This special edition of Reimagine Rural features Tony Pipa interviewing Tom Halverson, CEO of CoBank and a member of America's Rural Future: The Brookings-AEI Commission on Rural Prosperity. Halverson reflects on the commission's visits and public hearings in North Dakota and Minnesota, emphasizing the diversity of rural places and important trends regarding rural youth, agriculture, innovation, and the need for holistic, bipartisan rural policy reform.

Episode transcript and show notes.

Reimagine Rural is part of the Brookings Podcast Network. Subscribe and listen wherever you listen to podcasts. Send feedback to podcasts@brookings.edu.

A former mill town once defined by economic decline, Skowhegan, Maine, is thriving again through creativity and collaboration. From a growing regional food hub and a major riverfront revitalization effort to new housing and early education projects, residents are proving that rural communities can innovate, adapt, and build a vibrant future rooted in heritage and shared vision.

Also see Tony Pipa's interview with Scott Andes, senior advisor for economic development and professor of the practice at Carnegie Mellon University, to discover how federal investments can help distressed rural areas achieve long-term prosperity.

Episode transcript and show notes.

Reimagine Rural is part of the Brookings Podcast Network. Subscribe and listen wherever you listen to podcasts. Send feedback to podcasts@brookings.edu.

Since the 1990s, Beardstown, Illinois — official population 5,800 — has experienced steady immigration due to the meatpacking industry, breathing new life into this once declining town. Now a multicultural community with residents from over 30 countries, newcomers have integrated throughout neighborhoods, revitalized storefronts, and enriched local schools. In this episode, Tony Pipa explores how this small Midwestern town has learned to embrace change and built a vibrant downtown, and how policy changes and the national narrative about immigration are affecting this rural place.

See Tony's interview with Rachel Perić of Welcoming America to explore what rapid demographic change means for small-town life.

Episode transcript and show notes.

Reimagine Rural is part of the Brookings Podcast Network. Subscribe and listen wherever you listen to podcasts. Send feedback to podcasts@brookings.edu.