Tag: rural

By Sue Grafstrom, CRPD board member How does a small rural community respond to a global pandemic? My name is Sue Grafstrom, and that’s the question I have to answer. For the past two years I have been concurrently the Roseau County Emergency Manager and the Minnesota Department of Health’s Public Health Preparedness Consultant for ...

By Marnie Werner We’ve been hearing the stories in the last two weeks about rural hospitals, the lack of intensive care unit beds, and questions as to whether they’re prepared or not for the COVID-19 outbreak at our doorstep. So we decided to go to an expert, CRPD board member Santo Cruz, who is also ...

By Kelly Asche As more tests are being given, indications are that the spread of the coronavirus causing the COVID-19 disease is occurring throughout all of Minnesota, including in rural places. A recent analysis has even indicated that rural recreational counties in some states have become a hotbed of the virus in the United States. The ...

By Marnie Werner During these days of social distancing and #StayHomeMN, just going to the grocery store can be a daunting task for many among us. But as COVID-19 spreads, communities are also concerned about how to help people who can’t or shouldn’t go out, people who may already be sick and recovering at home, ...

By Kelly Asche & Marnie Werner Not only is having a connection to the internet important on a normal day, but during times like this, when everyone is suddenly expected to work and learn from home, the traffic suddenly goes up many fold, taxing even the best of systems. That’s why it’s important to keep ...

By Marnie Werner & Kelly Asche In the movies, you can always tell who the “red shirt” is—the guy brought along by the hero and his or her gang for the sole purpose of being the dinosaur’s first victim. He’s the happy-go-lucky guy who scoffs as they peer into the creepy dark cave and says ...

By Kelly Asche, Research Associate I still remember the moment my wife and I decided to move out of the Twin Cities and back to rural Minnesota. We were sitting at the same St. Paul bar we had been frequenting for years, discussing what we wanted in life. And we realized that that’s what we ...

By Marnie Werner, Vice President, Research & Operations (Note: The links in this post are not affiliate links. No one at the Center makes any money if you click on them.) When I saw it was my turn to write the blog post this week and that the assignment was “Why do I live here?” ...

  We asked the all-important question, “What is rural?” The first in our new set of videos on rural issues and research provides the answer!