[URBAN NOTE] "McAdam, New Brunswick and the struggle of small communities"

[rfmcdonald]

Looking at the small New Brusnwick village of McAdam, Spacing's Hassan Arif noted this August past how difficult economic adaptation is for these small towns.

Many small towns, communities, and rural areas face challenges with the decline of traditional industries such as forestry. Often, economic development arguments are less about “growth” than about stemming the decline. For many towns and communities a fundamental self-reinvention is in order.

These were the themes of a consultant’s report done pro bono for the town of Millinocket in Maine which had been hit by decline and mill closure. This report – actually a 9-page open letter – gained much attention in local media in Maine with the Portland Press Herald proclaiming that “All Maine is Millonocket.”

Among the recommendations in the report was a call for a greater emphasis on placemaking, beautification, and promotion of the historic town centre while also promoting its proximity to natural environments (including Baxter State Park and Mount Khatadin). Such a strategy would be aimed to attract tourism and potential new residents.

With the decline of extraction sectors such as mining and forestry “cheap land and disregard for consequences” was no longer an adequate strategy.