America’s Rural Future: Eastern Kentucky site visits highlight locally led recovery, Main Street reinvestment, and civic institutions anchoring a region in transition

Main Street as both economic infrastructure and civic identity

In Hazard, Mayor Donald “Happy” Mobelini of Hazard, Kentucky, and Perry County Judge Executive Scott Alexander described an unusual partnership and collaboration between the city and county that has resulted in a shared vision for revitalization and has included sharing a downtown coordinator and undertaking joint initiatives that have been instrumental in redeveloping Main Street. Between 2018 and 2024, Main Street has added 73 businesses, anchored on each end of town by key adaptive-reuse projects: the site of the Grand Hotel, transformed into an outdoor community gathering space, and the former bus station, now home to ArtStation.

In Manchester, leaders from “1 Clay County” highlighted how an organization that draws on leaders across sectors is able to move creatively and nimbly to drive initiatives and investments that extend beyond local government, pursuing a vision that pairs downtown improvements with river access, outdoor recreation, and tourism-oriented projects to connect the town to statewide tourism routes such as the Kentucky Bourbon Trail and Kentucky Coffee Trail. Both places highlighted the importance of a shared civic identity and participatory civic culture that reshapes narratives and external perceptions.

Flood recovery reveals where federal systems lose pace with rural rebuilding

Eastern Kentucky has been shaped by recent floods. In 2022, a storm classified by the National Weather Service as a 1-in-1000-year event killed dozens of residents and damaged or destroyed thousands of homes, becoming one of the deadliest disasters to hit the region in decades. Commission members met with emergency management and disaster recovery officials who oversaw the response and subsequent recovery. They described what it means to respond when the responders themselves are affected, especially when roads, bridges, and communications systems are down, and some communities are cut off entirely.

The Commission heard a consistent refrain: Federal partners were essential to the immediate response and subsequent recovery, but cumbersome processes regarding reimbursements, assessments, reporting, infrastructure, and buyouts significantly slowed progress. Delays raise serious concerns about long-term consequences for these rural communities. When residents cannot rebuild quickly or find nearby replacement housing, they may leave the region, further weakening local tax bases, workforces, and civic capacity. Speakers stressed that FEMA should remain a central partner, but that any effort to reform should make recovery funds faster, clearer, and more flexible for the rural communities and residents trying to rebuild.

And the power of public-private partnerships was on full display during the Commission’s visit to Chestnut Ridge, a new housing development that will ultimately consist of 200 homes on higher ground. The mix of home sizes, price points, and nonprofit development partners has resulted in a diversity of households and enabled early phases to get built quickly while larger-scale public dollars are assembled to complete later portions of the development, alongside ongoing work to restore bridges, roads, water systems, and other public facilities. These homes illustrate how housing recovery in rural disaster zones is a long-term development strategy, one that helps determine whether displaced residents have a viable way to remain in the region, and the importance of civic infrastructure—such as Craft Philanthropy, FAHE, the Housing Development Alliance, and the Foundation for Appalachian Kentucky—in making it happen.

Building a workforce and recovery infrastructure for what comes next

A major theme throughout the Commission’s visit was that the decline of coal reshaped Eastern Kentucky’s economy in ways that extend beyond the loss of mining jobs. Coal had long supported a broader network of related employment, local revenue, and business activity, and its decline left many communities searching for new sources of job creation and economic stability. That transition has contributed to population loss and made it harder for some communities to attract new employers, particularly where the workforce, infrastructure, and local institutions were built around a much different economic base.

To respond, business leaders, educators, and community officials emphasized the need for clearer education-to-job pipelines that connect students and adult learners with the skills local employers need. Speakers described the importance of aligning postsecondary programs with regional economic development goals, and how local place-based partnerships can align responsive local institutions to help rural communities support their students on the path to opportunity while making the region attractive to prospective employers. Workforce development must work in both directions: Employers need confidence that the region can prepare skilled workers, and residents need to see that education and training lead to real opportunities close to home. The Commission also heard about Opportunity Zones 2.0 and other approaches to stimulate new investment and jobs.

