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Monday Mailing

Year 21 • Issue 18 12 January 2015 1.

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Oregon Once Again Top Relocation Destination, Study Says Toolkit for Working with Rural Volunteers Renew Rural America (Resource) Using Google Earth to Understand Parking Utilization Webinar on New Report from National Research Council - "A Framework for Assessing the Effects of the Food System."

7 Key Lessons: 25 Years of Addressing Racism Through Dialogue and Community Change Land Use Decision-making - Winter/Spring 2015 Webinar Series 2015 Local Food Connection Coming Soon!

U.S. Climate Resilience Toolkit Released Closing The Gender Gap Among Bicyclists Funding Opportunities

1. Oregon Once Again Top Relocation Destination, Study Says Oregon has once again topped the list of a national survey of people relocating from elsewhere, making the Beaver State the top moving destination of 2014.

United Van Lines, one of the largest moving companies in the country, releases an annual report that examines data on the number of shipments between states to keep track of the rate people are entering and leaving each states.

For the last several years, Oregon has consistently come in near the top of that list. In both 2013 and 2014, in fact, it dominated.

In last year alone, 66 percent of Oregon's moves were of people coming into the state — an increase of five percentage point from 2013 Quote of the Week: "See every problem as an opportunity to exercise creative energy."

~Stephen R. Covey

Oregon Fast Fact: Oregon’s state motto is “Alis volat propriis” (She flies with her own wings)

To access the full story, click here.

2. Toolkit for Working with Rural Volunteers This is a toolkit for little places, the ones that don’t have a Volunteer Coordinator or a Development Officer or even a full-time Director, the ones that depend almost exclusively on volunteers. These communities are the sum and substance of both the Appalachian Coal Country Team and the Western Hardrock Watershed Team and it was these rural communities that provided the research base for this project.

You will find three basic sections, each of which can provide significant insight and ideas for rural volunteers. The first is Rural Volunteer Statistics, an extensive survey of the volunteers themselves— learn just who our rural volunteers are, what they do, where they associate and how best they can be reached.

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The second, Rural Volunteer Management Practices, summarizes 25 different volunteer practices that work. We know they work because we first identified practices that were working well in a rural community, transplanted those practices to 50 other places and then watched them for a year to see how they worked in a different context. Think of this section as a good idea catalogue, a collection of approaches to volunteer management that have been tested and documented, whether successful or unsuccessful.

To access the toolkit, click here.

3. Renew Rural America Resources, news and information that rural residents can access and utilize in providing leadership to their communities' revitalization efforts.

To access this site, click here.

4. Using Google Earth to Understand Parking Utilization Over the past year I have been involved in a number of development permit applications. One of the key points of controversy is over how much parking will be needed—and, therefore, how much traffic will be generated. In each case, the developer, staff, and public all offer their perspective on how much parking will be needed. I am sure you have heard about, or been in, public meetings where the public raises significant concerns over the amount of traffic that will be created and whether there will be enough parking. In some cases a traffic impact study is developed that uses ITE figures to model the projected parking demand. Yet, sometimes what you really need is local data.

The typical way we would go about collecting local data is to go stand in a parking lot and count the number of vehicles and the amount of movement in and out of the parking lot over a period of time.

This is a time-consuming endeavor to capture even one observation To access the full story, click here.

5. Webinar on New Report from National Research Council - "A Framework for Assessing the Effects of the Food System."

On Tuesday, January 13, the Institute of Medicine and National Research Council will release the report of a study on A Framework for Assessing the Effects of the Food System. The study explored ways to methodically compare different policies or proposed changes to the food system in terms of their effects on, and trade-offs for health, the environment, society, and the economy.

To register, click here.

6. 7 Key Lessons: 25 Years of Addressing Racism Through Dialogue and Community Change When we were created as the Study Circles Resource Center twenty-five years ago, our founder, Paul Aicher, gave us a fundamental charge – to find ways to make dialogue compelling, routine and powerful for everyone in the country. He envisioned community settings where people of all backgrounds and views would engage with each other on pressing issues, form relationships across divides, create community change together, and improve democracy in the process.

In our quest to bring this vision to life, we began asking informal and formal community leaders about their hopes and the kinds of support they needed. Early on, people from all backgrounds and regions told us that people in their communities wanted to talk about race but didn’t know how.

They told us that they needed ways to recruit people from different groups and bring them together.

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Within three years of our founding, we had decided to address the issue of racism head-on as we worked with and learned from community groups.

To access the full story, click here.

7. Land Use Decision-making - Winter/Spring 2015 Webinar Series Monthly webinars are offered from 12 Noon - 1:15 pm . The webinars are designed to help planners, elected officials and citizens better engage in land use decision-making processes.

