Become a Hometown Pride Community
How to bring Hometown Pride to your community
Is your town grappling with challenges such as population decline, neglected spaces, or leadership burnout? Keep Iowa Beautiful invites communities like yours to reach out to us about joining our Hometown Pride program, a proven initiative designed to revitalize and strengthen local communities.
Hometown Pride, a Keep Iowa Beautiful initiative, has already empowered 118 Iowa towns. With the help of thousands of volunteers, Hometown Pride communities have completed over 1,500 projects, raising millions of dollars for community betterment.
New communities are added regularly, as spots become available. If you are interested in bringing Hometown Pride to your area, please fill out the form below.
Transform Your Town with Hometown Pride
Hometown Pride empowers your community to:
- Cultivate Local Leadership: Develop a new generation of leaders passionate about the well-being of your town.
- Enhance Community Amenities: Create and improve local facilities and spaces that contribute to a vibrant and attractive community.
- Foster Civic Pride: Cultivate a sense of belonging and pride among residents.
- Boost Economic Vitality: Improved leadership, amenities and pride will make your community more attractive and supportive for businesses.
- Increase Collaboration: Building partnerships between local government, non-profit organizations and businesses to implement change
Participating towns are provided with five years of funding toward employing a professional “community coach,” who will work with a committee of 5-10 resident volunteers to run a successful community improvement program in each town. Hometown Pride works with your existing organizations and initiatives to achieve shared community goals.
Participants join as a group of 7-10 towns in one region, and provide a 25% match toward the cost. Each town works with their coach to complete projects for their community, and on average each town will complete 15-20 projects and raise $200,000 (or more) over 5 years (multiply that by 8 or 9 towns to see a regional impact of hundreds of projects and millions of dollars). Projects include things like new park amenities, clean-up events, public art, festivals, fundraising, leadership programs, trails, welcome signs, and more.
How to Join Hometown Pride
Please review our readiness checklist to better understand what we’re looking for in prospective participants, and the benefits of the program. We add new communities as space becomes available.
If you’d like to learn more, fill out the form below and we will be in touch.
Guidelines for Joining:
- Joining as a Group: New communities are added in groups of 6-10 towns within a county or adjacent counties. However, each town works independently to achieve their unique goals.
- Strong Community Support: Joining Hometown Pride requires robust support from community leaders across multiple towns within a geographic area. Review our readiness checklist for guidance on how to build and show support.
Connect with Us
Reach out to Keep Iowa Beautiful Associate Director Lorin Ditzler at [email protected] to discuss your interest in joining Hometown Pride or fill out the form below.
Be part of the movement and take the first step towards transforming your community. Join Hometown Pride and let’s build a brighter future together!
A Hometown Pride Success Story
When Delmar (pop: 542) joined Hometown Pride, no new businesses or amenities had been added to the community in 20 years. Community leaders were motivated to make a change, but unsure how.
Delmar Hometown Pride started off with a bang, raising more than $100,000 to build a long-awaited community amenity: a splash pad.
Their speedy success served as an immediate catalyst for economic renewal in Delmar. After seeing the community’s ability to come together and support change, local entrepreneurs and builders gained confidence in the town, and over the next few years Delmar saw 5 new businesses and a total of $2 million in construction.
Delmar Hometown Pride went on to lead renovations of the historic rail depot, restoration of a historic mural, construction of a disc golf course and more. Read the full Delmar story in this article by CityScape magazine.
Hometown Pride – I want to know more!
Want to know more about Hometown Pride? Submit your information below and we will reach out to you soon.
