As I See It / June 2007
Rural Routes
However cosmopolitan its inhabitants may be, the region known as the Mid Ohio Valley is considered a rural area by the federal agencies who determine such things. And though rural doesn’t really capture the spirit of the area, there is a huge difference between life in Charleston, Marietta or Parkersburg and life in Cleveland or Cincinnati.
It’s not just the traffic.
Despite the homogenizing access to national restaurant chains, discount shopping and multiplex theaters, the view from here contrasts with the view from there in so many great and small ways, it’s almost like two different worlds.
The ‘us’ versus ‘them’ comparison is generally gratifying – crime, poverty, violence, racial tension, corruption, traffic. Low score wins, we come out on top.
The terrorist threat is pretty minimal in Vienna, WV. Teays Valley is unlikely to experience critical gridlock, even at 5 o’clock on a holiday weekend. Hostile acts in Kanawha county are normally carried out by Mother Nature, and downtown gangs are still in their infancy, more attitude than action. Culture is alive with active supporters of the symphony and visual arts. Official signs note that the community embraces diversity.
Self-congratulations seem in order. But even rural communities have meth labs and break-ins, senseless vandalism and children who never have new toys, new clothes or rooms of their own. In Charleston, Parkersburg, Ripley and Marietta, over 16 per cent of the families live below the poverty line. That’s half of Cleveland’s statistic but not far from Cincinnati’s 18 %.
The disparity between the ‘have’s’ and ‘have-not’s’ is more apparent in big cities, but even when it isn’t obvious, that disparity is a core issue for cities of every size. State leaders worry that our best, brightest young people will go elsewhere because there isn’t enough opportunity at home. But they should also worry about the young people who won’t leave, because they have no reason to believe life will ever be any better.
Experience is the best teacher, but it can also be the worst. If the experience a parent has is life with no resources, no expectations and no incentives, they teach what they know, as their parents did, as their offspring will. It doesn’t take many generations to establish permanent residency under the poverty line. It doesn’t take many generations for a town to go from 16% to 34% population with no stake in the community.
It seems tragic to outsiders, but from the inside, it’s not a sad situation; it’s an angry situation. Kahlil Gibran wrote, “Work is love made visible”, but anger is poverty made visible. Around the poverty line, language is harsh, punishments, severe. Mean circumstances create mean spirits. Angry words provoke angry acts. Violent emotions morph swiftly into violence.
And then the community starts chaining gates, expanding the police force, shutting down parks, establishing curfews. Meth labs, the Ponzi scheme of the poor, crop up like dandelions. Meth labs are the new barometer of rising pressure in the neighborhood.
Being poor isn’t a crime and being poor doesn’t make a criminal. But the disparity between those that have and those that don’t is cause for fury. It should be especially infuriating for those that have, because they ultimately pay the difference. They will foot the bill in real, tangible ways, paying for more police protection, more insurance, more anti-theft devices and better home security systems. They will pay in increased social services, declining property values, and higher taxes to fund and staff more, bigger jails. They will spend enormous time and energy trying to keep themselves, their families and their vehicles safe.
There is research suggesting there may be a DNA-based ‘poverty gene’ passed on like blue eyes or a tendency to baldness. Perhaps that will be proved true and pharmaceutical companies will develop a vaccine. Or, it may be that, “The poor will always be with us.” Either way, those that ‘have’- money, homes, education, jobs, cars and health care- will benefit most when everyone has them.
There are no simple answers and maybe, no ultimate solution, though education and health care must be priorities. War on poverty is waged at the federal, state and local levels, but the fight must become personal, because the consequences are personal. No one can afford the high cost of poverty. PL
Copyright © 2007 A Woman's View. All rights reserved.
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