USDA Rural Development more than just agriculture
When United States Department of Agriculture Rural Development Director Kenneth Corn visited the Poteau Kiwanis Club’s weekly meeting Thursday afternoon at Western Sizzlin, he wanted to make it known that the agency he heads up deals with more than just agriculture.
“When people hear USDA, you automatically think farms, cows, meat inspectors, (meat) processing plants,” said Corn, a former state legislator. “USDA is a very broad agency. In fact, it’s the third-largest federal agency. It touches every aspect of American life. When you think about what happens in rural America, everything good that happens in this country comes from rural America. Our values a lot of times comes from rural communities. Our energy resources comes from rural America. Our water resources typically begin in rural America. A lot of innovation comes from rural America. The fact that it (rural America) has been left behind has created issues for the quality of life and economic prosperity as we move forward.”
Corn, who was in Poteau last week being the keynote speaker at the Poteau Chamber of Commerce’s Lunch and Learn in which he presented both the LeFlore County Hospital Authority and the City of Heavener grants through some of the USDA Rural Development Agency’s programs, told the Kiwanis Club members Thursday afternoon that President Joe Biden is not wanting to see rural America get forgotten.
“The president asked me to really focus on making sure rural Oklahoma wasn’t left behind,” he said. “He is concerned that rural America has been left behind. The reality is rural America has been left behind. In the last 20 to 30 years, it doesn’t matter which (presidential) administration it’s been, rural American has been the afterthought. So, President Biden has said that he wants us to make sure that we’re putting all our federal resources that we can in helping local communities, particularly in rural parts of our country, to get them the resources they need. So, it’s an historic time because of what Congress has working with the president to make investments through ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act), through the Bi-Partisan Infrastructure Law and through the USDA programs.
“I met with a lot of western (United States) governors in Idaho, and one of the things we talked about was the need for us to really focus investments where things are happening in rural America are used to create wealth in rural America. So often, what happens is the commodity we have in these communities and the resources here (in rural America) are extracted from here and gone to Oklahoma City or Tulsa or Kansas City or Los Angeles. Those commodities create wealth there, but taking them from these (rural) communities are not generating wealth (for them). Our goal is to try help these rural communities make the investments that are necessary so they can create sustained, generational wealth for people who live in rural America.”
Corn said USDA Rural Development has many functions.
“The USDA is really divided up into a lot of entities,” he said. “I have Rural Development. Rural Development is specifically is focused on basically community and economic development. So, we deal with several areas. One is rural housing. We focus on trying to get people into decent, safe, affordable housing. We have programs for single families. We have a program for our senior citizens that they can get help through us, either through a grant or a lowinterest loan, to repair homes. Most people don’t know it’s out there.
“Another thing we do is community programs, such as water and waste water. That’s a real focus for us right now. If you go anywhere across Oklahoma, you will find out that most of these communities have like 100-year-old water systems that have had very little maintenance done on them. In fact, many places across the state, you will find some of the resources that they’re using at water plants and waste-water plants are WPA (Works Progress Administration) built and designed systems. Now, that’s a testament to the people at WPA of the craftsmanship they had, but they’ve outlived their usefulness and doesn’t meet the standards of today that we need to provide clean and safe drinking water.
“Another thing is we do community development as far as community facilities. We can assist with things for public safety, fire trucks and police cars. We can assist with community centers, nutrition centers, roads and bridges — anything that is an essential part of infrastructure for a community to help it economically or improve the quality of life. The exception is we don’t do recreational things, but I say that there are always exceptions. There are ways sometimes to get around that. Semantics are important.
“Another thing we focus on, we focus on rural utilities. After the ice storm that came through here two years ago, we really discovered that our electrical infrastructure in this country is not very good. That is one of the areas we focus on with Rural Development is helping communities strengthen its electrical grid. Also, broadband is extremely important, especially after the pandemic. We learned the necessary access to broadband for educational purposes and business purposes was essential.
“We have programs that help rural business. If you’re a rural community, we have both sub-grant programs and some cointerest loan guaranteed programs to help build economic activity for small businesses. There are really all sorts of opportunity here. Most people don’t know about Rural Development. In fact, as I go across the state, when I mention Rural Development, most people give me the blank stare. They have never heard of it. It’s really part of the old Farm and Home Administration — it’s just been split up. I always like to tell people the U.S. Department of Agriculture is really the people’s department. When it was started by President Lincoln, the country was primarily rural, but now we’re more urban. Still, the aspects of the Department of Agriculture does is important whether you live in Oklahoma City or Poteau, it has still has its important functions. We’re busy out making sure people know these programs are available.”
The former local legislator said this new job is allowing him to keep following his passion — public service.
“Public service has always been what my life’s ambition has been,” Corn said. “I try to do it in a fashion that brought credit to people I serve. It was always a real honor and pleasure to serve the people of LeFlore and Sequoyah counties in the Oklahoma Legislature. I also tried to bring progress to the areas I served. So, the last seven years, I’ve continued doing public service, but it was as city manager of the City of Anadarko. It was quite challenging. There are issues all across Oklahoma, so when President (Joe) Biden asked me to take on this role (as Rural Development Director) in Oklahoma I thought I was uniquely qualified to do that for having been a state legislator and having been a city manager to know what issues are out there in rural communities — and there are many. It was an opportunity for me to get back into public service where I can serve all across Oklahoma and address what I think are some of the equities that we find throughout the state — and how we can make progress in economic development that are important for the quality of life in rural Oklahoma.”
For additional information, call the USDA Rural Development State Office at (405) 742-1070, the business programs office at (405) 742-1060, the community programs office at (580) 889-2554, Ext. 116, the multi-family housing programs at (800) 292-8293 or the single family housing program at (580) 540-3944.