GOVERNANCE

Goal:

The Importance Of The Governance Pillar

During the pandemic, local governments became the source of information for most residents and businesses. Not only were they coordinating testing, tracing, and developing quarantining guidelines in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, but they also continued to provide basic services to their communities. While governments were dealing with the constantly changing dynamics of the pandemic, they were also addressing infrastructure, maintenance, and other essential services. The pandemic highlighted the need for governments to increase their capacity to be able to shift with a constantly changing disaster while continuing to provide the day-to-day essential services. The pandemic also brought to light the following reasons why the region needs to improve its governance policies and capacities.

• Like the rest of the nation, the IND15RPC region saw many different initiatives at different levels happening within the region. Many of the initiatives had similar goals and outcomes but involved different jurisdictions or people.

• It was clear that local governments played an important role in disseminating information during the pandemic. However, information was changing daily and was coming from multiple sources. The pandemic exposed the need for a central location to hold information that was convenient and easy for businesses and residents to access rather than through multiple sources.

• Funding opportunities always come from multiple sources including local, regional, state, and federal governments. During the pandemic, there were more businesses and people needing access to these funds, many of whom were not familiar with the different sources or processes who needed to obtain the funding. Creating a central location to document and track the different funding sources available would lessen the stress for businesses and residents looking to access the funds.

• The IND15RPC overlaps several other regions including the Southwestern Indiana Development Council, Indiana First Region, and Indiana Uplands Region. Within its service area, it also contains numerous school districts, the Southern Indiana Gateway, several workforce development organizations, economic development organizations, and tourism organizations and groups. It is important to support those partnerships through shared data and pooled resources. Through the development of a regional coalition of local leaders, the region can work together to focus on the development and promotion of regional projects while addressing local issues.

• Local Economic Development Organizations (LEDOs) are the first point of contact within the region and support their communities in many ways beyond just economic development. They are often stretched beyond their capacity with their work to increase local funding and connect organizations and people within their community. When a community loses its LEDO, a large vacuum is created. Supporting the LEDOs and creating a wider network as well as sharing their information and data with a wider group will leverage their knowledge as well as bring more assistance to help support them with their primary function of economic development.

• Many governments struggled to maintain services and infrastructure when resources were diverted to local emergency management officials, health departments and emergency responders. In addition, more services directly related to the pandemic were being provided by local governments (testing, tracing, etc.). Many governments faced uncertainty about future funding from state and federal sources and made cuts to their budgets to account for anticipated reduced revenues into their budgets. Additionally, many communities anticipate it will take several years for their budgets to recover from the pandemic. This created challenges to governments with budgets that were already straining to complete the necessary maintenance and repairs. Rural communities will have to be more creative in how they attract businesses and talent with a constrained budget.

• The capacity for local planning in each community is different across the region. Part of this is due to the allowance of planning and zoning in the community, staffing, and budgets. To see growth in population and businesses there are certain expectations by homeowners, builders, and developers. This includes having entitlements in place already, having access to utilities and infrastructure, knowing what to expect with planning and zoning and the time it takes to get approval, and knowing that they have a voice at the planning meetings.

• When a pandemic or disaster happens, it is important for a community to have a plan for how resiliency and recovery are achieved. Providing consistent responses, sharing information, and creating a shared vision of the path forward will create the best conditions for a faster recovery.