The Department of Commerce web site has posted an announcement for the Governor’s Rural Community Summit.  The meeting will be held next week on August 26-27 at the Ramkota Hotel in Bismarck, North Dakota.

Ed Schafer, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture (who, incidentally, hails from North Dakota) has been invited to speak.  Confirmed speakers include Under Secretary for Rural Develpment Thomas C. Dorr and Jack Schultz, author of Boomtown USA: The 7 1/2 Keys to Big Success in Small Towns.

I believe the purpose of this summit will be to promote ideas that small towns can use to increase business, draw people into their communities and develop a strong local economy that can network and strengthen the entire state.