Funding Rural

Savannah Barrett’s deep Kentucky roots have guided her entire career. She’s the Exchange Director for Art of the Rural, a nonprofit that uses creative connection and storytelling to build relationships and bridge divides between urban and rural communities. She co-founded the Kentucky Rural-Urban Exchange and she’s joined together with others from her community to buy a historic property, the Grayson Springs Inn, and restore it as a cherished community space.

More than 95 percent of American beef cattle spend the end of their lives eating grain in feed lots. It’s an easy way to get them fat faster. However, a growing number of ranchers like Eastern Oregonian Cory Carman, of Carman Ranch and Carman Ranch Provisions, are finding alternatives. She is a fourth generation rancher who is thinking differently about the animals she raises, the products she distributes and how that impacts the community she lives in. Cory is working to uplift the region and industry she’s in—noting that rural places are willing to take risks and be creative. But those risks take investment, and often from out of the area. Cory encourages philanthropy to come alongside ranchers to help further inspire that innovation.

Governor Tom Vilsack started out as a small-town lawyer, then mayor, and went on to serve as governor of Iowa for 8 years. He ran the US Department of Agriculture under President Obama and President Biden. Gov. Vilsack is now the CEO of the World Food Prize, which presents an annual award of $500,000 to individuals who have increased the quality, quantity and availability of food in the world. During his time as Secretary of the USDA, he called on the philanthropic community to step up to the plate and provide more funding for rural communities.

Rhodes Scholar, lifelong Portlander, and community visionary JT Flowers draws the parallels between urban and rural communities. Born and raised in NE Portland’s historic Black neighborhood, the Albina District, Flowers recently served as Senior Advisor and Director of Government Affairs at Albina Vision Trust, the largest community-led redevelopment effort in America. The Trust was created to buy back land, rebuild community, and reestablish a prosperous Black neighborhood in the heart of Portland’s central city.

Mel Butterfield asks, ‘if adults aren’t modeling healthy behaviors, why does it surprise us when youth behavior suffers?’ She is a fourth-generation Central Oregonian and the director of Central Oregon YouthLine, a peer-to-peer crisis, help and support line nationally available. Young people don’t always want to talk to adults when it comes to their mental health, so YouthLine is staffed by young people who have gone through training to support their peers. They say “It’s OK to not be OK” - because we all need to talk about mental health more. Youth experiencing a crisis can call 877-968-8491 or text "teen2teen" to 83983.

Rev. Dr. Ryan M. Eller is a ninth-generation Appalachian who deeply understands his region—and where generations of their wealth went. As Executive Director of Appalachia Funders Network, Eller leads a coalition of more than 80 funders who are committed to socio-economic transition in Central Appalachia. Eller began his career in community organizing and wishes more funders had that valuable experience, which taught him that thoughtful action is the oxygen needed to effect change and help remedy longstanding issues.

We're back with a new season of Funding Rural! This fall, we bring you more fresh, heartfelt conversations about philanthropy and how it can better serve rural and Indigenous communities. The folks you'll hear this season will showcase the power of local work and investing in the grassroots organizations that are making systemic change from the ground up.

When people don’t know where to begin when it comes to funding rural America, collaborative funds are a great way to start. Charlie Brown is the executive director of the Trust for Civic Life, which is an example of one of those funds. They’re made up of 20 different funders from across the country all working together to empower people to get involved in shaping the future of their communities and everyday democracy . They prioritize listening and learning instead of coming in with a top-down approach.

Funding for disaster response is much needed in the American West where vast rangeland ignites quickly under dry conditions. In Eastern Oregon, innovative Rangeland Fire Protection Associations (RFPAs) bring together local ranchers and state resources to work collaboratively when fires break out. Derek Burkhardt is a 4th generation rancher and farmer from Vale, Oregon who is in a leadership role with his two local RFPAs, and Allison Rayburn is the Oregon Dept of Forestry’s Rangeland Fire Program Coordinator. They share their motivations, recent firefighting experiences, and wish lists.

Meeting the mental and behavioral health needs of rural communities, where people are dispersed and remarkably self-reliant, can be a challenge for a variety of different reasons. In Northeast Oregon, Community Counseling Solutions serves an area of more than 60,000 square miles, in which just 100,000 people reside—the sheer distance can stretch resources thin. Kimberly Lindsay is their director and she cofounded the David Romprey Oregon Warm Line in Oregon, which unlike a hotline for an immediate crisis, warm lines provide early mental health intervention with a confidential free phone service. If you or someone you know is just wanting to connect, call 800-698-2392.

