Custer, South Dakota · Population 2,043
Building the future of America in small-town heartlands.
SAR | Tour Guide who can't write code. Building emergency systems for his county sheriff with AI. Building the tech republic for blue-collar America.
0
Lines of code written by hand
6
Political AI terminals deployed
15
Acres, debt-free, built by hand
1
Founder. No investors. No team.
Deployed Systems
Operational intelligence for communities that got left behind.
Emergency Evacuation System
Digital rapidTAG for the Custer County Sheriff. 13 ICS evacuation statuses. QR registration. Real-time command dashboard. Built during active wildfire season.
Political Intelligence Terminals
AI-powered campaign intelligence for a Governor, US Congressman, Attorney General, and 3 gubernatorial candidates. War chest tracking. Opponent mapping. Voter sentiment.
Grow Campus
15 acres in Custer, SD. Built by hand with a tractor. The first AI campus for rural America. A nonprofit lab where veterans and blue-collar workers learn to build with AI.
The Builder
Paraguayan orphan. Raised 15 minutes from the Pentagon. 11 years federal gov tech. NYSE IPO. Left it all.
40,000 miles in a van studying dying towns. Became a tour guide in the Black Hills. Became a SAR Captain. Became a Wilderness First Responder. Bought 15 acres of raw land and built a homestead with a tractor and his own two hands.
Then watched his town start dying. Median age 57.6. Population 2,043. More funerals than births.
Six months ago he didn't know what a terminal was. Zero code. Zero CS degree. Just a trackpad and AI. Today: live emergency systems for his county sheriff, political intelligence for elected officials, and a campus taking shape in the shadow of Mount Rushmore.
Luke Alvarez
Founder, Black Hills Consortium
Nobody is coming to save small-town America.
So one first responder with AI is proving any town can do it.
luke@blackhillsconsortium.com