The subject of this news article attended RCAP's annual fly-in in February in Washington, D.C., an organized week of visits by RCAP staff and board members of RCAP's regional partners to representatives on Capitol Hill.
From the Port Clinton (Ohio) News Herald:
Written by CATHARINE HADLEY
March 10, 2011
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The director of the local United Way chapter recently spent a week in the nation's capital, meeting with legislative officials.
During the last week of February, Chris Galvin promoted the goals of the Rural Community Assistance Partnership.
"I am on the board of WSOS, and WSOS is the grantee for RCAP," Galvin said. "They administer the program and do water and sewer projects in small communities in seven states. WSOS is the grantee in what's called the Great Lakes Region."
According to Galvin, local communities can leverage federal funding for infrastructure projects.
"They also train water treatment workers," Galvin said. "People in this area have gotten jobs in water treatment facilities as a result of RCAP.
"The RCAP project last year did a conference, a two-day conference, for small communities to learn about federal resources that are available to them, from the Department of Agriculture, from the Environmental Protection Agency."
She said some federal officials seemed enthusiastic about holding the "Small Towns, Big Futures" conference each year.
Local city officials also enjoyed the conference, Galvin said.
"They all had a really favorable impression. They learned a lot at that conference," she said. "They're also fans of the work that RCAP does."
While she was in Washington, other parts of the world were in the throes of political turmoil.
"Personally, for me, when we were moving from one Senate building to another, or one House building to another ... I'm really impressed with how accessible legislative government is, because we weren't the only group in Washington making calls on elected representatives," Galvin said.
"There were demonstrations going on in Egypt and Tunisia, where people wanted democracy, and I was living democracy," she said.