of Agricultural Development, DATCP, Madison

George Twohig, Attorney, Twohig, Rietbrock, Schneider & Halbach S.C., Chilton

Rhonda Strebel, Executive Director, Rural Health Initiative of Shawano County, Appleton

Each brings particular experience and professional expertise that enhances our ability to pursue CRI’s chosen priorities:  Rural Labor, Rural Oral Health Care and Sustainable Communities. We appreciate the strengths they bring to the CRI leadership team.

CRI Relocating

CRI will soon be taking up residence in new office space in the Department of Environmental and Rural Sociology in Ag Hall on the UW-Madison campus.   New contact information will be posted on the CRI website (www.cri-wis.org) when the move is complete. Meanwhile, we can be reached at 608-239-9102 or wilda@cri-wis.org.

Events

Rural Oral Health Care Forum, March 24, 2010

On March 24^th, CRI gathered leaders from agencies, associations, provider groups, policymakers and others with a stake in rural health at the Rural Wisconsin Health Cooperative in Sauk City.  The goal was to assess what this group of informed individuals saw as the key issues in rural Wisconsin dental health, potential solutions they could suggest and/or agree upon, and to what degree there might be a basis for working together on some of these issues.  See Rural Oral Health Care in Program section below for more.

Partnering for Progress, Celebrating Our Rural Communities, September 25, 2010

The Wisconsin School for Beginning Dairy and Livestock Farmers, the Council of Rural Initiatives, the Lakeshore Natural Resource Partnership and Gathering Waters Conservancy are partnering to present the second annual barn dance and celebration of rural communities, values, heritage, and building partnerships to improve life in rural communities.  It is also a fundraiser for the four sponsoring partners.

The event is an old-fashioned barn dance and harvest festival held at the Saxon Homestead farm in Cleveland, WI on Sept. 25 from 5-10 p.m.  The Klessig and Heimerl families will host the celebration at their grass-based dairy farm near the shore of Lake Michigan in their 150-year-old restored barn.  In addition to the lively King Comets band, guests will enjoy locally grown food and beverages, the display and sale of work of Wisconsin authors and artists, and a reading by acclaimed Wisconsin author Jerry Apps from his Barns of Wisconsin.  Your best source of information is to talk to one of last year’s satisfied attendees!

Tickets are still available ($85 for couples, $50 per person and $20 for students; all tax deductible) from Jim Kessler (920-304-1919) or at the door.  Farm is at 15621 South Union Road, Cleveland, WI.

Programs

Rural Labor

Many Voices, One Community

A Project of Council of Rural Initiatives and Puentes/Bridges

Rural communities in the Midwest face serious challenges to their continued vitality. Among the most critical is the challenge of rural labor, primarily in agriculture.

CRI and Puentes/Bridges have joined forces to develop a project designed to create more welcoming communities in rural areas where immigrants are a growing segment of the local population and an essential factor in community economic health.  Bridging experiences are needed to bring differing cultures to mutual trust and understanding.

“Many Voices, One Community” is designed to accomplish this cultural bridging by engaging local leaders from all segments of the community in cultural awareness training and project planning to create meaningful change.

Twenty hours of classroom training plus experiential learning for volunteers from diverse sectors of the community and months of mentored team planning constitute the basic formula for achieving increased cultural awareness, and the basic skills for developing cross-cultural interactions and social acceptance among groups of differing backgrounds.  Consistent with CRI strategies, we plant the seeds but implementation is by and for local residents, encouraging rural leadership development and civic engagement.  A successful pilot project funded by the Otto Bremer Foundation is underway in Buffalo/Pepin Counties.  CRI has hopes of replicating this model elsewhere in the state and beyond.

Rural Oral Health Care

CRI presented “Partnering for Progress: Improving Rural Oral Health,” a forum for Wisconsin policy makers, legislators, health care sector representatives and providers, and public consumers of dental services on March 24^th at the Rural Wisconsin Health Cooperative offices in Sauk City.

Participants agreed that chief issues include: 1) Access to care and insurance coverage for lower income populations, including Medicaid patients, and the high cost of care; 2) Workforce issues – like low Medicaid reimbursement rates that deter dental providers from seeing patients most in need, a shortage of specialty providers, maldistribution of dentists and other providers statewide, and concerns about the future adequacy of the work force based on current trends; 3) Insufficient preventive care for children and adults; and 4) Challenges in public health – like poor consumer oral health literacy, shortage of public health resources and lack of coordination of programs meant to alleviate problems.

CRI continues to seek partners to join in efforts to address specific areas of these concerns and to seek funding for same.

