… governors recognize there’s a huge disconnect between the nation’s superstar cities and rural areas left wondering when the recession’s going to end. Governors of states including Iowa, Kansas, North Carolina and Pennsylvania have started programs to bolster rural economies…
Rural America is too vast and varied to paint with a single brush. Many rural areas are thriving. Still, it’s clear that overall, the rural economy is falling far behind major metropolitan counties.
…
In Kansas, Gov. Laura Kelly has created an Office of Rural Prosperity. The effort is beginning with a listening tour of rural areas, led by Lt. Gov. Rogers and featuring several cabinet officials. The tour has already hit 28 cities in eight regions, with two more stops planned this week.
Rogers says that broadband and housing always come up, along with complaints about cuts to state services. “We closed a lot of agencies in rural Kansas, so they have to call Topeka,” he says. “Rural Kansas probably got hit harder than our urban areas did for the last eight years.”
(Read more: GOVERNING)