By Jim Stasiowski
- The federal agency charged with pepping up Appalachia’s anemic economy is turning to state colleges, including Virginia Tech, and private consultants for help.
- The Appalachian Regional Commission, created four decades ago to grapple with the area’s stubborn poverty, recently decided to pay four universities and two consultants a total of $200,000 to help distressed communities take development projects from concept to completion.
- In Virginia, Virginia Tech has been paired with Wise and Dickenson counties and will share its development expertise with them.
- By next month, the counties will begin holding hearings to let residents agree on a project to pursue. The project could be geared at improving tourism, housing, downtown development, community parks, water and sewer service or anything else the community wants or needs, said John Aughenbaugh, development specialist with Tech’s Economic Development Assistance Center.
- “We’re excited about the process,” said Dickenson County Administrator Kiet Viers. “We’re going to take this and initially try to define ourselves as a locality. For instance, are we a tourism destination?”
- Outside Virginia, the Appalachian Regional Commission is paying Mississippi State University to help two counties in Mississippi, Auburn University is assisting two counties in Alabama, and the University of Tennessee is helping two counties in Tennessee.
- Two consultants also have been hired: Civic Economics Inc. is aiding communities in Pennsylvania and Ohio, and Terrell Ellis and Associates is assisting communities in West Virginia and Kentucky.
- Appalachian Regional Commission spokesman Duane DeBruyne said the consultants and university experts will help economically distressed communities strategize and reach agreement on what projects to pursue. They also will act as mentors to teach local officials how to carry out plans and, importantly, help them find money to fund the projects.
- “Once they get that experience under their belt,” DeBruyne said, “the sky’s the limit.”
- Aughenbaugh said Appalachian communities often need outside help to carry out their plans because they cannot afford to hire staffers. He said Susan Caruvana in Tech’s development-assistance center will help Wise and Dickenson identify funding sources for their projects and help them submit funding proposals.
- “What they want at the end of the day is an issue of a couple of issues that the community has rallied around,” he said. “We want to walk them through the process of putting their plans into action.”