People who are poor should be central in SOAR leadership

Former War on Poverty anti-poverty worker, Robert W. Shaffer has some advice about how to improve upon past efforts at economic transition in eastern Kentucky: Let people who are poor have seats at all tables where decisions about the future of the region are being made. From Shaffer: Poverty statistics will once again be used to bring millions of dollars to Eastern Kentucky to be spent by those who are not poor. What is never considered is the enormous price poor families pay to produce these statistics. They are, after all, the expert witnesses. Who has a greater stake in SOAR’s success? It makes common sense that poor people should have seats at the table where decisions are made about how those funds will be spent. But it is an open secret that many in leadership do not want poor people to acquire the confidence to participate at the highest levels in programs designed to enable them to rise out of poverty. The Shaping Our Appalachian Region Initiative has been key to shifting the overarching conversation about transition in the region, and has helped bring in millions in federal investments. However – as we’ve written about previously on this blog – the entire initiative has a long way to go before all eastern Kentuckians are equally represented among it’s leadership and participants. As Shaffer points out: “SOAR’s present leadership consists of the one percent of the population accustomed to controlling all federal and state funds available to the region. The executive board...

SOAR still important, but second summit falls short of expectations...

One week ago today, the Shaping Our Appalachian Region Initiative hosted it’s second summit in Pikeville, Ky. If readers will recall, SOAR started with much fanfare, excitement and anticipation two years ago. Since it’s inception, SOAR has been funneling millions of dollars into eastern Kentucky through various state channels, public-private partnerships and federal programs. There have been hours and pages of media coverage dedicated to the initiative and what types of economic development and prosperity it might bring into the region. We cannot deny the positive impact of SOAR. They are many and varied and we respect and welcome that. However, two years later (2014 was dedicated to various working group committees gathering ideas and information through a series public listening sessions), and many of the public’s fears about SOAR becoming a space for political posturing, exclusion of viewpoints that stand outside the status quo, and tired ideas about what will bring a sustainable economy into the region seem to have materialized. The breakout sessions at the 2015 SOAR Strategy Summit were led by panels that were filled with people doing great work and operating great programs in eastern Kentucky. They spent their time telling audience members about their programs and how they were helping the region succeed. That’s all fine and good, but what wasn’t clear in many sessions was what the panelists or their programs had to do with the recommendations or ideas coming out of the 2014 listening sessions, or the 2013 SOAR Summit. It seemed to many that these panelists were carefully chosen...

Some advice to SOAR from the War on Poverty

The second Shaping Our Appalachian Region (SOAR) summit is almost a week away. Much has been speculated about what SOAR will produce, about what SOAR lacks, and about the many possibilities and opportunities SOAR can create. In preparation for the second summit, it’s worth looking back to other initiatives that were created with the express intent of drawing eastern Kentucky out of poverty and pushing it into prosperity. WMMT’s Making Connections News recently spoke with two veterans of the War on Poverty about lessons that set of programs and initiatives can teach the SOAR movement. Hollis West grew up in a coal mining family in southern Illinois and was the head of the Knox County Community Action Agency in the 1960s. Robert Shaffer worked at the federal Office of Economic Opportunity, which sent him to the region in the 1960s to better implement the office’s mission: “maximum feasible participation of the poor in the decision making process.” “I went to the people and asked them what they wanted instead of what we wanted them to do,” Shaffer said. He and West worked with the community, including and most explicitly with people who were poor, to create jobs and improve infrastructure. The community started a furniture and craft-making company. “This is what is hard for people to understand today: what it meant to the poor people to see that building and see that this belonged to the poor.” His advice for the SOAR process: In Night Comes to the Cumberlands, [Harry Caudill] talks about the...

New year, new transition opportunities

Happy New Year! Renew Appalachia has been on hiatus over the Holidays, and at least a couple of big developments happened over the break that have big potential for the Appalachian Transition movement in 2015. Broadband Internet will be expanded to far-flung corners of Kentucky in the coming years, beginning with the creation of a plan for expansion this year. The expansion will happen through a public-private partnership between the state government and Macquarie Capital. The first leg will be installed in eastern Kentucky. Broadband expansion in the region was a recommendation that came out of the initial Shaping Our Appalachian Region (SOAR) summit in 2013. It’s not exactly clear just how far the broadband lines will extend into eastern Kentucky – a press release from Hal Rogers’ office only says that “work along I-75 from northern Kentucky to Williamsburg will for the ‘spine’ of the network, with work in the priority region os southeastern Kentucky occurring simultaneously.” Despite that, it’s hard to not be optimistic about the possibilities that expanded broadband could provide to the region. The Appalachian Regional Commission started developing a new strategic plan that will begin in 2016. ARC wants its new plan to focus on the future of the region, including how best to advance sustainable economic development. According to the ARC: “The Appalachian Region has historically been dominated by a few industries, such as mining, textiles, tobacco and timber. This is particularly true in its most economically distressed counties. Dependence on these industries as economic drivers and employers has left many communities...

Abandoned Mine Lands funds should be reinvested in just economic transition...

