Community Capitals Documentation

Author

DSPG Group: Capitals

Published

July 24, 2024

Capitals Project Description

This is a Quarto book used to document the work completed in the DSPG 2024 year for the Community Capitals project.

Project Sponsor / Collaborator: ISU Community and Economic Development

  • Bailey Hanson
  • Jennifer Drinkwater

DSPG Team Lead: Matthew Voss

DSPG Graduate Fellow: Solomon Eshun

DSPG Interns: Lily Christenson, Manjul Balayar, Nhat (Chris) Le

Overview

In our project, we seek to explore the relationship between community capital indicators and the overall condition of communities in Iowa, aiming to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and gaps within these communities. The main work focuses on major events such as natural disasters, job losses, new job creation, school closures, and new opportunities for tourism and healthcare. The study seeks to identify the most relevant community capitals, trends over time, and the impact on community resiliency, by analyzing correlations between various indicators and comparing quantitative data with some qualitative insights.

That aside, we also seek to develop a comprehensive database of significant events, using sources such as the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN), Iowa Economic Development Authority Board minutes, and weather disaster summaries. The Data analysis will include exploring relationships within and between different community capitals, and visualizing findings using dashboards created in Shiny or Tableau. The overall goal is to provide a tool for stakeholders to better understand and enhance community resiliency and quality of life.

Project Description

Project Summary

What do the community capital indicators tell us about a community? Community strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, gaps, etc.

How well do the identified indicators tell us about the condition of a community in relationship to the community capitals?

Project Scope

  • Database of major events in Iowa communities (natural disasters, plant closings/major job loss, new plant opening/jobs created, school closures/school district mergers, closure of state-run hospitals and nursing care facilities, new opportunities for tourism – music festival, bike trails, recreation, etc., opening of new hospitals/care facilities)

  • Data analysis:

    • Correlations between indicators – including relationship of indicators within and between capitals as well as with different peer groupings (population, RUCC)
    • Trends and change over time.
    • Comparison to qualitative data and use as – visioning, RHRA, small towns poll.
    • Which three capitals are most related (ex: if interested in built capital – which two others might be most relevant to understanding built?)

  • Dashboard – tableau

  • Resiliency fit into capitals.