Meadowlark Project Provokes Conversation

The Meadowlark Project brought its sweet song to Madison last night. The meeting, hosted by St. John's Lutheran Church and led by Meadowlark staff member Jerry Nagel from Fargo and Lab Team member Joe Bartmann from the Rural Learning Center in Howard, drew twelve local residents, including the Madville Times and a relatively well-behaved Madville Times Junior (she obviously wanted to help take notes, as she kept grabbing Dad's pen -- too bad she can't even make words with her mouth yet, let alone her mouth!).

As noted on these pages previously, the press didn't give a very clear roadmap of exactly what was meant to come of this meeting, whether we were gathering to form a club or an action plan or what. That confusion may have arisen from the fac that the Meadowlark Project is doing something different. We generally look for the creation of committees and specific actions as the gauges of whether anything is getting done (although this writer holds that the number of committees in a given area is inversely proportional to the amount of work getting done). The Meadowlark Project is not dedicated to creating branch offices or timelines for action. In their planned 60 public meetings in six months, they are simply promoting community conversations about issues that folks in this region maybe don't sufficiently discuss. Just sitting and talking can be bothersome to the good German-Norwegian-Lutheran stock of the upper Midwest; we usually prefer action to words. But as the scenarios discussed in the meeting pointed out, charging ahead with action without taking time to converse about the ideas and values informing our actions can lead to troubles. The Meadowlark Project wants us to have those conversations.

As a starting point for conversation, the project uses four scenarios about the future of the upper Midwest. None of the scenarios are completely apocalyptic or utopian; they actually elements of both types to portray relatively realistic directions our future could take (as realistic as any "What if..." story that attempts to guess what South Dakota will look like in 2050).

Among the points we discussed last night:

1. Growth: Noting that two of the scenarios used population growth as an indicator of success (or population decline as failure), this editor asked if there comes a point where we have to cap our expansion, where we stop seeking new industries and residents because we have maxed out our resources. In response, Bethel Home president Jim Iverson pointed out that the city did say no to a big industry a few years ago that would have overtaxed the city's wastewater treatment system. Madison doesn't say no very often to big business and economic growth, but it has happened.
   
2. Conservation: Linda Salmonson, Economic Development Manager at East River Electric, noted that much of the talk about future planning fails to take a serious look at conservation. Iverson agreed that people around here complain about energy availability -- and energy availability figured importantly in each scenario -- but still drive around in their SUVs. He cited an acquaintance who drove all the way to Brookings just to get beef for the grill, even when we have a fine meat locker, Jack's Cold Storage, right here in town.
3. Diversity: Folks in Madison often don't think about diversity. A growing Hispanic population still lives mostly under the radar, unconnected to community institutions, despite a prominent new Mexican restaurant, El Vaquero. The Lakota, Nakota, and Dakota are perhaps the fastest growing and youngest segment of South Dakota's population, yet we haven't had serious conversations about reconciliation since the Mickelson administration. Community leaders here seem to think they can just ignore questions of diversity and minority issues, but the conversations last night pointed toward the idea that we will have to embrace diversity to draw the people we'll need to sustain our population and work force as the baby boomers die off. Nagel pointed out that Manitoba actively recruits immigrants from around the world to replace their out-migrating rural populations and keep rural communities alive.
   
4. Technology: One of the scenarios portrays a world in which technology has created two very distinct classes of haves and have-nots. Dr. Douglas Knowlton, president of DSU, noted that technology is an essential part of the future picture. Indeed, the scenario presented the suggestion that information infrastructure ought to viewed and funded the same as traditional transportation infrastructure. Remember the old "information superhighway" talk? In the old economy, we needed to be able to transport the key goods -- ag products, manufactured goods, even workers -- as efficiently as possible. In the knowledge economy, we need to be able to transport the new currency of the realm, information, as efficiently and as broadly as possible. Maybe we need to include provisions in our highway spending bills that require parity in new roads and new information links, a mile of fiber-optic cable (or a square mile of wireless coverage) for every mile of concrete.
   

Again, no committees were formed, no actions taken. We just had a good conversation... and that's where good ideas and sound policies come from.