A Rural Neighborhood Should Involve Everyone

When we think about community organizations, a rural neighborhood may not come to mind. But actually I grew up in a highly rural area completely dependent on the agricultural economy, and it was definitely a neighborhood.

By that I mean that we knew which roads were in the neighborhood and which ones weren't. While some families were better friends than others, there wasn't any doubt about who "belonged." When there was trouble or rejoicing, we knew who our people were.

Organizing for Results in a Rural Neighborhood

But more than just the general sense of belonging that stems from being part of a neighborhood, forming an organization can be useful in obtaining good maintenance for your roads, attention to your rural housing needs, and assistance with problem properties, people, or theft.

When you do that, you let your county (or township) authorities know that you're serious about results, and you're willing to work to make your area special. So this page contains some advice.

Tips for the Rural Neighborhood

1. If you don't have a clear sense of boundaries, ask people and see if any consensus emerges. If not, draw a boundary arbitrarily and start work. If you learn later that others are offended because they were omitted, or that you actually have a common issue with another group, you can expand your boundaries. Try to stay within the same school district. In rural areas, you may not have a name for your neighborhood, but if there's any old historic place name, start using it. Or if you can easily fabricate one based on the name of your local mountain peak or stream, do so. But in rural neighborhoods, it isn't essential.

2. Investigate whether an existing group will serve the purpose if you can expand it so all members of the family are invited. Sometimes there's a farm or hunting group, and only the men tend to be invited. Or the women might have a social club. And the children already may be involved in 4-H or maybe scouting. If the existing group isn't enthusiastic about allowing everyone to come in under their tent, you can always form an auxiliary group, such as "XYZ Club Friends." But then you need to be inclusive, if there are households in your geography that weren't part of the original group. It's just that tagging onto an existing group can make an easy start.

3. If there is a need to socialize that's readily apparent, give that plenty of space in your meetings. Food and talk are important to rural families. In fact, if you do nothing but socialize for awhile, that's fine in rural neighborhoods.

4. If a gripe or a problem readily emerges, start brainstorming about steps you can take to ease the problem. Or often in rural America, the problem is easy to see, but hard to talk about. People don't really want to admit that they're losing population, it's going to be hard to keep the school open, and the brave talk about finding a new owner for the café isn't going to materialize. So if people can't stand the stark talk about the problem, do what rural folk do: talk for 20 or 25 minutes about the weather, the horses, how bad the younger generation is, and so forth, until someone has the nerve to talk about the business proposition here. If that doesn't come until after the chili supper, the barbecue, and the bonfire, so be it.

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5. Beyond that, the advice is really quite similar to that for neighborhood associations in general. It consists of getting to know your elected officials and others who influence conditions in your neighborhood. If someone in your rural neighborhood isn't on the board that influences the immediate fate of your organizing issue, find out who those people are. They may live a good distance from you, so you have to go see them, or invite them to the next pig roast. Then after you meet them, invite them to your meetings every time, even if it's a 90 mile drive and you don't really expect them to show up.

6. In a rural neighborhood, you're not likely to need to build too many new relationships, but certainly a key one could be your agricultural extension agent. I'm sure you know who that person is, or someone in the group does, but really make friends. Or it could be that your state university has an extension agent that doesn't concentrate exclusively on rural matters; if so, you really need to befriend that person. That's how you learn the latest in good research.

7. Select a leader if and when the time comes that it’s unwieldy without one. Otherwise keep it informal.

8. Feature a program when you're going to have a meeting. It could be entertainment, but also you need to invite your bankers, politicians, lawyers, engineers, road board people, conservation agents, law enforcement official, and whoever is relevant to your particular needs to take a turn at speaking and answering your questions.

9. Remember the kids. Include them in the meetings, and pay attention to what they think about the community. If you could harness their natural youthful enthusiasm, instead of having them grow up counting the days until they can escape, your community might have a new lease on life.

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