In Manchester, local leaders described how Clay County is working to address the lasting effects of the opioid crisis as part of a broader community renewal strategy. Speakers placed substance-use recovery in the context of economic transition, outmigration, and the availability of local jobs and opportunities, and identified policy gaps that disrupt the consistency of care needed for success.

The Manchester model emphasized that treatment must extend beyond the initial period of sobriety. The approach combined residential treatment, mental health care, staff with lived experience, employment connections, transitional housing, and continued follow-up with graduates and their children. The discussions clarified that effective substance-use recovery in rural communities requires sustained relationships, reliable funding, and coordination across health care, housing, workforce, child welfare, and re-entry systems, especially for people leaving jail or prison who remain at high risk of relapse.

Civic infrastructure as the architecture of opportunity in place

The public panel at Hazard Community and Technical College highlighted how federal programs such as the Promise Neighborhoods and AmeriCorps have supported community development efforts, though panelists noted that more can be done to better tailor programs to rural contexts. Panelists also raised concerns about how implementation of H.R. 1—the budget reconciliation bill enacted in 2025—could affect rural communities through significant changes to Medicaid and SNAP. Appalachian Regional Healthcare was described as one of the region’s largest employers and an economic anchor, while its hospital and clinic network, disaster response work, and a new oncology center are the core infrastructure seeking to improve health outcomes in the region.

A major theme was the importance of stemming “brain drain” and giving young people chances for leadership and opportunities through initiatives such as Hazard’s Civic Fellowship Program and the Craft Academy for Excellence in Science and Mathematics. Audience comments reinforced these themes, raising the importance of STEM and robotics programs, stronger educational pathways, transportation access, and well-paying jobs that make staying or returning home more viable. Together, the panel framed civic infrastructure as the network of schools, health systems, youth programs, employers, and local partnerships that help the younger generation see opportunity in their hometowns.

Looking ahead

During its visit to Eastern Kentucky, the Commission encountered a region working through layered transition while actively shaping what comes next—and reshaping an external narrative that has often painted the region in a negative light. Instead of presenting recovery, revitalization, workforce development, health care, and youth opportunity as separate challenges, local leaders framed them as connected pieces of a broader effort to help residents remain rooted in place. From flood recovery and Main Street revival to employer-aligned training and long-term substance-use recovery, the visit showed how rural viability is built on the strength of local institutions, civic participation, the ability to collaborate across sectors, and an intentional investment in the next-generation leadership.

The Commission observed similarities in themes that emerged during previous visits to North Dakota and Minnesota and the Mississippi Delta—communities with assets, leadership, and ideas, working with federal and financing systems that are too often inaccessible and mismatched with the realities on the ground. As the Commission continues its work, the experiences of Eastern Kentucky will inform its thinking on how federal, state, philanthropic, and local partners can better support communities navigating economic transition, disaster risk, and demographic change. These insights will contribute to the Commission’s final recommendations in 2027.

Coverage from Eastern Kentucky media highlights the Commission’s listening tour

• The Mountain Eagle, May 6, 2026. “Can eastern Kentucky reverse ‘brain drain’? Panel will gather in Hazard to discuss it”
• Hazard Herald, May 6, 2026. “Hazard writing its next chapter on its own terms” (Op-ed by Tony Pipa and Luke Glaser)
• WYMT-TV, May 12, 2026. Steve Hensley, “Issues and Answers – Brookings-AEI Commission on U.S. Rural Prosperity”
• WYMT-TV, May 13, 2026. Neeley Greene, “Bipartisan commission holds hearing in Hazard on rural issues”
• WEKU, NPR for Central and Eastern Kentucky, May 14, 2026. “Think tank groups discuss rural communities, youth opportunity in Hazard”