Questions about the webinar? Register at http://extension.psu.edu/land-use-webinar. Contact Peter Wulfhorst at ptw3@psu.edu or call 570-296-3400 8. 2015 Local Food Connection Coming Soon!

The Local Food Connection celebrates its 9th year bringing together local farmers, ranchers, and fishermen with area food buyers. This business-to-business conference provides networking opportunities, educational workshops, and a tasty breakfast & lunch made with ingredients donated by local producers.

Breakfast and lunch are important features of the day and allow you an opportunity to highlight your product. LCC culinary arts students do a terrific job of showcasing your product in dishes they prepare for one of the best luncheons around. Help us show all the bounty that this area has to offer by contributing to these meals. See website localfoodconnection.org 'FAQs' section for food donation questions.

The theme of the 2015 conference is (Re)Thinking Local: Innovation and Sustainability. Our keynote speaker, Standing Stone Brewery, will be speaking about how through innovation and rethinking everything--from where they source their food, how they deal with waste, and their role in the community--they have gotten to where they are today. This Ashland based business has received numerous awards for their commitment to sustainability and for going beyond being just a restaurant and brewery. Come hear their story at this year's Local Food Connection.

Date Monday, February 02, 2015 Time 8:00am to 4:00pm Location Lane Community College Center for Meeting & Learning 19 Gonyea Rd. Eugene, OR 97405 Cost $30/attendee. January 29th - deadline to register To register for this event, click here.

9. U.S. Climate Resilience Toolkit Released In response to input from the State, Local, and Tribal Leaders Task Force on Climate Preparedness and Resilience a partnership of federal agencies has released the U.S. Climate Resilience Toolkit which provides easy-to-use tools, information, and scientific expertise to help communities build resilience to climate-related impacts and extreme events. The toolkit centralizes information from across the federal government to meet the information needs of policymakers at all levels of government, planners, resource managers, businesses, and citizens. To watch a short video overview of the toolkit, click here. The recommendations of the State, Local and Tribal Leaders Task Force on Climate Preparedness and Resilience are summarized here.

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10. Closing The Gender Gap Among Bicyclists PORTLAND — On most mornings, Hau Hagedorn bicycles to work with her husband, riding along with their three boys as they pedal to school.

It’s been a family ritual that began eight years ago when Hagedorn bicycled while her children rode along in a cargo trailer. It wasn’t an easy habit to start.

“I’m pretty petite and it’s quite a load when you’re hauling kids,” says Hagedorn, who lives in North Portland and works downtown. “It was hard at first, but I tried to focus on the health aspect.”

The benefits of bicycling – daily exercise, cost savings and reducing one’s carbon footprint – are just as good for women as they are for men.

And yet as a woman, Hagedorn is in the minority among bike commuters. Nationally, women represent a quarter of bike commuters. Even in bike-friendly Portland, male bicycle commuters outnumber females, 2-to-1.

To access the full story, click here.

11. Funding Opportunities FUNDERS’ NETWORK FOR SMART GROWTH AND LIVABLE COMMUNITIES PARTNERS FOR PLACES is offering grants to cities and counties to improve communities by building partnerships that promote a healthy environment, a strong economy, and well-being of all residents. Local, place-based foundations, public charities created by city or county governments, or partnering nonprofit organizations in the United States and Canada are invited to apply. Deadline: 1/28/2015. Click here to visit the website for details.

THE PRESIDENT’S COMMITTEE ON THE ARTS AND THE HUMANITIES is offering grants through The National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Awards to recognize excellence in after-school and out-of-school arts and humanities programs for underserved children and youth. Deadline: 2/2/2015. Click here for more information and application guidelines.

THE NATIONAL FISH AND WILDLIFE FOUNDATION is offering grants through the Five Star and Urban Waters Restoration Grant Program, to develop community capacity to sustain local natural resources for future generations. Support is provided to local partnerships throughout the United States for wetland, riparian, forest, and coastal habitat restoration; urban wildlife conservation; and stormwater management. Deadline: 2/3/2015. Visit the website here to review application guidelines.

NEA is offering Art Works Grants to nonprofits, units of state or local government, and federally recognized tribal communities or tribes. Objectives: The creation of art that meets the highest standards of excellence, public engagement with diverse and excellent art, lifelong learning in the arts, and the strengthening of communities through the arts. Deadline: 2/19/2015. Click here for application guidelines.

WILLIAM J. & DOROTHY K. O’NEILL FOUNDATION provides capacity building, special projects, and general operations support for family-centered endeavors in the areas of education, health and wellness, self-sufficiency, economic development, housing, arts and culture, and environmental sustainability. Deadline: Letter of Intent by 3/25/2015. Click here for funding guidelines.

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