Sustaining Rural Communities

CRI is part of a four-partner collaboration of nonprofits (Partnering for Progress) all working on efforts intended to enhance rural Wisconsin’s future sustainability. They work together to conserve farm land and natural resources, support beginning and continuing farmers and sustain rural communities to improve life in rural Wisconsin.  The partnership includes Gather Waters Conservancy, the Wisconsin School for Beginning Dairy and Livestock Farmers and the Lakeshore Natural Resource Partnership.  To call attention to the common purpose of such diverse groups, recognize the many synergies between agriculture and environmental concerns and the need for many kinds of partnerships to assure future rural growth and vitality, these groups are sponsoring a second annual barn dance and celebration of rural communities on Sept. 25^th at the Saxon Homestead Farm in Cleveland.  Proceeds from this event will be shared equally among the partners.

CRI often works within coalitions, encourages civic engagement at the local level and direct citizen input into improving life in their own communities. Through education about the needs and options for local concerns and developing leaders who can address them – whether access to health care, education, communications technology, entrepreneurial opportunities and more, CRI is continuing the values and supporting the recommendations of our antecedent project, the Future of Farming and Rural Life in Wisconsin.  See event details in Strengthening Networks below.

Strengthening Networks

CRI and Puentes/Bridges have frequently collaborated on issues related to immigrant integration in rural Wisconsin.  Both nonprofits have taken on diversity education and cultural competence as primary missions.  Throughout2010, they have taken on a joint project, funded by the Otto Bremer Foundation, “Many Voices, One Community” that is designed to develop local leaders to take on the responsibility of creating more welcoming communities. In areas where increasing diversity is a consequence of rural labor needs but is an unfamiliar and uncomfortable circumstance for many, understanding the inescapable nature of culture is an essential first step in building understanding and respect between long-term and new residents.  Many Voices is described in more detail in the Program section of this newsletter.

Voces de la Frontera has long provided leadership in Wisconsin in advocating for fair and comprehensive immigration reform.  Their base has been urban, but with the significant growth of immigrants in the rural workforce, Voces has sought out CRI as a partner of common cause in rural areas. CRI has participated in a number of joint efforts and campaigns for educating the public and policymakers about the realities motivating immigrants – free of the prevalent myths and misinformation driving much of the current debate.  We seek to inform the public about their contributions to the State economy and social fabric, legal dilemmas, and limited options for survivability in their homelands.

Under Voces leadership, CRI has participated in all of the following (although we do not directly lobby):

The Coalition for Safe Roads – a campaign in favor of legislative authorization for a special driving card for undocumented workers, to be used for driving only, and earned after taking instruction and passing both written and road tests.                                               

No Milk without Immigrants Campaign – an awareness-raising effort about the importance of immigrants in agriculture and reliance of farmers and processors on them for labor source.

Statewide Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights – an emerging statewide coalition organizing multiple groups from many sectors to work for fair and just immigrant/refugee treatment and policy changes that benefit the immigrant community.

CRI has participated by invitation in several recent health care forums/workshops.

Beyond Lip Service: Exploring the State of Oral Health in Rural Wisconsin (Aug. 17);

Rural Residency Programs (Aug. 20); Expanding Health Care Access for Underserved Populations: (Aug. 25^th); Policy Tool Development Workshop (Oct. 1).  While not collaborations per se, these sessions are a way of adding a rural perspective to discussions about health system needs and cross-pollinating information among stakeholders.

Upper Midwest Rural Partnership – “Partnership Building and Regional Collaboration: A Strategic Initiative” co-sponsored by the United States Department of Agriculture and Partners for Rural America.  CRI participated in the North Central regional meeting on how regional collaboration can be used to help revitalize rural America.  Each of the regional meetings was asked to address the USDA priority areas in rural economic development, broadband, energy development and local food systems.

Partnering for Progress – See “Sustaining Rural Communities” and “Events” above.

Resource Development

In the last year, CRI has benefited from the generosity of the Otto Bremer Foundation (enabling CRI capacity building and the pilot project of Many Voices, One Community); and Gold’n Plump (CRI efforts on behalf of rural labor/immigrant integration).

CRI is in need of strong and consistent support from supporters and advocates of rural Wisconsin.  Our work on behalf of rural causes and residents depends upon reliable donors.

News Notes

Voices of Rural Wisconsin

An unfinished project from the Future of Farming initiative has found a new outlet in the pages of the Wisconsin Academy’s People and Ideas quarterly magazine.  “Rural Voices” is an attempt to capture a sense of the changing rural experience in Wisconsin over the past fifty-plus years from persons of assorted ages and locales in a series of extended interviews.  Many personal accounts of how rural life has changed in Wisconsin over the past decades, what these changes mean and their implications for our future are addressed in an abbreviated serialized account of writer Bill Berry’s interviews and conclusions about these conversations.  For access to the magazine, see www.wisconsinacademy.org or call 608-263-1692.  Access to edited versions of the audio of these interviews is at   http://www.portalwisconsin.org/ruralvoices/.