The trouble is that modern agriculture is good at producing wealth but not at creating new employment, because automation from farm to store has been so effective.  The success of agriculture does breed jobs in other sectors, mostly retail, food service and accommodations.  But it is not employment that can sustain a prosperous middle class.

 

The People Vote “No”

Seeking another path to prosperity, Mitchell in 1997 put to public vote a project to issue bonds and create a municipally-owned broadband network to deliver the triple play of tele­phone, Internet and television.  It was the brainchild of one of the city’s two institutions of higher learning, the Mitchell Technical Institute.  The business community was heavily in favor.  But the public, fearing high costs, voted down the initiative. 

 

The failed vote looked like the end of the story , but it turned out to be the beginning of a new chapter.  It is a surprising thing, but when a municipality demonstrates real hell-for-leather resolve to bring broadband to its citizens and businesses, it has a way of changing the investment equation for the private sector.  The cable television company found that – while an old coaxial cable network had seemed appropriate for the Mitchell market before the vote – that same market now justified an investment in opti­cal fiber.  The incumbent telephone company put Mitchell on its list of communities to receive a wireless upgrade to 4G service. 

           

Focus 2020

The Mitchell Technical Institute (MTI), whose vision had sparked the vote, built a Technology Center to serve students and the community.  It attracted the attention of competitive local exchange carriers in the region as a place to house their equipment.  MTI applied for and won a grant to build a Network Operations Center (NOC) in the Tech­nology Center as a service platform for private-sector carriers.  It was not long before a competitive local exchange carrier (CLEC) won a low-interest loan from the Rural Utilities Service of the US Department of Agriculture and began constructing an end-to-end fiber-to-the-home network.

 

On this foundation, institutions, business and govern­ment have collaborated intensively to drive economic devel­opment.  As part of a strategic plan called Focus 2020, they work cooperatively to promote digital literacy and supply the highly trained workforce in increasing demand by area businesses. 

 

The school district launched a 1:1 laptop program for secondary school students and a pilot program in “mass customization” of learning, which aims to give students edu­cation appropriate to their individual abilities.  It opened a Career and Technical Education Center in partnership with MTI and Mitchell’s Dakota Wesleyan University to equip secondary school and MTI students with the skills in greatest local demand: agriculture, health care, energy, construction and communications. 

 

Two hospitals merged to create Mitchell’s largest employer, which draws staff from the combined 100+ gradu­ates leaving Dakota Wesleyan and MTI each year.  The broad­band build-outs have led to the formation of three new engineering, consulting and software companies that employ more than 500 professionals and technicians, with two new start-ups being incubated by the community. With new tech-centered office properties rising and hundreds of citizen volunteers engaged in promoting its vision, Mitchell is leading a rural renaissance that turns the disruptive forces of the modern global economy to its advantage.