How Small Towns Can Not Just Survive But Thrive

In the early nineties, I was asked by the National Civic League to speak to a delegation of the interim government of Kazakhstan about  group decision-making.* I gave my spiel, emphasizing basic techniques for including meaningful public involvement early and often, and achieving group consensus around controversial and complex projects. Then I said, “Any questions?”  The group was very quiet and one man finally raised his hand shyly and asked, “But what do you do when people disagree with each other?”  Unfortunately, I got their real problem only at that moment. These folks had grown up in a society that suppressed and punished individual wisdom. I had grown up assuming a basic right to have an opinion different from my government. My presentation was irrelevant to their needs.

Many of us are disappointed in our government. I am not immune from being angry at my government representatives from time to time. However, as Winston Churchill observed, “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.”  We are human beings and as such, when we work together - it isn’t easy.  We make mistakes, make imperfect decisions, and offend others.  However, if we keep at it, and practice respect and openness, we can wind our way through problems and make better communities and become stronger.

In the early nineties, the Western Slope began to experience rapid growth and change. Not only was the population growing, a different demographic of people moved into small mountain towns. Those that had grown up in those towns saw their values ignored and what they loved about their communities trampled. Tom Baker (now the Town Manager of New Castle, CO) and I began to talk about our concern that there was more to navigating successful growth and change besides zoning and regulation. People and values also needed to be attended to.

We convened a group of experts** and decided that instead of listening to speeches, we would ask hard questions about change and allow the experts to grapple with the unknown future through dialogue.  From that dialogue emerged these shared observations about what small towns can do well and can practice to move through change without breaking up the unique values and qualities of their cherished communities. These are the principles that guide how I approach civil service and community management. I am far from perfect, but having some guiding principles helps me focus on what’s important and lasting.

Behaving Our Way Into New Ways of Thinking

 1.  It’s Up to Us.
If we decide there is no hope for a future, then we have no responsibility to the future. We are not just cogs in the wheel. We can find new ways to work together and meet new challenges.

2. Reclaim Your Power
“We are all part of a huge family.  Within the family, our acts of caring, insignificant as they may seem, are nevertheless an integral part of a vast network of compassionate acts that are occurring throughout the universe at each moment.  Just as billions of tiny acts of ignorance, greed, violence, and exploitation have created most of the suffering and breakdown that now exist, so the billions of tiny actions of compassion – which include wisdom and skillful means of joy – preserve and heal the situation.” – Ram Dass

3. Pay Attention to Intention
“A real ‘new world order’ is not a question of economic of political adjustment, but a realignment of our motivation.” – the Dalai Lama


4.  No Quick Fixes
“There is the question of whether we have time enough to engage in something as messy as collaboration.  We believe things are happening so fast that we’re better off sticking with the more tried and true – often more confrontational – ways of addressing things.  Because if we don’t, we might run out of time.  We have exactly as much time as there is. There is no point in worrying about how much time there is, because there is just that much.  When people hear this, they say, “Well, you’re just a total determinist. What is it that the people of Missoula pay you for anyway? To just watch things happen?” But I have come to the conclusion that there is a certain way of being frantic that we have adopted that serves us very ill, and there is a certain way of being with what’s going on that would serve us better.”  - Daniel Kemmis

5. Co-Operate
Manipulation and control are no longer effective ways to solve problems.  If leaders don’t behave with integrity, people lose trust.  Important issues go underground, where they fester and re-emerge to damage important work.  The control paradigm views the world as good guys and bad guys, winners and losers, saviors and savages – all in competition for power. 
If we choose to behave in new ways, we can forge a better world. We can begin to work cooperatively. We can be flexible and creative. We can include ALL affected community members in the decision-making process. We can share leadership. When we honor different opinions and needs, better solutions present themselves.  When all community members participate in building their future, positive change is possible.

