I'd be glad to. We have extensive experience in all 50 states working with about 1,500 what we call “main street communities” all across the country, which are small commercial areas.
One of the things we find in terms of economic impact for preservation and heritage conservation is that much of the work is in labour cost and in local goods and services as opposed to new construction, where much of the costs are going outside the community. When you're putting money into a building in a local community for rehabilitation, you're putting it into the pocket of the local plasterer or the local plumber, and that benefits the local community.
We have, probably, not as many government programs to encourage rehabilitation in rural areas as I would like, but there have been some rural development grants and the like in the past that we've been able to try to drive toward the reuse and rehabilitation of older buildings. It's certainly an area that is ripe for more study and also more investment by governments.
I'll just mention one final thing. As governments, federal as well as provincial and municipal, think about where they put their offices and where they prioritize their investment, one of the important things that can happen is putting heritage and older buildings first in that queue in terms of looking at where governments can make an investment that really helps their community.