Minnesota Needs You: A Guide to Rural Issues

Businesses can’t grow if they can’t find employees. And people can’t take jobs if they don’t have childcare.

Rural Minnesota is grappling with a serious childcare shortage, and that shortage impacts everyone. Businesses can’t grow if they can’t find available workers. And people can’t take jobs if they don’t have quality childcare.

But running a childcare facility can be prohibitively expensive.

One issue driving up costs is the lack of childcare facilities that are sized to help providers maximize child-teacher ratios. Another is the high energy costs of running the centers.

There is no one-size-fits-all model. We will have to get creative. But so far, initiatives to help rural childcare providers have lacked funds for new buildings or significant improvements to existing spaces.

But our communities increasingly recognize that:

1. Childcare is an investment in economic development.
2. The most effective action for building childcare capacity is to help childcare providers make their businesses financially stable.

Communities can seek benefits from utilities, or other public or private funds for building, expanding, or retrofitting childcare centers to

• Maximize efficiency of student and teacher ratios
• Provide healthy, temperature-controlled spaces requiring minimal energy use

This saves on start-up and operation costs from day one. These savings, combined with community partnerships, provide the funds to keep our best childcare teachers and staff in business.

See How a Green Bank Can Help with Rural Childcare Access
See Rural Childcare Innovation Program
See New Childcare Pod Model in Stevens County
See Intergenerational Programming at Warroad Community Child Care Center

Healthcare is critical infrastructure for our communities. We need services that are available, accessible, and affordable.

Living in rural Minnesota shouldn’t mean sacrificing quality healthcare. Our families deserve care close to home, not hours away. We work hard and our healthcare system should work for us too.

Our health is shaped by what surrounds us, and living in rural areas comes with unique challenges.

• Rural residents face longer drives to healthcare facilities and have fewer options for providers. Lack of mobility options is a barrier for many to access these services.
• Rising costs, staff shortages, uneven medicare reimbursements, and denied insurance claims make it difficult for rural hospitals to provide quality care. Unfortunately, Minnesota leads the nation in rural hospital closures of obstetrical units, forcing people in labor to travel farther, putting lives at risk.
• Stress from unpredictable farm profits, to pollution, and a changing physical environment can make it harder to care for our families and ourselves.

What we need:

• Health plans we can afford.
• Stabilized funding for our healthcare facilities.
• Investment in broadband, housing, and childcare, so health professionals can live and work here.
• Investment in mental health services and support systems, so rural residents get the help they need to cope with stress, depression, and other challenges.

We can’t fill workforce gaps if there isn’t a place for people to live. We need affordable housing, senior living, and good community design.

To fill gaps in essential services, from the hospital to the manufacturing plant, workers need affordable housing.

People want to come to live, to work, to raise their families here. But they can’t if there isn’t a place to live.

We need housing options for every phase of life.  Affordable and modern choices for folks just starting out. Functional housing for growing families. And options for life-long residents who want to safely stay in the community.

Single-family housing is closely tied to the availability of senior facilities. Without accessible options, seniors stay in large, older homes longer, often causing them to fall into disrepair rather than being passed down to new owners ( Center for Rural Policy and Development ). Addressing housing comprehensively is essential to meet our needs. 

Investing in new housing and senior living facilities offers an opportunity to incorporate sustainable community design and ensure long-term energy savings. Resources are currently available at the state and federal level to build zero emission communities and housing with near zero energy costs; it’s time for our towns to seize this moment!

See Housing Needs and Solutions in Rural Minnesota
See MNCIFA, passed in 2023, to help communities access money for renewable energy projects from individual homes to city-wide systems.

Broadband in every corner of our state is a necessity, not a luxury

Access to broadband in every corner of our state is a necessity – not a luxury – to participate in the global economy,

• farmers need it to use new technologies,
• our schools need it for online education,
• small businesses rely on it for accounting and to sell their goods.

The people of our community work as hard or harder than anyone, but they need a level playing field to compete.

Our state goal is to get high-speed internet to all homes and businesses by 2026 – and we’ve put together the funds to do it:

• $652 million from the federal government, passed under the IIJA (Infrastructure Investment Jobs Act), PLUS +
• $100 million investment from our state passed in 2023.

