From extraction to regeneration: place-based development in Appalachia with Steven Baumgartner

Описание: For decades, communities across Appalachia have watched jobs disappear, resources drain, and local wealth flow outward. But in Morganton, North Carolina, a nonprofit called The Industrial Commons (https://www.theindustrialcommons.org/) has been quietly rewriting that story — building cooperative businesses, training workers, and keeping wealth rooted in place through circular textile manufacturing and community-owned enterprise.


In this episode, host Kate Gasparro sits down with Steven Baumgartner (https://www.baumgartneruss.com/who) , founder of Baumgartner Urban Systems Strategy (BUSS) (https://www.baumgartneruss.com/) , to explore how place-based, values-driven urban development can transform even the most disinvested communities. Drawing on two decades of experience at global firms, Steven brings a systems thinker's lens to one of the most compelling sustainable city development stories in the country.


Together, Kate and Steven unpack what it really means to translate a mission into a place, why decentralized sustainable infrastructure outperforms the heavy systems we've relied on for generations, and how the circular economy model pioneered by The Industrial Commons offers a replicable blueprint for equitable, regenerative development.


Resources:


This Southern Appalachian town uses co-ops to build new communities around old industries (resilience) (https://www.resilience.org/stories/20...)


An Appalachian Model for Regenerating Place-Based, Community Wealth (Next City) (https://nextcity.org/features/an-appa...)


How Corporate Greed Keep Appalachia Underdeveloped (Columbia Political Review) (https://www.cpreview.org/articles/202...)


New industries, new jobs needed to boost Burke economy (The Paper) (https://www.thepaper.media/news/burke...)


The Industrial Commons breaks ground on transformative Innovation Campus (eTextile Communications) (https://www.etextilecommunications.co...)


The loss of manufacturing once devastated Morganton. Now, it's witnessing a revival (The Charlotte Observer) (https://www.charlotteobserver.com/new...)


Send a text (https://www.buzzsprout.com/twilio/tex...)


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