RURAL AMERICA: A Call For Change

There has been a lot of talk in our politics lately about the ‘rural-urban divide.’ While there are cultural wedge issues at play that should be part of our conversation, there are areas where we should be able to find agreement and demand our government’s attention. Real challenges, caused by decades of budget cuts and policies that have disproportionately hurt rural and poor communities. 

To that end, we wanted to look past wedge issues, labels, parties, and red vs blue and take a deep dive into rural America. Examine the unique challenges these communities face and what kinds of legislative priorities could offer progress. We asked one of our favorite rural activists – Carolyn Darrow, Virginia Rural Moms to weigh in on the rural reality and what voters should be pressing their representatives to talk about and work together to solve.

Rural America: A Call For Change

 – Carolyn Darrow, Community Organizer and Activist in rural Virginia 

I often joke that no one moves to our county for the good jobs and great schools. In fact, local jobs are limited, no matter your education level. The largest employers are the school system and the hospital. Our teachers are currently protesting stagnant wages and crumbling, unsafe schools, generation-owned family farms are struggling to make ends meet, and while some on social media and even in our own statehouse and in Washington want to focus on wedge issues that further divide ...what rural America really needs is a candid debate about how government can address the needs of our communities.

Access to Healthcare

My rural county is lucky to have a local health center still operating, that provides good middle-class tech and admin jobs. More than half of rural counties don’t have a hospital, and 45% don’t have obstetric facilities. 

Most rural areas (and several close to my home) have far more limited healthcare options. No one wants to drive an hour to a small hospital only to go bankrupt when you get there. If you have to be transferred to a larger hospital, you have additional expenses and it will be harder for your family to visit and advocate for you. Many rural folks will fight not to be airlifted anywhere. And as caregiving largely falls on women within families, travel and time off have the largest effect on their financial and emotional lives. 

Rural women are less likely to be screened and more likely to be diagnosed with breast cancer at a later stage. Women will get their kids to doctors’ appointments, but then don’t have time off left to get the care they need for themselves. Sadly, this care extends to prenatal, directly impacting high maternal morbidity rates in Virginia.

The United States is one of only 13 countries in the world in which the rate of maternal mortality continues to be worse than it was 30 years ago. Since 2016, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, black women in Virginia died as a result of childbirth at three times the rate of white women, with at least two-thirds of these deaths being preventable. 

And, mental health resources are even more scarce in rural America. Even if your insurance will cover it, an appointment with a therapist or psychiatrist may be more than an hours’ drive away, and the soonest available will be 4-6 weeks out. When your child, spouse, or yourself is having a crisis, this barrier to care is real and affecting the health and safety of our communities. 

Americans living in rural areas experience far higher rates of firearm suicide than those living in urban areas. The average firearm suicide rate increases as counties become more rural, and the rate of firearm suicide in the most rural counties is 58 percent higher than in the most urban. Most gun-owning Americans think their firearms make them safer.  The reality is that access to a firearm increases the risk of suicide for all people in the household. 

Job Shortage & The Broadband Disadvantage

The jobs available in a small rural county are limited to retail, services, start your own business and farming. Like most rural areas, there is a lot of competition for few openings. People who have a job stay in that job and young adults typically move away after college and start their own life in the suburbs. Rural internet access would make a huge difference in the quality of jobs we could have and the ability of our educated young adults to stay at home, by being able to either telecommute or possibly start businesses of their own (if only they also had access to capital and/or affordable health coverage).

Family Farms, Affordable Housing & Our Changing Landscape 

For generations, the backbone of small towns like mine has been the family farm. The matriarchs and patriarchs of these longtime working farms are the ones that keep the church going, organize the potlucks and bake sales, check on neighbors, and often work long into retirement to make ends meet. 

But, we’re unable to care for these stewards of our way of life as they have cared for us. Safe and affordable housing is limited, especially for the elderly. Many in our aging population are unable to age in place. Their children have moved away to pursue careers, often forcing our aging parents & farmers to move near to their children to be cared for, away from all their social structures and the place they love and are committed to. 

When our elderly farmers pass away or their farms pass into bankruptcy, often their children have no real options but to sell the property for development. Rural internet might not immediately seem a solution to this loss of landscape – but reliable internet would let breadwinners work remotely so that they could keep their high paying job closer to urban centers and their health insurance - and keep their farmland intact. 

Building Bridges

Looking over the many policy challenges outlined above, you might wonder why anyone would want to live in rural America. Truthfully, as all of these pressures and current political tensions drive our communities further into defensiveness and divisiveness, I find I’m asking myself that question a lot now too. 

But, while the divisive voices often seem the loudest, there are many of us here quietly working to build bridges and create positive change.

Regardless of where we fall on the political spectrum, we all share a deep sense of place. We love where we live. The smell of hay in the summer giving way to pumpkin patches and apple orchards of fall, to the cold, snowy anticipation of Advent. Cities and suburbs have their wonders too, but they don’t seem to be vanishing as quickly as ours. 

My hope is that leaders will emerge that can bring us together - and move us forward in solving the problems that have stymied our ability to thrive. I welcome campaigns that focus our attention on the real challenges facing rural America, political platforms that speak to them and a track record of legislative solutions that will make our lives better ...vs wedge issue politics that prevents progress and deepens divisions. 

At the end of the day, we are neighbors, friends that share the same fears, the same challenges and the same aspirations for better. If we can focus on common goals we just might be able to work together to bring needed change and elect leaders that are willing to fight for all of us. 

We deserve that, let’s start voting for it.