Innovators in Rural Community Economic Development

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Wealth Creation: A New Framework for Rural Economic and Community Development

A new approach to rural development is emerging. Instead of being about attracting companies that might create jobs over which communities have no control, the emerging paradigm is about connecting the unique underutilized assets of place with market opportunity to grow assets that are owned and controlled by and for the benefit of low-wealth people and places.

Investing for Rural Resilience

Shanna Ratner was a keynote speaker at the Canadian Centre for Rural Creativity 2018 Rural Talks to Rural Conference in Blyth, Ontario in October 2018. The title of her talk was "Investing for Rural…

Chasing the Dream on PBS

Shanna Ratner was featured along with our colleague and friend Jack Salo and others in the September 2018 premiere of Chasing the Dream, a WSKG Public Media (PBS) production looking at issues…

Not My Job: Creeping Customer Exploitation

Are you old enough to remember when it was not your job to pump your own gasoline? If not, let me share the world I grew up in. Gas stations were staffed with gas attendants. Those attendants were real…

Shanna's Recent Watercolor Paintings

Now that I am no longer working full-time, I have time to pursue some of my other interests including watercolor painting. I hope you enjoy these recent works, based on a technique I learned last summer…

International Applications of WealthWorks

Action Aid, an international NGO, has used the Handbook on Gender Sensitive Access to Markets written by Shanna Ratner and Barbara Wyckoff in trainings in Gambia, Rwanda, and Indiia. Stepdown trainings…

A Flexible Framework for Evaluating Community Conservation for Land Trusts

The Land Trust Alliance has just published A Flexible Framework for Evaluating Community Conservation that provides draft goals, indicators, and sample measures of impact for nine common community…

The Kindness of Strangers

I just got back from two weeks in England and Scotland and the thing I will remember most is the kindness of strangers. Not one stranger and not one act of kindness, but many on an almost daily basis.…

A (very) short introduction to wealth and a sustainable economy

Some of you may be interested in this 5 minute Ignite Talk on

Wealth and a Sustainable Economy that I gave at my 45th high

school reunion at Sandy Spring Friends School in Sandy Spring…

New Member of Artist in Residence

I have become a member of a local artists' cooperative called Artist in Residence.

We have a retail store on Main Street in St. Albans, Vermont. This photo is of the recent

installation…

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