Harness the Wealth! helps rural communities

MACHIAS – Some Washington County residents are hoping to hitch the county’s economic wagon to Harness the Wealth!, a new program Maine Rural Partners is launching to boost and build communities statewide.

A meeting is set for 11 a.m. today at the Washington County Courthouse conference room. The meeting is open to the public – or to anyone interested in learning more about the opportunities at hand.

Harness the Wealth! is a new initiative from Maine Rural Partners, a nonprofit group based at the University of Maine in Orono. The program is based on successful models of rural community building in states such as Nebraska and Montana, one of the Maine Rural Partners board members said.

The Washington County group wants to make an application as a single “community” – even though its 35,000 residents stretch from Steuben to Danforth. The county commissioners support the plan and will sit in on the meeting from noon to 1 p.m. in between their interviews for a new county manager.

“The program sounds like an opportunity for the county to have some help in planning where we are going,” Washington County commissioner chairman Kevin Shorey said Tuesday. “The timing for this is very good with a new county manager coming on.

“The county manager would be at the table for this, and this would be one of the initial projects the manager could work on.”

Maine Rural Partners has an Aug. 11 deadline for applications from groups that want to be one of two pilot communities for Harness the Wealth! which has federal funding from U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Development agency.

There may be funding for communities beyond the initial two pilot programs. Generally, communities that show strong interest and initiative likely will have “tools” and planning available to them, even if not chosen as pilot communities.

An initial planning group for the Washington County application met June 14 to talk about what bringing the Harness program Down East could mean.

Attending the meeting were Sean Daye of Machias Savings Bank, Barbara Drisko of the Washington County Drug Action Team, Judy East of Washington County Council of Governments, Cherie Galyean of Maine Community Foundation, Peter Greene of Union Trust Co., Will Hopkins of Cobscook Bay Resource Center, Cynthia Huggins of University of Maine at Machias and Amr Ismail of Mason Bay Resources in Jonesport.

Also attending were Darin McGaw of Washington County Community College; Anne Perry, a state representative from Calais; Kevin Raye, a state senator from Perry; Dianne Tilton, formerly of Sunrise County Economic Council; Janet Toth of Eastern Maine Development Corp. and Lora Whelan of Eastport for Pride.

Harness the Wealth! was launched in May with a two-day training session in Unity for more than 50 people involved with rural development interests.

Participating communities will work with a “community coach” who in turn links local leaders with a “community exchange team” to identify the specific needs of the community.

The pilot program is intended to focus on what Maine Rural Partners calls the six “rim” counties: Oxford, Franklin, Somerset, Piscataquis, Aroostook and Washington.

The program lasts about two years as communities invest in creating locally supported and locally controlled endowments or other sources of funding. Communities are expected to implement a community investment plan.

“Washington County could have a unique application because of our diversification,” Shorey said. “There is lumbering, fishing, paper mills, small business – a whole microcosm of a true community here. That gives us some traction to show we would be a unique place for this program.”

Maine Rural Partners was incorporated in 2003 to create independent legal status for the Maine Rural Development Council. That program was hosted by the University of Maine Cooperative Extension from 1991 to 2003 in cooperation with the National Rural Development Partnership.

Maine Rural Partners is now housed within the Margaret Chase Smith Policy Center at the University of Maine.