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North Dakota is facing an employment crisis: too many people have jobs.

The state’s unemployment rate, 1.1 percent, is the lowest in the nation. Jobs are going unfilled because people don’t want to live in North Dakota as much as, say, Portland’s Pearl District.

Shawn Kessel, the city administrator in Dickinson, N.D., wants to remedy that by bringing the Pearl District to North Dakota.

鈥淲e want to revitalize Dickinson,鈥� Kessel said. 鈥淧art of that success is vibrant downtown. We were looking at the success Portland has had with the Pearl District. We wanted to see what we could do to replicate some of that success here in Dickinson.鈥�

A Portland architecture firm is helping out. Gary Reddick, president of , is using computer-generated imagery to give Dickinson officials some design options and show them what their community might look like with some new downtown buildings. He has already done the same for Minot, N.D., 170 miles away.

鈥淚t’s very cool,鈥� Reddick said. 鈥淲e’ve grown up with it here in Portland. It’s no fantasy, and it’s not make-believe. It’s nothing new to anyone who has worked in an urban context, but it’s very new to people in rural North Dakota.鈥�

Reddick hired a photographer, and gave him precise instructions where to stand to get the right visual perspective on a vacant lot.

鈥淲hat we did here was determine which blocks we wanted and placed a building on it with the computer to make it look like it was actually built,鈥� he said.

Kessel said excitement is running high in Dickinson. There will be a town hall meeting and a charrette next week.

鈥淥bviously, I have some thoughts on what things should look like, but I don’t want this to be my vision,鈥� Kessel said. 鈥淚 want it to be the community’s vision.鈥�

The idea of revitalizing selected parts of North Dakota started when Reddick visited Minot with his friend Steve Larson, the owner of The Hillsboro-based company provides various security products and services. Its board of directors includes Tom Ridge, the former secretary of Homeland Security. Eid Passport has a number of military contracts with installations in North Dakota.

鈥淚 instantly saw the potential in North Dakota and Minot,鈥� Reddick said. 鈥淵ou quickly come face-to-face with the oil rush that is going on in North Dakota.鈥�

The state recently surpassed Alaska and Texas as the nation’s leader in oil production. Nevertheless, North Dakota still has too many jobs and too few inhabitants.

鈥淚t’s starting to affect commerce,鈥� Kessel said. 鈥淲e’re at the opposite side of most of America. We really could use good, qualified workers to join our community.鈥�

Kessel said the problem is not that companies dislike North Dakota.

鈥淭here are companies who want to relocate there, but there is no place for their employees to live,鈥� he said.

To make matters worse, floods last year destroyed 4,500 houses in Minot.

鈥淭hey went from an extreme housing shortage to a housing crisis,鈥� Reddick said.

Nature dealt Dickinson a similar blow.

鈥淲e didn’t have a flood, but we did have a tornado in 2009,鈥� Kessel said. 鈥淲e lost of lot of housing. Some of that was low-income housing.鈥�

In Minot, Reddick started by identifying usable land.

鈥淒owntown parking lots were shovel-ready development sites,鈥� Reddick said. 鈥淲e educated local officials on how they could use this housing shortage to create a renaissance for downtown.鈥�

Most of the lots were much larger than the ones in Portland.

鈥淵ou’re talking about large developments,鈥� Reddick said. 鈥淭hat got everyone excited.鈥�

Armed with Reddick’s proposals, city officials went looking for developers.

鈥淲e added to our team and competed for the work, winning the unanimous vote of the council a little over a year ago,鈥� Reddick said.

There are now six to eight development sites for mixed-use buildings for the town of 50,000 people. One former school playground will become a city park.

City officials in Dickinson heard a few months ago about what was happening in Minot and expressed interest in the same thing for their community of 25,000 people.

鈥淰ibrant, attractive downtowns are important,鈥� Reddick said. 鈥淭hey’re important in convincing young people to stay home rather than move someplace more interesting. They also attract businesses. It’s fun work. There’s a ton of such projects to be done in small communities that really need some kind of jolt.鈥