Dialogue participants spent the second day discussing their priorities with state agencies and learning about relevant state programs. These interactive discussions between agency staff and rural citizens produced a set of possible next steps around the three rural priority areas of land use, infrastructure and energy.
Next Steps – Land Use
Soil Health
- Connect USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) soil health programs and state and local watershed districts.
- Identify more partners to invest in soil health, including the crop insurance industry, food and beverage companies, and the recreation industry.
- Publish a Minnesota Soil Health Report, which assesses progress on improving soil health in the state.
Water Quality
- The state needs more outreach and opportunities for farmers and landowners to become part of the MN Agricultural Water Quality Certification Program. The program supports farmers improving water management on land in production through practices that also build climate resilience.
- Improve residential water use by addressing issues like water softeners, lawn fertilizers, and supporting actions like rain gardens that help retain water.
Tourism
- Tourism programs, including through the University of Minnesota’s Tourism Center, have the potential to educate visitors and can highlight local actions and responses to climate change.
Community Stewardship
- Responses to climate change require a greater understanding of community assets, including land, community events, and a greater connection to local institutions like schools, hospitals, and businesses.
Next Steps – Infrastructure
Stormwater
- Reviews of stormwater treatment in smaller towns.
- Outreach and education to city engineers on options for redesigning stormwater infrastructure in light of climate-related events.
- Better local data to show how smaller-scale projects build upon each other to create a larger impact within a community watershed.
- Improve interaction between rural citizens and government agencies and planners on projects related to water quality, zoning, and land management. Agencies need to better communicate about programs, including how they can be accessed and program accomplishments.
- Increased support for the Clean Water Legacy Fund.
Transportation Planning
- More coordination is needed among different levels of government and organizations involved with transportation planning.
- Citizens often don’t understand road jurisdictions (federal, state, county) or where and when community input is needed. Community engagement needs to be improved before projects are underway.
- Road conditions could be better mapped, given increasing weather-related wear and tear. Making this data more available to the community would help set priorities and improve community engagement. The public could contribute to data collection.
- There needs to be greater investment in human-powered transportation, particularly walking and biking.
Next Steps – Energy
Clean Energy Transition
- Expand the CERTs program within rural communities around the state.
- Use the GreenStep Cities program as a way for small communities to start building a community energy plan.
- Increase education about clean energy options for communities, including in the high schools.
- Convene more multi-stakeholder discussions around clean energy development in the community to set long-term and short-term goals.
- Increase understanding and access to the Property-Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) program. Improved case studies on finished projects can show energy savings.
Program Gaps
The State Convening aimed to examine how rural priorities could be met by existing programs; however, the discussion highlighted some gaps where there is either no program, or little connection between the program and rural communities. Some identified needs include:
- State program translator – Many state programs are difficult to navigate and/or difficult to find. A community-friendly resource of agency programs and contacts would address this challenge.
- Rural-focused research on climate resilience – Rural communities face unique challenges in terms of transportation, natural resource-based economies, and high energy use. The State Convening highlighted the lack of good research on the impact of climate change on the health of rural workers, among other topics.
- Best practice sharing – Citizens from the three communities benefited from talking with each other. Rural communities working on climate resilience must be better connected to exchange best practices and learn from each other. The Morris Model, which emerged following the Morris Dialogue, is an example of a good practice that could be shared.
- Continued connection between state agencies and rural communities – State agency staff expressed the value of direct engagement with rural citizens in a constructive environment, where they could learn about their priorities. There needs to be continued space for state agency staff to get feedback from rural citizens, and vice versa, in an environment that is not confrontational or politically charged.
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