Preferences for Economic and Environmental Goals in Rural Community Development in the Western United States

Rural residents in the United States do not always agree on local development priorities, yet understanding and accounting for their preferences is a step towards more effective and equitable community development. We use survey data spanning different types of rural Intermountain West communities to gauge residents' preference weights for economic and environmental rural development goals. Given that community tenure and age are often related to development preferences, respondents are divided into three groups based on these factors using a classification tree approach. Long-term residents (>36 percent of life spent in the community) have the strongest economic preferences, while older newcomers have the strongest environmental preferences. The Leti heterogeneity index reveals that long-term residents also displayed the greatest homogeneity of preferences. Ordered probit analysis shows that goal preferences are also related to sex, education, household income, community financial security, and the share of county income derived from wealth assets. These findings provide a more nuanced and methods-based understanding of residential tenure in a community and its relationship to development attitudes across a variety of rural place types, all valuable information for rural community and economic development practitioners.