OSAGE BEACH, Mo. -- In a conference room of community and business leaders from across the state, the slides kept on coming.

The first was about the "can-do" spirit of Peru, Ill., which had bolted ahead of a bigger town by extending infrastructure to a new highway, resulting in millions in commercial development.

Later came a slide that featured Paducah, Ky., which drew in artisans to a run-down part of town, culminating in $20 million in economic investments that turned the area around.

Finally, a slide appeared on the screen that should have made any Cape Girardeau resident proud -- a picture of a smiling Jay Knudtson surrounded by pictures of the Show Me Center, a revitalized downtown Cape Girardeau, Academic Hall and the Otto and Della Seabaugh Polytechnic Building.

"Mayor Jay Knudtson is doing a wonderful job of taking Cape Girardeau to the next level," said Jack Schultz, who was leading a seminar at a conference Tuesday at the Lake of the Ozarks.

Schultz heaped some praise on Cape Girardeau at the annual conference of the Federal Home Loan Bank, which included hundreds of community leaders and bankers from across the region.

Schultz told the audience that he had included a whole chapter on Cape Girardeau in his 2004 book, "Boom Town USA: The 7 1/2 Keys to Big Success in Small Towns."

The conference was intended to help community and state leaders promote rural America.

Too often, Schultz said, different agencies like the chamber of commerce, city government and universities, let ego get in the way of working together.

"I call it the silo complex," he said. "Most places have a university in one silo, the chamber in another silo and the city in another. But in Cape Girardeau, they smashed the silos and worked together."

Working together on projects like the university's River Campus, the Show Me Center and on revitalizing downtown is the only way that small-town America will make significant strides, he said.

Sam Jones, the regional administrator for the U.S. Small Business Administration Region VII -- which includes Cape Girardeau -- was in the audience. He said he wasn't surprised that Cape Girardeau was mentioned as a successful place.

"The hot bed for economic development is in the Cape Girardeau-Sikeston area," Jones said. "Look at a map: Springfield and Branson have stabilized. They're not increasing. But in your area, things are really happening."

Jones mentioned the ethanol plants as a big example of economic growth in Southeast Missouri.

"It doesn't get any bigger than that right now," he said. During the day Tuesday, there were seminars on Bush's economic legacy and banking issues. Tuesday night, Ben Stein gave what basically amounted to a stand-up routine to the audience. Stein, a political speech writer for President Nixon, also is known for his economics professor role in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" and more recently for his game show "Win Ben Stein's Money."

The two-day conference concludes today with a round-table discussion moderated by A&E's Bill Kurtis. The discussion will be about attracting business to rural areas, and seminars on the community value of the arts and providing tools to help small towns survive in the 20th century.

smoyers@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 137