Steve Smith and Rich and Lois Peterson at Rural TeleCon '99 in Colorado

Since 1984, EIII has been devoted to strengthening their own corner of rural America - Southwest Nebraska and Northeastern Colorado. Their efforts have focused on three areas --Education, Environment, Economic Development (the 3 Es).

One of the goals of the MIRA initiative is to enable community organizations to strengthen themselves, which would in turn equip them to help the community. To the members of EIII, that meant bringing new people into the organization, developing an organizational plan, becoming more proactive, and raising awareness of the organization in the community.

Jennifer Smith relaxing during a MIRA workshop break

One of the main concerns of the community is stemming the tide of youth who want to live elsewhere, and encouraging the return of those that do leave for college or other training. Over the past decade the average age of residents in the area has been steadily increasing as people in their 20s and 30s move to other areas. EIII set out to determine why this was occurring and what could be done to encourage youth to stay. In it's 1999 survey of 400 local high school graduates from 1975 to 1998, EIII gained some valuable insights into why people leave (water controls, high taxes, looking for better employment opportunities) and why others stay (good place to raise a family, community atmosphere, natural setting).

MIRA also enabled EIII to continue and/or expand on some of its current initiatives. By purchasing additional computer equipment, they were able to assist local business with their strategic planning, and to provide computer consulting to both students and businesses.

Public awareness of EIII continues to grow. The organization has recently received another grant that provides computers and high-speed internet access to needy households in the area.