With unprecedented federal infrastructure investments beginning to reach communities across the U.S., there is hope that “the time is ripe to make wider and more resilient geographic prosperity a real possibility,” as a recent Brookings report put it. How can philanthropy support community-led, bottom-up approaches that meet these top-down resources to address the greatest needs and deliver the highest impacts?
Amid deep and widening geographic disparities, taking advantage of this possibility requires prioritizing the capacities of local communities, particularly isolated, remote rural areas. Overstretched and underdeveloped civic infrastructure is hampering progress as rural communities strive to overcome challenging, decade-long trends, including stagnating or declining population levels, economic growth increasingly oriented toward urban centers, lack of broadband connectivity, and lagging education and health outcomes. This lack of civic infrastructure leaves too many rural communities in a relentlessly reactive mode, unprepared to effectively access and manage major federal and state investments.
Federal guidance even acknowledges that rural communities “struggle to get financial or technical assistance,” and that simply allocating funding through a complex array of federal programs “isn’t enough to build equitable, sustainable rural prosperity.” While metro areas are organizing stimulus command centers, many rural communities are struggling to figure out how to tap into funds even when they are explicitly earmarked for rural areas.
As a result, the opportunity to access transformational funding has opened a window for struggling rural communities, but many are structurally unprepared to take advantage. What is needed are “new, intentionally developed service delivery methods to support rural priorities and objectives.” So for those who live in or support one of these rural areas, what are we to do?
Building strong rural institutions
Rural-focused philanthropy increasingly recognizes the importance of rural hub institutions and embraces place-based approaches. Without effective place-based institutions, rural development efforts fail to get off the ground or sputter out after a short flight.
Rural areas are also defined by a set of unique challenges and opportunities. A 2022 network analysis conducted by the Institute for Networked Communities in rural East Texas concluded that regional capacity is limited because “individuals manage multiple roles — as economic developers, workforce developers, community advocates, fundraisers and program administrators — often on top of their ‘day jobs.’” When local capacity is so stretched, with a few key leaders wearing many hats, and with every sector initiative depending on the same core network, whether health, education, economic development, food security, or arts and culture, then there is little margin for error.
As a result, rural capacity-building efforts should not be static, siloed, stand-alone initiatives, but should be part of an interrelated, dynamic, layered approach, interwoven into all support, with capacity included as a constant consideration in rural grantmaking.
Philanthropy must prioritize the work of revitalizing and building new rural institutions that will power success in place. Effective social institutions are at the heart of dynamic, thriving places, but acknowledging their importance is not enough. With the transformational federal funding window having arrived, there is mounting pressure for philanthropy to move from abstraction to action, and we need better tools to do so.
Rural Reinforcing Layers (Re-Lay) Framework
The moment calls for a simple, straightforward framework to kickstart a cycle of rural capacity-building that becomes a force multiplier for regional renewal and innovation. Tools already under development in rural East Texas, through collaboration with place-based philanthropy and multi-sector nonprofit partners, show promise for providing structure to rural capacity-building efforts. The Rural Reinforcing Layers (Re-Lay) Framework focuses on three factors:
the unit or level of change;
the investment or intervention type; and
the institutional capacity status.
The unit or level of change helps philanthropists to rapidly identify and situate rural capacity gaps and determine where to concentrate attention and resources. This tool encompasses a continuum from hyperlocal to statewide, and should reveal sector-specific assets and gaps to identify where additional capacity is needed.
Hyperlocal entities: at the sub-county and sub-municipality level, including food pantries, school campuses, health clinics, and shelters.
Local entities: at the county and municipal level and including government agencies, school districts, health districts, economic development corporations, and chambers of commerce.
Regional entities: encompassing multiple counties and municipalities and including food banks, councils of governments, regional economic and workforce development councils, hospitals, and community and technical colleges and universities.
State entities: encompassing multiple regions, and including education agencies, economic development boards and councils, health agencies, and higher education coordinating boards.
