Cohort 2023

Phoenix Youth and Family Services

Bridging the Gap in Local Data Collection and Transparency in Rural Communities

Ashley, Bradley, Chicot, Desha, and Drew Counties, AR

Ashley, Bradley, Chicot, Desha, and Drew Counties in Arkansas are composed mostly of rural communities with populations of fewer than 10,000 people. Roughly 30 percent of people in the region identify as Black, nearly twice the statewide average. Black households in these counties, on average, tend to have significantly lower median household incomes than the state median household income. Further, whereas these five counties only make up 2 percent of the state’s population, Federal Bureau of Investigation statistics indicate that in 2020, convictions in these counties made up 6 percent of convictions in the state. It is important to implement local community-led solutions to address issues like high rates of legal system involvement, but data for rural communities are often aggregated into larger areas, which can mask racial and ethnic disparities.

With Catalyst Grant funding, Phoenix Youth and Family Services, a nonprofit dedicated to advancing social, economic, and community development for impoverished rural residents, will partner with FHI 360’s National Institute for Work and Learning to create more robust data-collection tools and engaging visualizations of local policing and prosecution data. The two organizations will leverage administrative data (e.g., on arrests and incarceration) and will hold qualitative information–gathering sessions to create a logic model that details risk factors for legal system involvement and prevention/intervention strategies, as well as a publicly available community resource map for people impacted by legal system involvement. This effort will make data more transparent locally. The organizations will also provide access to the data and create easily accessible and digestible reports for community members. The goal is to promote conversations in the community and develop solutions for rural communities that are often overlooked in data collection.