THE RURBAN FRINGE

If It Works in Sangudo, Why Not In Your Community?

The following is a guest post by Dan Ohler, coach, colleague, and co-operative co-founder … read on to find out more how he and other community members revitalized their small rural community though collaborative action.
Sangudo Opportunity Development Co-operative (SODC) is a unique investment co-op working to revitalize the economic viability of the small rural community of Sangudo, [...]

A Recipe for CED

While getting groceries the other day, I patiently waited while other shoppers lined up their purchases by the till.  More often than not, it seemed to be a mish-mash of items (hot dog buns, cottage cheese, pepper, and toothpaste, as one example) which led me to think … this is what communities do.
That is, many communities like to [...]

Cultivating Free-Range Communities

Any parents out there?  Great.  Have you heard of the “free-range parenting” movement?  Similar in spirit to free-range farming, the trend bills itself as common sense parenting in uncommonly overprotective times.  That is, to raise self-reliant, confident kids, parents need to open the door to freedom from time-to-time.
Which got me thinking … do we treat our communities the [...]

Your Project and the Role of Government

All project stakeholders are not equal.
On many projects that I become involved in, almost everyone seems to think that the local government needs to be involved in a key manner. 
This can be good … fostering civic engagement, encouraging two-way communication and helping to further the actions of independent agencies, for instance.  Or this can be bad … with [...]

Farmers Become Ag Educators

In Ontario, a rural leadership and capacity-building project is offering communities, agencies and organizations the opportunity to identify and build the skills of local leaders through a series of relevant program and resource tools.
Part of this project asked rural communities to share what makes their communities great … with Harold and Shelley McPhail – the [...]

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