Rural communities need broadband and Minnesota is delivering.

See Map of Awarded Projects in 2024
See Minnesota Broadband Grant Program web page.

Good for our people, good for our pocketbooks.

As tax bases shift, city and county governments can look to supplement revenue or reduce costs without burdening residents. One option: taking advantage of renewable energy projects like solar, wind or transmission sited in your community.

Energy production revenue

• In 2021, eight Southern MN counties received a combined $12 million in their annual revenue payments from wind energy production taxes. (Energy production tax revenue is largely unrestricted and can be added directly to a county or township’s general fund.)
• A Report by the Center for Rural Affairs shows how some counties are using this money to reduce tax burdens, update aging infrastructure, and kickstart new initiatives.

Funding that lowers energy costs

• Morris, population 5,000, has used state financing to fund a host of local renewable energy projects – saving the city money for other needs.
• Inflation Reduction Act incentives rebate local governments 30-70% of renewable energy project costs, making them even more cost effective. Once built, renewable energy systems save cities operating costs year after year.

Taking advantage of renewable energy is good for our pocketbooks and our environment.

Our infrastructure should meet our changing needs.

Climate change is bringing more frequent and extreme weather challenges – from fires and floods to poor air quality. This means that when we build, we need to build better. We can take advantage of federal and local funding to build smarter, in ways that cost us less and give us more:

• Roads and bridges should be built to survive the 500-year storms and floods
• Natural spaces should be planted and integrated into the landscape to prevent erosion and serve as a sponge for the water that runs off hardscapes.
• Buildings should be made resilient with solar and battery storage, heat pumps or networked geothermal to save us money, reduce pollution, and keep us powered even if a transmission line goes down.
• Energy grids should be planned to anticipate outages, using rooftop and community solar arrays in micro grids to give us resilience – especially in rural areas. We shouldn’t be reliant on one power line that a tree could take out.

Plan now to be ready in case disaster comes.

Should disaster strike, how will our community respond? Will it rebuild to replace? Or rebuild to make better. The days after a disaster are a difficult time to think about infrastructure. Cities and towns across Minnesota, even small ones like ours, should have conversations now so when and if there is a need to rebuild, the community has a road map and vision to guide the rebuilding process.

Looking out for our neighbors, whether they are down the road or across the globe: this is what we are good at in rural Minnesota.

Whether we call it unusual weather or we call it climate change, we are all living with the same thing:

More extreme storms, record-breaking heat waves, dwindling winters, more droughts, more floods, more tornadoes, more wildfires, and the more damage that comes with it.
Insurance companies raising rates, reducing coverage, and leaving markets — including Minnesota – are a tangible result of what science has told us: If we stay on the same course, disasters from changing climate will keep increasing in number and growing in severity.

But ever-increasing damage from climate change is only inevitable if we fail to take action.

Individual actions help us each individually – saving us money, protecting our health, or increasing our home or property’s resilience. These are critical.

But it will be the actions we take collectively that shift us to a better future – that moves us off the trajectory of growing chaos to one that restores our climate. Reduces catastrophe. Repairs tomorrow.

Fortunately, taking care of what binds us is what we are good at in rural Minnesota. Looking out for our neighbors. Bringing in the crops. Building the new fire station. Honoring our veterans. Together we can work to solve climate change, too, as long as  we don’t look the other way.

Climate change is happening because we have burned fossil fuels to run our economy for the last 150 years. Those fossil fuels gave us what we needed then: power. Power to feed, power to cool, power to make, power to move. And the power to build something better.

That something better is here now: the technology to turn sun, wind and battery storage into what we need for our lives. Renewable energy is more efficient. It is plentiful and delivered to the wind turbines and solar panels for free, day after day, year after year. It doesn’t pollute our air. It doesn’t poison our water. It doesn’t need to come from distant places. It just needs a chance.

We don’t need to accept a future with an unlivable climate. We can turn it around.

Here’s what it takes:

• Leaders who understand and are honest about climate change
• Governments that keep investing in the technologies that help us transition, and
• Supporting the real solutions that make our lives better and leaving false solutions behind.

Confronting climate change is about making the decision that helps instead of the decision that harms. We can pull together to do that. Pulling together is what we do best.

