Carnegie Mellon University

PCRG SUMMIT

12th Annual PCRG Community Development Summit

Metro21 Distinguished Fellow Rick Stafford, along with Metro21 intern Bobby Lincoln and other presented "Rural and Small Communities: Leveraging Our Region's Assets" at the Pittsburgh Community Reinvestment Group 12th Annual Community Development Summit on May 16-17, 2022, focusing on Equity, Equality and Justice.

Since the 1980’s, many regional industrial river towns and rural coal towns have experienced severe economic decline. Meanwhile, investment growing in the City of Pittsburgh created stark regional economic, racial, class, educational, and environmental inequities. Other small towns in the region with one large employer remain vulnerable. Carnegie Mellon University is exploring economic development strategies to develop/identify policies, tools, and funding sources that could support these towns. We pursued three research questions:

  1. What lessons can be learned from communities that have already faced such cataclysmic closings
  2. What proactive strategies can vulnerable communities pursue to forestall/mitigate against sudden
    economic collapse?
  3. What local, state, regional, and federal programs and resources are available to help
    prepare/protect these communities from economic decline, and what state legislation could be passed to aid these communities beyond what is currently available?

This session reported the answers to those questions.