Central Appalachia needs more than just good ideas to shepherd the region through a just economic transition; it needs investment – and lots of it – to make those ideas a reality. That may seem like a tall order, especially given that perhaps the region’s most reliable and consistent source of investment, coal severance tax revenue, is steadily falling as coal production in the region continues to decline.   However, there is another pool of money that investment into the region’s economic transition could be pulled from: the Abandoned Mine Lands Trust. Coal companies pay taxes every year to reclaim old and abandoned surface mined lands, and that money goes into the AML Trust. Currently, there is about $2.5 billion in this trust. That money could be “re-appropriated” in a way that would serve Central Appalachian communities that have been dependent on the coal industry for years, says Evan Smith, a Whitesburg attorney who works with the Appalachian Citizen Law Center. It is on the table, and it’s not impossible [to get AML funds re-appropriated]. But, it does take a lot of organizing, and a lot of visioning together to come to an agreement of what you do with the money. Visioning and organizing to reach that agreement could be a role for the Shaping Our Appalachian Regional initiative. Re-appropriating government dollars and reinvesting them into Central Appalachia is certainly on the minds of the SOAR Executive Committee members, who recently voted to support 2015 legislation that would create the Kentucky Appalachian Regional Development...

Eastern Kentucky ‘will not thrive without significant and smarter investment’...

A central theme is woven through all of MACED’s new strategy briefs, and it is crucial to the success of any of the other strategies: increased investment. Why is investment so important to eastern Kentucky? MACED explains in its final new strategy brief, “Ensure Meaningful Investment:” Public and private investment in infrastructure lays the groundwork for the region to take advantage of new economic opportunities. Early childhood education, broadband access and quality health care support an engaged, capable workforce. Investments in promising economic sectors and entrepreneurship can give businesses the kick-start they need to stand on their own as part of a thriving economy. Not that there hasn’t always been investment poured into the region, both from outside and inside sources. Much of that investment has come since the War on Poverty was announced 50 years ago and federal dollars began being redirected into the region for various programs. State money has also played a role through the several state-led initiatives that have been created in year’s past to find solutions for eastern Kentucky’s economic woes – even though those initiatives eventually fizzled out. There’s also been plenty of private money flowing through the region’s coffers through foundations and nonprofit groups. But even with all this investment coming into the region for decades, more is still needed to enact the changes that are required to advance eastern Kentucky’s economy forward. And, as MACED explains in their brief, it’s not necessarily the amount of investment that’s coming in, but it is about how that money is invested: Increasing investment in the...

Forestry is still ‘critical part’ of eastern Kentucky’s economy...

Long before coal mining dominated eastern Kentucky’s economy, logging was the big business in the region. Stories of log rafts barreling down creeks on their way to the Kentucky River when the water was high and on to the Ohio River still permeate regional folklore. There simply is no way to deny the impact eastern Kentucky’s  natural resources have had on the region’s past and present economy. Our forests may not be as abundant as they once were, but they still can be a driving economic force for the region’s future. MACED’s fourth new strategy brief about the forestry sector explains why: In 2013, the forest industry generated $12.8 billion for Kentucky’s economy and employed more than 27,500 people statewide. In eastern Kentucky, the industry employed more than 5,700 people in 320 businesses in 2011. Pulaski County’s sizable cluster of wood and paper products manufacturers employs more than 1,500 people. In addition to those promising figures, the housing market – the recent crash of which hit the wood products sector hard – is beginning to rebound, the price of hardwood logs is increasing, and the sustainable wood products sector has seen promising growth in recent years. The MACED report points out that “with the right training and technical assistance, eastern Kentucky’s many wood products manufacturers can take advantage of the growing market demand for sustainable wood products.” The economic potential of eastern Kentucky’s forests is not just about wood products manufacturing. From the report: Healthy forests act as “carbon sinks,” crucial for combating climate change. And eastern Kentucky’s headwater...

“Booming” local foods sector needs support to become “economic engine”...

MACED’s third strategy brief – released today – focuses on the local foods movement in eastern Kentucky, which truly is booming. A new farmers market in the region seems to open every summer. Local butcher shops, like JW Farms The Chop Shop in Hazel Green, are increasing interest in locally-sourced meat products. Small eateries and restaurants, like Treehouse Cafe and Bakery in Hazard, Summit City in Whitesburg, and The Blue Raven in Pikeville – all of which source some of their food from local producers – are becoming anchors of Main Street rebirth, and leading the way for others to do the same. It’s all no wonder, given Appalachians’ intimate history with agriculture and local food. Eastern Kentuckians have been subsistence farmers since they first settled this region. In fact, it’s likely the only thing we as a people have done longer than mine coal. To this day, the favorite foods of many Appalachians come from family gardens – fresh, ripe tomatoes with just a touch of salt, white half runner green beans cooked with salt bacon for flavor, new potatoes with a buttery texture that can’t be imitated. They are eastern Kentucky delicacies and staple foods. And now, they could become one of our economic saviors. Creating an infrastructure to better support local farmers and food producers is one of the most logical steps we can take toward revitalizing the region’s economy. It just makes sense to capitalize upon one of our most innate assets and find ways to create opportunities with it. Those...