Alliance for Rural Impact Comes to Stuttgart

The Alliance for Rural Impact held a conference at the Grand Prairie Center on Thursday, April 30, with close to 75 people from around the state present to hear how to revitalize our towns.

There were workshops on Healing your town, the Root Cause of Disconnection, the keynote was The Hospitality of Home: Making Government Feel Like it Cares, and Building a Culture and Place They Want to Stay.  

Speakers from ARI, Revitalize or Die, ACC Capital and Municipal Hospitality, shared their knowledge of how to create a community that people want to be in. They spoke on Civic Pride and Civic Apathy, and making a strategic plan to make the community care.

Jeff Siegler, founder of Revitalize or Die spoke on initiatives to develop leaders, saying, “Residents don’t always care what you say you’re going to do. How did you make them feel?”.

“Pride is visible. When you put in the effort, things get better.” Seigler said.

Seigler discussed what happens to communities when they lose their public schools. Students today don’t learn about civic duty, financial literacy and other things they need to become good citizens. Great communities are made of good citizens. Many in the room were shocked to hear students no longer have to take civics classes, which are vital to understanding how our government works.

The entire day was a strategic learning plan on how to improve communities.

For more information, contact the Alliance for Rural Impact at ruralimpact.org 

Lunch was catered by ABS.