Rural poverty causes implementation of P.L. 94-142, The Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975, to be uniquely different from urban implementation. Rural areas may try to emulate urban policies, where it is possible to identify and group severely handicapped children for appropriate services, but in rural areas the availability of specialists and classroom space influences policymaking. This paper reexamines the theory of street-level bureaucracy as it pertains to implementing P.L. 94-142 in rural areas. The theory of "street-level" bureaucracy concerns the interaction between policy implementor and the target of policy, with a focus on the implementor's procedural actions and decisions. The theory, originally applied to urban contexts, is extended in this paper to rural contexts. The paper considers the relationship of rural poverty and street-level (or "country road" -level) bureaucracy as they affect special education policy for students with severe disabilities. This paper applies the literature in systems theory and social policy to data and analyses from a previous field study. Emerging theoretical propositions imply that the recipient of the policy is actually the policymaker and developer and that the "country road"-level bureaucrat's response to policy has a negative effect both for systems and implementation. This paper contains 47 references. (ALL)