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BURNS — Community strength builds from the diversity of its members. High Desert Partnership in Burns has found its niche in the growing field of collaborative work, bringing many different voices together for a shared vision of success.

High Desert Partnership Board member Fred Flippence became involved with the volunteer-led organization in February of 2009 when it applied for its first grant to support group meetings.

“The hardest part in developing the partnership, when you are applying for grants or trying to get people to contribute, is to convince them to pay you to get people together to talk,” he said.

But “talking” is where problems are identified and solutions found.

“We try, in most collaborative processes, to make sure we don’t go in with a predetermined outcome and we make sure all stakeholders are invited and encouraged to be a part of the process,” Flippence said.

Flippence’s primary involvement is through Biz Harney Opportunity, the collaborative focused on business development. He said Oregon Community Foundation’s early involvement helped leverage support from other funder organizations, like the Ford Family Foundation and the M. J. Murdock Charitable Trust, to pay for staff.

Brenda Smith, executive director of High Desert Partnership, said OCF’s initial investment in 2013 allowed the organization to hire an executive director and build out its mission.

“The board worked a lot of years without funding, making connections and building relationships with private landowners, the Forest Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the BLM,” she said. “I feel like it was a spark from OCF that sent us down this road.”

The High Desert Partnership doesn’t just talk about problems and come up with solutions, they find funding to make projects happen. Currently, through a partnership with the Burns Paiute Tribe, Biz Harney Opportunity is providing business training to tribal members. 

Tracy Kennedy, the Burns Paiute Tribe planning and economic development director, noted the absence of tribal voices earlier in the development of the partnership.

“I am a firm believer in rural communities and the tribe is a beneficial member. We needed to work together,” she said. “Brenda was the key to reaching out to the tribe and making me feel like I was welcome at the meetings.”

When Kennedy joined Biz Harney Opportunity she said it wasn’t long before she realized it made sense for the tribe to join efforts with the collaborative.

“We decided, ‘Let’s work together to get funding for our small businesses,’ and for the last three years we’ve done that,” she said. “Once you get into funding agreements and relationships are built, you are tied at the hip.”

Grants pay for culturally and market-relevant classes, like a 10-week course about starting a business and instruction in managing credit, saving for retirement and Individual Development Accounts. 

The partnership extends even beyond the boundaries of Harney County. Kennedy said members of the Warm Springs Community Action Team staff travel to Burns and provide the training.

Kennedy said legal service is also available to tribal members setting up businesses through Lewis and Clark College’s small business law school.

“It’s the first time we’ve been able to support our small business entrepreneurs,” she said. “Ranchers grow up in the environment of the family-run business, but that is not true for tribes. Some of our people selling their wares door to door don’t think of themselves as owning a business, so the partnership with High Desert is planting seeds.”

To provide a marketplace for its artisans, the tribe recently received a grant to renovate a 7,500 square-foot building into a culture center and business incubator. 

“A lot of people are coming home and want it to be better,” Kennedy said. “Several businesses have had facelifts, our downtown continues to flourish, and the tribe wants to be a part of that change in order to expose its businesses and art.”

The genesis of Harney County’s economic pipeline is its schools where High Desert Partnership is lending a hand to existing career learning opportunities. Smith said after conducting one-on-one interviews with a variety of community members it was obvious that supporting youth was on everyone’s minds.

“Our ‘Youth Changing Community’ collaborative has been focused on this career connection lane for a while, and after the feedback, we decided we wanted to enhance and create opportunity for youth,” she said.

Recent OCF funding helped shift High Desert Partnership’s relationships with schools, allowing time for its staff to build relationships with teachers and administrators, youth and employers. Smith credited Denise Rose, the youth collaborative’s coordinator, for building credibility.

Rose has a teaching degree, worked in human resources and recruiting and, before coming to High Desert Partnership, worked in economic development for Harney County. She had the experience and the networking necessary for this newly formed youth focused collaborative.

During the height of COVID-19 restrictions, Rose said the youth collaborative rolled out a new internship program when school was online and students were having difficulty getting elective credits.

“We offered work experience for school credit and supplied the administrative piece for the school and we could connect the businesses to the parents and the students,” she said.

To help kick start students’ imaginations about future careers, High Desert Partnership arranges speakers for Burns’ eighth-grade career class and hosts a career fair at the Harney County Fairgrounds for high school students. During this year’s Burns High School Highlander Days registration, Rose said she had a table with information about the internship program. 

“Moms came with the kids to pay fees and saw the booth and said, ‘You need job experience, go sign up,’” she said.

In the fall of 2022, High Desert Partnership celebrated career education with a youth summit at an historic, downtown location. Through question and answer sessions and breakout groups, Rose said participants shared lot of valuable information.

“The summit did something crucial to our program,” she said. “We got feedback from locals, industry experts and regional organizations that helped direct where we are going the next couple of years.”