Our aquifers held the water for our grandparents and need to hold the water for our grandchildren – but they won’t if we give it away, let industry pollute it, or allow it to run dry.

Rural places are facing increasing water challenges with supply uncertainties exacerbated by drought and the water intensity of industrial agriculture. Many of our waters are unfit for swimming and fishing, and our aging drinking water treatment systems need costly upgrading and maintenance.

Now is the time to make significant investments in our water systems. Federal and state money has been allocated to help communities make these investments.

• When we upgrade our drinking water facilities to address nitrates, PFAS and other contaminants, we need to upgrade them to save our communities money, too. Energy is the most expensive part of operating a water treatment facility. Using solar and wind, paired with battery storage, will not only make these systems reliable, but it will also drastically reduce ongoing energy costs of providing clean drinking water.

See how the City of Morris plans to use solar to offset the costs of operating their water treatment facilities.

• When we replace lead pipes – thanks to federal and state investments – we should think about whether other systems, like thermal energy networks, should be included at the same time.
• When agricultural and industry pollute or deplete our limited water resources, they must be held accountable.

Rural people, closely connected to the land, understand better than anyone the changes to our landscape.

Strong communities depend on healthy ecosystems:

Our well-being and the health of the land are entwined. Our environment impacts our health, our economy, and overall quality of life. Our natural surroundings are often a big part of what makes a place feel like home.

Many of us live near industrial facilities – farms, manufacturing plants, coal plants, mines – where we are exposed to pollution that seeps into the groundwater we drink or drifts into the air we breathe. If our air, food, and water are bathed in chemicals or pollution, our health suffers. 

We share responsibility for our natural resources:

We all have attachments to the places we call home and should be invited to have a say in the decisions that affect it.

What does it look like for communities to have a voice in the decisions that affect them?

It looks like transparency about new projects and clear education on the pollutants in our air and water, so we know the risks we face. It looks like being able to attend public meetings and share input on the agricultural and industrial regulations to protect our health and safety.  It looks like feedback at every step of the process. Too often, outsiders want to do something to the land we live on.

Our rural communities thrive when they are safe and welcoming for everyone. Diversity strengthens us in many ways—through differences in age, gender, culture, skills, and backgrounds. When we get to know people as people first, we build trust. And trust and respect are essential to getting through challenges our communities face. Embracing our differences not only enriches our social fabric but also strengthens our economy by bringing in new ideas and filling essential roles and jobs.

We can take these steps to ensure everyone feels welcome and supported in our rural communities:

• Engage with immigrant and refugee groups to foster understanding and build stronger community ties.
• Invest in translation resources so that everyone can participate in local events and government meetings.
• Adjust meeting times to make government meetings more accessible to working families and individuals with different schedules.
• Promote mental health resources and reduce stigma by creating spaces where everyone feels safe seeking help.

By welcoming people of all ages, backgrounds, and abilities, we create stronger, more connected, and happier communities.

See Models for a More Welcoming and Engaging Community

Democracy means having a say in the decisions that shape our lives.

More than voting.

It isn’t just about elections. It’s about the decisions that affect us every day: our schools, streets, and safety. Having a voice in the matters that affect us is the core of our democracy.

That means we need two things:

1. Good information, and
2. An opportunity for real discussion.

Too often, decisions that affect us are made without our input.  We all have busy lives, but we also want the chance to be part of decision points, share our thoughts, and know our voice was valued.

Representation Matters. Our elected officials impact almost every aspect of our lives; from our schools and streets to our energy systems, social safety nets, and even the hours we can access our local parks. Good governance happens when our voices are reflected by the decision makers that represent us – government accountability to citizens is at the core of our democracy.

Share the Responsibility of Leadership: Continually placing all the leadership responsibility on the same individuals isn’t fair to them or the community. We encourage and support community members from all backgrounds to step forward and participate in local governance. We know the power of down-ballot positions, so let’s ensure that leadership roles reflect all of us and our needs.

Remove Participation Barriers: Meeting times for important local leadership boards often leave out most of today’s rural working folks and parents. It’s critical to schedule meeting times that work for everyone. Otherwise, we all miss out on new leadership.