Twentieth International Conference on Diversity in Organizations, Communities & Nations

Abstract

Rural residents in general have higher demands on social services, while the services they receive are limited. Utilizing existing community town halls and resources became highly significant to improve accessibility of social services of populations living in rural area. Three cases of community town halls were analyzed from 465 cases (298 cases from news articles, 167 cases selected as the successful cases from Rural Areas Information Service (RAISE) statistics). After reviewing 10 cases, finally 3 cases have been selected for the analysis. Findings indicate that successful social service hub appeared to 1) provide a variety of services in specified geographic area 2) focus on local problems 3) resident-centered community 4) help individuals gain skills 5) work on behalf of residents that are subject to marginalization. More attention on utilizations of the existing community town halls is needed to increase the accessibility of social services and quality in rural area