America’s Family Community

Rexburg, Idaho is one of the 397 agurbs® that I identified in my book. I visited it on Thursday while I was touring several communities in Eastern Idaho. I was impressed with what I saw.

Rexburg is an example of a town that has literally had to rebuild itself. In 1976 the Teton Dam, a Corps of Engineers dam, burst because of a design flaw, hurdling 19 miles of water thru the Upper Snake River Valley. Word was quickly spread thru the valley, allowing people to scramble to higher ground. Rexburg was covered with 5 feet of water within hours. Eleven people died in the disaster. But Rexburg and the other communities hit by the flood didn’t give up, rebuilding their towns back, one building at a time.

Rexburg, which has grown from 15,791 in 1999 to 22,000 in 2004, is undergoing a real boom. Three years ago a small two-year college was converted to BYU—Idaho, several local manufacturing companies are expanding, and the wonderful quality of life is attracting many to move to Rexburg and the region.

Several call centers have located in Rexburg because of BYU—Idaho. Not only are there 10,000+ students, but there are 70 different languages spoken by these students. This language proficiency is a tremendous benefit derived from the two year missions of young people from the Church of Latter Day Saints, more commonly known as Mormons. This language base will become more important as we become a more global economy. I’d bet that several local entrepreneurial companies will result from this language advantage.

I visited AMET, a local manufacturer that started in Rexburg in 1990. They have doubled their employment in the past year as their business has continued to grow with the introduction of a new product line. They build specialized “state of the art” automatic welding systems. Their systems have been purchased by Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Ford, Caterpillar, GE, General Dynamics and many other companies. Their equipment is used to build the space shuttles’ external fuel tanks. Don Schwemmer and Dave Stompro started the company in Dave’s basement.

Rexburg is like most of the agurbs® that I’ve gotten to visit in the past year. It is a friendly, dynamic “town on the move”. And I love its motto, which is “America’s Family Community.”