Community Facilities

Brandon, South Dakota, with a population of about 9,000, has seen significant growth in the last decade, including the area of senior care. There are two assisted living communities in Brandon, but there has never been a nursing home. This has put strain on both the patients and their families...

While the shovels may have all been painted gold, they weren’t just bought off the shelf; some were used, donated, came in different sizes, and had different uses. It was a metaphor for the day as community members from the small community of Parmelee, South Dakota, located on the Rosebud Indian...

Cross posted from the Department of Education blog: It’s no secret that community colleges are leading the way to achieving the President’s goal for the United States to once again have the highest college attainment rate in the world by 2020. Community colleges are hubs for career-training, re...

As more Americans strive to be eco-friendly and environmentally conscious, the buzz surrounding renewable energy has exploded. Millions across the country already do their part every day to recycle, reduce carbon emissions and make the earth a little bit greener, but how can you do more? Rural...

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack met face-to-face last week with about 40 farmers, ranchers and producers from Iowa and Nebraska impacted by flooding along the Missouri River. The Secretary promised the group he would stay until every question had been answered and every concerned voiced – and he...

Recently I attended a presentation and groundbreaking near Midland, Michigan, for a unique USDA Rural Development Community Facilities project: A residential treatment center for the Ten Sixteen Recovery Network. This is an unusual type of project for our agency. Our community facility projects tend...

Energy savings was the theme for the Earth Day event held with Garfield County in Burwell, Nebraska in April. Rural residents gathered at the Garfield County Library with USDA Rural Development Nebraska State Director Maxine Moul and staff. Garfield County was presented with a plaque from Rural...

If you’ve ever remodeled an existing home, you can appreciate this problem. Sometimes things just get complicated. The Kenai Peninsula Food Bank in Alaska needed to grow. The original 9,000 square foot building, constructed in 1997, no longer met the needs of the area, so an expansion was undertaken...

It’s dark and damp November, Vermont’s least welcoming month. The brilliance of autumn is gone and the dazzle of snow is still around the corner. Brattleboro is no different than most other communities in Vermont, or just across the river in New Hampshire, where people are worried about jobs, paying...

Jefferson County in Mississippi, a rural county with a population of almost 10,000, was the site of an event last week commemorating a USDA Rural Development Community Facilities grant and loan combination that will bring a modern, state-of-the-art library to that county.