For nearly five years, the Ford Foundation and Rural Development Initiatives have been helping change the face of community leadership in Sweet Home and east Linn County.

One of more than 80 programs in different regions throughout Oregon and Siskiyou County, Calif. supported by those oranizations, a third class of community leaders has spent weekends over the past month in seminars and workshops learning techniques for effective leadership and organization.
ogram is investing in rural communities to build a sustainable training program for leadership, said Jo Ann McQueary, a local coordinator for the program. The first class, which included McQueary, was held five years ago. The members of that class, called the first “cohort,” taught the second, who in turn have been teaching the third.

The years in between the classes, the program returned with programs called “Effective Organization” and “Community Collaborations.”
Once the program is complete, the leaders can continue the training programs, McQueary said. “I see the value of it everywhere I go in east Linn County. I’ve seen it effective elsewhere. It causes lots of changes. What we’re looking for is community vitality.”

The training is built around the development of an actual project, applying what they learn as they move through the classes, McQueary said. During the four-weekend course, participants are learning about conflict resolution and how different types of people view and handle the conflicts that arise among projects.

The first cohort’s project was putting up address signs along roadways in east Linn County. The current group is planning to repair and improve the Foster Lake Trail, which has suffered a lack of maintenance since much of the path on the north side of the lake was completed a decade ago.

The project is funded by a $5,000 match from the Ford Foundation. The Sweet Home Economic Development Group is offering up to another $5,000 match to dollars raised by the group, for a total project value of up to $15,000.

McQueary, a community services specialist with Linn County Sheriff’s Office, has seen the benefit of those skills and more in her work around Linn County with a variety of different groups, some relating directly to law enforcement and others relating to community vitality functions.

It has helped her be more effective in the work she does for the Sheriff’s Office and other groups, she said, helping her understand other people, preferences, styles, differences and more.

“I think it’s the fact that you really understand, on a small grassroots effort, you can get it done, and you’re not the little engine that could,” said Jolene Watson, manager of the Lebanon branch of Umpqua Bank. “You’re the one that did.”

Watson is member of the second cohort and is helping run the third cohort’s classes, which finishes with classes on May 14 and May 15.

“I’m learning a lot about myself, the skills I have and how to better use them,” said David Kem, a Sweet Home resident and rodeo volunteer. He believed he was a competitive person, but he found out different, particularly through the Meiers-Briggs personality profiling process, learning he is more of a compassionate, cooperative sort of person.

He said it’s helping him understand how to fit in group building and putting a team together. Building a group and getting the trail finished is how Kem’s class will graduate.

“It’s the first class I’ve been to in my life I wasn’t trying to fall asleep the next day,” Kem said.

The class is “great,” said local farmer Jan Nielson.

“I got nominated by someone to take it. I knew some people that were in it that said I should take it.”

Nielson is the president of the Sweet Home Farmer’s Market board.

“This class is to help you develop skills for working in groups,” Nielson said, and she’s been working with a lot of groups lately.

Working with large groups can be tricky, she said, and that was demonstrated as the class of 30 from a wide variety of backgrounds tried to pick a project. Using the skills they learned, they finally settled on the lake trail.

It’s not about what gets picked but rather how the project gets done, Nielson said. Once the class completes this project, its members will be able to do it again with new tools for forming groups and writing grants.

Through the class, she has learned more about how people communicate and different types of personalities better, she said.
“It was just a big thing for me,” she said. “I think sometimes people are snobs, and it turns out they’re introverts.”