6.  Be a Mensch.
“A mensch is not just a human being, but a humane being.  Without being a Pollyanna, these people manage to be positive, optimistic, and generous in their thoughts and deeds towards others.  They definitely leave the world better than they found it.
·         They don’t interrupt.
·         They take turns.
·         They don’t take advantage of people who are down.
·         They are gracious in victory.
·         They are noble in defeat.
·         They are consummately fair.
·         They have integrity.
·         They are the people you want to grow up to be like.
·         They are the kind of person you want your sister (or brother or child) to marry.
·         They are the kind of person you’ll cherish, if you’re lucky enough to have one in your life.
- Mark Goulston, MD

7.  Widen the Circle
We are inter-dependent and our decisions affect those outside our own neighborhoods, organization and governments.  It isn’t always easy, but we must work together. While acknowledging our diversity, we can work collaboratively with respect. Where there is a choice, choose to be inclusive.

8. Focus on Right Relationship
“We will succeed only to the point we learn to work well with one another, to depend on each other and embed ourselves in community for the long haul.” –Margo Adair

9. Find Power in Diversity
We practice tolerance of differences. We ask for help. We give help when needed. These are hard choices by today’s cultural standards. Our choices are often based on fear for our security. When our attention is focused on living well with our neighbors, the paradox is that we may end up happier than when we spend our energy trying to cull out those we find offensive.

10. Learn from Success
“One of our greatest failures as community builders is not learning from success. We spend way too much time on what didn’t work and don’t spend enough time on what does work.  What will take us in successful directions in the future is the successful direction of the past.  That’s part of the history that we ought to value and share.“ – Milan Wall

11. Choose the Open Door
“I think we have two ways of looking at the things we face – one is through a sense of threat and fear, and the other is through a sense of healing. If we paid more attention to what we are building in small pockets, and how that can grow out from itself, we would do better than when we try to force things all at once.”  - Daniel Kemmis

12.  Celebrate the Journey
“We are going to at least have at take the little successes and string them together and start making the necklace for the headpiece to go on. People have to feel that they can see some small successes for their time and effort, or they’re not going to keep putting the kids in day care and coming to meetings.” -  Rachel Richards, currently Pitkin County Commissioner

13. Commit to the Long Haul
“Let me tell you the secret that has led to my goal. My strength lies solely in my tenacity.”  - Louis Pasteur

13.  Deliver New Leadership
“Rather than imposing onto the system, a midwife allows the system to move in its own ways. She doesn’t push, but accepts. The midwife is prepared to take more active steps, but only when they become essential. She represents a safe place into which new life may emerge.  She holds new life with awe and reverence, and claims no credit for its miraculous arrival, satisfied to have been present for the journey.”  - Janet Quinn, PhD.

15. Leave Room for Grace
“Grace is such prolific concept that no single understanding can exhaust its meaning. But surely some part of grace has to do with a manner of acting in the world that is striking appropriate to time and place… Such acts are supremely human; they only occur when we bring our very best human traits to bear upon the situation at hand. But such moments always evoke as well an unmistakable element of givenness, of something at least in part beyond our control.”  - Daniel Kemmis

Many big city folks look down on small towns as unsophisticated. That’s not my observation.  In small towns, you can’t afford not to work together and you can’t rely on experts and professionals to do it for you. You have to learn to do it yourself and do it well.  Small towns have much to teach the world about inter-dependence and building successful and fulfilling communities.

* There were many professionals to choose from, but because I have been active in the faith-based campaign against nuclear testing and nuclear weapons, I was also able to give them an update on where the US was with testing and weapons production which is a primary interest in Kazakhstan – the location of the Soviet Union’s nuclear weapons testing facility.

** Daniel Kemmis, Director of the Center for the Rocky Mountain West; Ed and Betsey Marston, High Country News; Milan Wall, Co-Director of the Heartland Center for Leadership Development; Raye Ringholz, Author of Little Town Blues; Jim Lochhead, water attorney and Director of the  Colorado Department of Natural Resources; Rachel Richards, currently Pitkin County Commissioner and former Mayor of Aspen; Jim Hooker, former Mayor of Snowmass Village; the late Ted O’Leary, former Mayor of Glenwood Springs among others.