History of the Center For Rural Planning

The Center For Rural Planning (CRP) was founded in January 2004 in response to the growing pressures on small, rural communities, to address change, and to plan for vibrant, sustainable communities.

The organization was formed as a result of its founders going through a three-year community planning process in a rural township outside of Duluth. During this process the founders built on their belief in the value of rural communities, their experiences in living in rural communities and a belief in the value of communities themselves.

CRP was founded based on the following:

• Self Determination : Rural community planning is best accomplished by the communities themselves. The real experts are the residents themselves. CRP was formed to work through a planning process with the community to support communities in determining their own destinies.

• Building Community Relationships : Community planning can provide opportunities not only for producing plans, but can also provide opportunities for building community relationships and community leaders thereby increasing the community's social capital.

• Integrated Systems / Project Oriented : Most rural development approaches focus on single issues. CRP approaches rural development through an integrative, systems approach looking at where the community is now and who they are. Then, asking the community where they want to go and what the community should look like a vision is created for the community. The completed community plan also focuses on how to achieve their vision with not only policies, but also a list of projects to achieve the vision for the community.

• Building Community Capacity : Most rural townships and small communities manage their affairs through part-time elected officials and many community volunteers with minimal resources to put towards planning. Rural communities, be they planning commissions or land use planning steering committees, are by and large volunteers with limited resources, be they financial or people experienced in community planning. These volunteers are the experts with knowledge about their communities and resources, but they lack the tools to transform and integrate their knowledge into comprehensive plans. There is minimal time and energy to pursue the resources necessary for community planning - a need CRP is positioned to respond to.

• Developing Agreements : One of the most difficult challenges in planning is finding a way for people with many conflicting interest to civilly sit down, talk to each other, and find agreements. CRP has developed and uses an alternative dispute resolution process for communities to find agreements.