In this research, it is posited that perceptions of the quality of services and facilities in small towns are dependent on the social organization of those places. Two components of this social organization are the social capital that inheres among individuals and the civic structure of the town. This hypothesis is tested using multi‐level models that combine individual‐level social capital and community‐level civic structure to explain variations among 99 rural towns in Iowa. I find that civic structure contributes positively and significantly to effects between communities, while individual‐level social capital is positive and a significant contributor to effects within communities. The civic structure models explain 32 percent of the variance in perceptions of the quality of core public facilities and services and 43 percent of the variance in secondary public‐private services. The strong contributions of individual social capital and civic structure suggest that investments in the micro and macro social structure of small towns can assist in strengthening perceptions of community infrastructure.
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