Cook County selected as part of Empowering Small Minnesota Communities program

Cook County has been selected as part of the Empowering Small Minnesota Communities Program through the University of Minnesota.  The program, established in 2023, was funded to help communities of less than 15,000 people with the resources needed to research and advance key infrastructure projects.

Cook County was selected to be part of the Arrowhead region, which includes Aitkin, Carlton, Koochiching, Itasca, Lake, St. Louis, and Pine counties. According to a press release from the University of Minnesota, the university “will research and report on the socioeconomic impact of transportation gaps to accessing health care access in the Arrowhead region.”

The project will focus on non-emergency medical services for people in the region and the challenges of getting routine care.

“Cook County, other counties in the region all have a similar challenge of folks, predominantly in rural communities, getting access to health care at a variety of times, right? It’s not just an emergency room, but maybe dialysis, or maybe just a regular check-in,” said Kyle Shelton, director of the Center for Transportation Studies at the University of Minnesota.

The Arrowhead Regional Development Commission applied to participate in the university’s program and will be the primary partners for the project.

Other Cook County organizations have identified transportation and healthcare challenges, especially for aging adults.  This spring, WTIP spoke to Julie Wilson from Care Partners about a series of listening sessions and community assessments that raised these issues as primary concerns.

“I think the goal would absolutely be to learn from those additional efforts,” Shelton said.  “We’ll be working with ARDC and other partners to identify who are the right people to talk to about this challenge.”

The study will be multifaceted, with the university seeking to hold focus group sessions and review data from regional healthcare providers.

“It’s also a big challenge for coordinating across all of the providers, and so that’s one of the things that we’re going to try to establish, too,” Shelton said.

The program aims to help smaller communities obtain the appropriate information and support when proposing larger projects to local or state governments.

Presentations for the project are estimated to take place in early 2026.

“Most of the projects have been between about three and nine months, depending on the scope and the scale,” Shelton said. “For this particular project, that may move into spring of ’26 by the time they’re ready to share those things.”

WTIP spoke to the University of Minnesota Director of Transportation Studies, Kyle Shelton, about the Empowering Small Minnesota Communities program and the proposed project.  The audio of that conversation can be found below.

Josh Hinke August 14, 2025