In Ohio’s poorest county, about 50 people met a few days before Thanksgiving to discuss what would make their community a good place for everyone to be happy and live fulfilled lives. The conversation was a stark reminder of both the resiliency of Ohioans in the face of hardship, and their belief that happiness isn’t going to come from outside the community.
The conversation, held in Athens, was facilitated by Your Voice Ohio and sponsored by local news media, the Ohio Debate Commission and Ohio University. It was the 13th in a series of Your Voice Ohio pre-election conversations designed to help journalists better understand the issues people want addressed to improve life in their communities.
Journalists from five different news organizations, the Athens News, Athens Messenger, Meigs Independent Press, Vinton County Courier and WOUB public radio, sat with people to discuss what they know and hope for the community and reflected afterward on what they heard.
Residents shared stories of small-town poverty, where there is no internet or cable, preventing access to news and personal services. One journalist shared a story of a small town that had lost its laundromat. Some residents were too poor to buy their own washing machine. If they had a car, they had to drive more than 20 minutes to find a laundromat.
Yet, people celebrated an infrastructure of individuals and organizations who are doing good work. Residents said the area is naturally beautiful and has a good presence of higher education. While there was a sense of tension between the university community and the rest of the county, they cited Ohio University and Hocking College as assets.
Athens represented a theme that has emerged in Your Voice Ohio conversations: Basic needs aren’t being met and people struggling with those needs feel disrespected. Common concerns are a lack of adequate resources, economic opportunity, safe and affordable housing, adequate and equitable education and healthy food.
Among the changes that Athens participants said would be most effective at making the community a better place were:
- Improve the economy by encouraging and supporting small business.
- More funding and resources to implement change.
- Safer/affordable housing
- Infrastructure
- Improve attitudes and community
How they defined those challenges reflected the nuances found across Ohio. Infrastructure, for example was defined as making Athens County look like a place where people want to live. Action plans included personal mentoring, helping people stay in and maintain their homes, provide broadband access, assist struggling villages, have a positive solutions-focused attitude, give voice to people.
Ohio Debate Commission leadership participated in the event and expressed interest in a partnership that would help include voices of Ohioans in the debate process.
A more complete report will be available in the next few days.
Ever since President Johnson declared war on poverty in the 1960’s there have been millions of dollars invested in SE Ohio. Why are we still, economically speaking, the poorest in the State? Has the economic development needle moved any in comparison to the rest of the State? Are we in a state of learned helplessness? I am a life-long resident of Athens County. It is hard for me to believe that we haven’t been moving forward.
Linda:
That’s a good question, and I am sure there are many factors for Athens County’s economic struggle.
For one, I heard people talk about inadequate public education — inadequate because the state still requires communities to ante up sufficient funds, and in an area with high poverty, the schools can never offer the services and programs you might find in suburban Columbus. Education is a key factor in improving one’s quality of life.
But there are many other factors. As we heard in the community meeting, if people are struggling with basic needs of food, shelter and transportation, it’s hard to meanwhile improve the quality of life.
To help us examine the counties, the Your Voice Ohio project hired former Akron Beacon Journal reporter David Knox to assemble a comprehensive data base for all 88. If you want to look at the various measures and how Athens compares, Knox keeps the updated data here: https://sites.google.com/paladinreports.com/ohio-jobs-project/home
I took a look and found some interesting figures. The Median Household Income for Athens County has always compared poorly with the state and the nation. Job growth has been steady in the county, but not for the goods-producing sector. That would be mining and manufacturing — often the highest-paying jobs. More than 30 percent of those jobs have been lost since the days of LBJ. In 1960, Athens had the 12th-highest poverty rate. Coincidentally, at the same time goods-producing jobs took a dive in the 1960-70s, the poverty rate shot up.
Doug Oplinger, Your Voice Ohio
Linda:
It appears that Athens County posted its highest number of jobs in the last two years, mostly due to growth in the service sector. Does that follow the opening of the new expressway all the way to Columbus?
Perhaps a change is in the works?