There are so many folks who want to age in place but live far away from the care they need, and that can present challenges for their health, happiness and the social fabric of their communities. Dr. Jordan Lewis is the director for the Center on Aging at the University of Hawaii at Manoa with the Thompson School of Social Work and Public Health. He’s Alaska Native on his mother’s side and got his PhD in Community Psychology from the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Over the course of his career, Jordan has been drawn to the study of elder care— especially in rural and American Indian/Alaska Native communities. He wants to study the ways in which people can “age how they wish” and what we can all learn from the elders who are navigating that chapter of life.

When massive wildfires swept through Oregon in 2020, Dee Anne Everson helped hundreds of people who had just lost everything, and five years later, she’s still helping them. She’s CEO of United Way of Jackson County Oregon, and has a special leadership philosophy that’s evident in her work. Everson leads a staff of 7 and they partner with hundreds of volunteers across south-central Oregon to help folks with everything from transportation issues, senior needs, and emergency cash support for things like car repairs or utility bills. They’ll even help you prep your taxes.

Crosshatch Center for Art and Ecology in Northern Michigan is an artist residency that aims to build community through farming, ecology and economy. The Northern Michigan Small Farms Conference is a program of theirs that brings farms together to learn and connect in the height of summer. Led by Brad Kik and his wife, Amanda, Crosshatch was also a key partner behind a recently completed new building near downtown Traverse City called The Alluvion that serves as a performance center, co-working space, and also provides affordable housing. Kik shares his fundraising experiences for both Crosshatch and The Alluvion, and offers a perspective rooted in place and purpose.

Philanthropy has long been a champion of public radio, providing grants for everything from infrastructure and new buildings to special reporting projects. Recent federal cuts have made philanthropic support even more critical to keep public radio stations afloat: across the country, in rural and remote areas, and especially on Tribal lands. Sue Matters is the station manager at KWSO 91.9 FM, which is a non-commercial radio station that is licensed, owned and operated by the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs in Oregon. She shares her experience, spanning nearly 40 years, on the reservation’s radio and what the station means to the culture and well-being of listeners.

In rural and remote Oregon, where populations are low and the need for educators is high, there’s Rural Teacher Corps, a Grow Your Own program that is implementing new approaches to identifying, supporting, and training tomorrow’s teachers. Dave Dallas, who runs the program, teaches in the College of Education at Eastern Oregon University and he’s the Director of Teach Rural Oregon. He shares how philanthropy can play a key role in meeting some of the overlooked needs in rural education.

Native American Tribal communities are a blind spot for philanthropy with just .4% of funding going to Native organizations—but some philanthropic organizations are trying to change that. Stone Hudson, a citizen of the three affiliated tribes (Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara) of the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota shares his experience as Program Officer at Meyer Memorial Trust where he oversees the Tribal Nations Partnership Initiative. His sense of service, stewardship and curiosity is magnetic, and he knows how to show up authentically and bring people together in the process.

Luke Shaefer, PhD is one of the nation's foremost scholars of poverty and social welfare policy. He is a professor at the University of Michigan and is the inaugural director of Poverty Solutions, an interdisciplinary initiative that partners with communities and policymakers to find novel ways to alleviate poverty. In 2015, he co-authored the book, “$2 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America”, which was named one of the 100 Notable Books of the year by the New York Times Book Review. In Flint, Michigan, Luke helped launch RX Kids, the nation’s first citywide cash prescription program designed to help ease the financial journey into parenthood.

Green River, Utah (population 900) can be seen as a waypoint in the desert with more hotel rooms than residents. Or it can be seen through the eyes of locals like Maria Sykes. She’s the director and co-founder of Epicenter, a nonprofit in Green River that focuses on housing and fosters creativity and art in the community. Maria did not grow up in the region, instead she came by way of Americorps, and in the 16 years she’s lived in Green River, she’s contributed to its vibrancy, livability, and iconic neon signs.

Libraries are vital to rural communities—they do so much more than just check out books. They provide internet access, heating and cooling centers, early learning, nutrition, STEM programs, story time and more. Dr. Regina Washington-Arthur is the managing director of the Rural Library Network for Partners for Rural Impact. With a background in public health, Washington-Arthur explains that libraries contribute to the overall health of a community; they are a critical component of the cradle-to-career educational pathway; and more often than not, they do so with limited financial resources.

More than 50 million Americans face food insecurity. And in the U.S., 9 out of the 10 counties with the highest rate of food insecurity are rural . To offset this disparity, Roundhouse Foundation recently launched a 6 million dollar investment which will support local food purchase over the next three years. Carly Auten is food program director at NeighborImpact, a grant recipient that distributes more than 4 million pounds of food every year and feeds 80,000 people across Central Oregon every month.