The Rural Re-Lay Framework’s next factor is specifying the type of investment or intervention. The framework breaks down potential types into four basic buckets:
Funding: charitable grant investments for staffing, equipment or other assets to achieve program-restricted or general operating objectives.
Data and information: research and analysis to better understand a challenge or opportunity and guide decision-making.
Convening: support to bring partners together to foster relationships, build networks and make collaborative decisions.
Technical assistance: training, coaching, mentoring and other specialized assistance to address a targeted need.
The intervention types are not mutually exclusive and are often synchronized and reinforcing. There are many options for building institutional capacity, and as everyone who has suffered through bad training sessions will confirm, not all options are appropriate or equally effective. Specifying the intervention type is informed by local knowledge, experience and analysis, and should be laser-focused on addressing an identified barrier or challenge at the corresponding unit or level of change.
The final factor in the Rural Re-Lay Framework is the current capacity status of the institutional partner that will be receiving the investment or the intervention. There are five general status categories:
Launch: a new institution being developed that is fragile and in need of intensive support.
Consolidation: an institution that has progressed beyond the fragile launch or renewal phase and is working toward stabilization and resilience of core functions.
Sustainability: an institution that has progressed beyond the consolidation phase and is resilient in executing core functions toward achieving its mission.
Expansion: a sustainable institution that is significantly expanding core functions.
Renewal: an existing institution that is inadequate and in need of intensive support.
The Rural Re-Lay Framework allows rural capacity-building initiatives to answer the critical and dizzying questions of “where,” “what” and “how.” For place-based philanthropies, employing the Rural Re-Lay Framework makes it possible to undertake a big, bold, multi-level push into rural capacity-building.
Using the Rural Re-Lay Framework
This all may feel a bit abstract, but there are several examples of the Rural Re-Lay Framework in action, including many at the foundation where I serve as program officer, the T.L.L. Temple Foundation. The framework’s three key factors are in bold within each of these examples:
At the hyperlocal level of change, the T.L.L. Temple Foundation is investing in technical assistance for leaders of food pantries to support them in renewing and sustaining their operations.
At the local level, rural East Texas libraries recently received funding and technical assistance in partnership with Rural LISC to expand their services and become hubs for broadband access and support through the Digital Navigator program.
Partners for Rural Impact are convening parents, caregivers, teachers and community leaders to plan the launch of local cradle-to-career education programs.
The T.L.L. Temple Foundation partnered with Alexander Research and Consulting to address regional workforce and labor market information and data gaps by launching the Rural East Texas Economic Opportunity Analysis.
The East Texas Food Bank received multiyear funding to expand services as a regional anchor institution.
As a result of having no community development financial institutions located across the entire region, the T.L.L Temple Foundation provided funding to launch the Rural Opportunity Catalyst for East Texas (ROC-ET) Initiative.
The foundation embedded technical assistance within the Deep East Texas Council of Governments to expand their capacity to lead regional broadband infrastructure development.
A collaborative of Texas Rural Funders is seeking to adopt from Oregon a data and information initiative at the state level to expand a federal funding opportunities prospect list and a grant writer roster to help rural nonprofits traverse public sector funding streams.
The future of rural capacity building
For decades, too many rural communities have struggled to revitalize institutions, strengthen infrastructure, and expand access to capital, resulting in the pervasive perception that rural places have been left behind as modern opportunity and success agglomerates in cities.
Changing this story and laying the essential groundwork for thriving, modern rural communities will require the renewal and innovation of rural institutions for the 21st century. Where effective rural institutions exist, we must invest to make them stronger through leadership training and technical assistance, network-building within and between sectors, and game-changing technology, information and tools. Where there are gaps, we must launch and build new rural institutional models that are intentionally designed and fit for purpose.
The Rural Re-Lay Framework provides straightforward tools to navigate and accelerate multisector, integrated rural capacity building by guiding decisions on where to invest, how to invest, and how to measure institutional progress. The Rural Re-lay Framework leads to bottom-up, big-push capacity-building that gives rural areas a chance to access and use the incoming top-down resources toward the greatest needs and highest impacts.