| Resources Communities Program Collaborative
(NC)
Location and Context
With staff support from The Conservation Fund, the Resourceful Communities
Program works in North Carolina's most distressed rural communities, especially
the eastern shore and the Sandhills regions in eastern North Carolina, including
the Cape Fear, Neuse, Tar-Pamlico, Roanoke and Pasquotank river basins,
which comprise over 70% of North Carolina's poorest counties. These counties,
and the rural communities which comprise them, are rich with natural resources
of land, forests and water, but lack the economic capital to preserve and
nurture these resources for the benefit and enjoyment of low-wealth coomunities
who have historically worked and owned these natural assets.
Collaborative Structure and Strategy
The RCP Collaborative is a functional alliance of partners working to advance
community-based efforts to create new economies that protect, enhance and
restore natural, cultural and historic resources. While addressing racial,
social and economic issues, and broadening the base of leadership and power,
these communities are working together to build resourceful communities
through empowering local citizens and leaders to develop new, more inclusive
leadership structures and, by doing so, to develop new community-based models
for preservation of the history, culture and resources and advancement of
natural resource-based economic development. RCPC is blending conservation,
community development and poverty alleviation to help underserved communities
"build back better" in the wake of devastating floods from Hurricane Floyd
and to help create revenue-sharing models of eco-tourism development and
community-based forestry in many of North Carolina's poorest counties and
communities.
Leverage and Impact
The RCP Collaborative employs conservation and community development tools
to help maintain healthy and intact ecosystems, while promoting organizational,
youth and entrepreneurial development, and establishment of new diverse
and inclusive community leadership. In a decade of work in North Carolina,
RCP Collaborative has leveraged more than $70 million in public, philanthropic
and private investments in partner communities; and helped establish local
and regional organizations that are creating economies based on heritage-
and eco-tourism, small businesses, and sustainable forestry and agriculture.
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