Commentary; Posted: 7/16/03

Uís Extension Division has served well

Loss of state aid to the Extension Division of the University of Minnesota and to Minnesota counties is threatening some popular programs, including 4-H clubs and Master Gardeners.

Anytime a major program dealing with the development of boys and girls is under siege, community leaders must listen and take action.

The Extension Division which has a $60 million budget for this year, must cut $2.5 million in expenses. Federal funds have been flat at $10.5 million, state funds are $26 million, grants are $6.8 million and fees and sales bring in $2.5 million.

Because state funds have been cut by 15 percent and funds from each respective county are uncertain, the extension program in Minnesota is being downsized into 15 or 20 regional offices housing the extension specialists who will be serving three or four counties.

Meanwhile, county officials, who have been spending their dollars for complete extension programs, requested and received more flexibility on deciding what programs they wanted and were willing to pay for in their counties. A listening process is under way to see what programs counties should house at the county level.

Each county has its advisory committee to the county commissioners. What it decides and recommends will be critical to how much of the program commissioners will fund with county dollars.

The most visible program in extension is 4-H which has 160,000 members in development programs. There are 27,000 in 4-H clubs.

Master Gardeners number 2000 and 45,000 people are learning about nutrition. This does not include the thousands who receive special information and advice on questions.

The programs of extension are youth development, family living, agriculture, natural resources and community vitality.

In extension, educators from the University do research, guide the programs, such as 4-H and provide information to solve problems. While it serves the agricultural communities, it also is active in the suburban and outer-ring communities.

At the same time these extension educators feed information back to the University about the needs in the communities they serve, all part of being a land grant University.

This pending regionalization is significant because it will house staff in a regional office, serving three to four counties, which removes it from the grass roots. If counties choose not to have county offices for extension educators, the services will have to come from a regional office, and programs, such as 4-H will suffer.

Some argue that extension has lost its relevance because initially it served the agricultural community. Today in this age of corporate farming, there are fewer farms and farm families to serve.

While that may be true, extension educators have done a good job of setting up programs for families in the Metropolitan Area, where the need is different but just as serious.

Those who favor a strong 4-H, Master Gardener and teaching nutrition in poverty areas and assisting the vast farming industry had better pay attention to this regionalization of services.

They should insist that the county board of commissioners keep local offices operating at the county level where historically theyíve served a real need. ó Don Heinzman

Top of Page