Edwards pledges to fight poverty

STAFF WRITER

A small crowd flocked to Appalshop in Whitesburg yesterday to catch a glimpse of presidential hopeful John Edwards and to hear what he had to say about poverty, an ongoing issue for the people of Appalachia.

“Through the last few days, I've been moved by what I've seen,” Edwards, a Democrat, said about his three-day “Road to One America” tour spotlighting poverty, a state in which 37 million Americans live. “Today, I'm glad to be here with you, people who have historically been focused on by America.”

The stopping place was fitting for Edwards' tour, as Appalshop was founded in 1969 per President Lyndon B. Johnson's declaration of the “War on Poverty.” Appalshop was formed as a training program to use area youth's creativity to address the problems in Appalachia and give the area a voice across the country to “tell the real story,” said Appalachian Media Institute Project Director Rebecca O'Doherty.

Hosting a forum of youthful members of AMI (Appalachian Media Institute) at 11 a.m., O'Doherty asked each member to present issues most prevalent in modern day Appalachia.

“Leaving the mountains is a right of passage for me,” Jeremiah resident Macklyn Blair, AMI peer trainer, said about youth having to leave the area in search of good jobs.

Saying 23 of his family members left the community they love for financial reasons, Blair said, “I don't want to be number 24.”

“I'm so proud of him,” said Blair's grandmother, Glena Smith, who stood outside Appalshop listening to the live broadcast of the forum on WMMT 88.7.

Speaking about grandfather Daniel V. Johnson Sr., Willa Johnson, an AMI intern, told Edwards and the crowd the union organizer for United Mine Workers and Appalachian Regional Health Care worked all his life to overcome the stereotypes associated with Eastern Kentucky. Referring to Sen. Robert F. Kennedy's 200-mile tour of impoverished southeastern Kentucky areas in 1968, which ended in Prestonsburg as Edwards' tour did yesterday, Johnson said her grandfather traveled with Kennedy to help him understand the people.

While other forum members mentioned Appalachia's drug problem, AMI Director Natasha Watts focused on the issue, saying she went away to school and came back to find the kids she played in creeks with and went to school with, “smart kids off whom she would have cheated,” were on drugs. Abuse of prescription drugs is a problem in the mining towns where chronic pain is prevalent and a lack of jobs depressing, Watts said, asserting pharmaceutical companies like Purdue Pharma - which Pike County is contemplating suing for the effects of its drug OxyContin - should be held accountable, but money won't solve the problem.

“We're gonna live with the heavy cost of addiction for years and money won't cover it,” Watts said.

Although Edwards did not speak during the forum, asserting he came to listen, youth from the audience grabbed the opportunity to voice concerns and question him on issues.

Isom resident Nikki King wanted to know why coal is more important than her life and the issues of those dealing with the process of providing electricity to the eastern part of the country - like the slurry spill Martin Countians faced a few years back - to which Edwards later said, “Nobody misses corporate voices. They get heard well.”

And to Carrie Rice's question, “Why can't miners get blacklung benefits?” Edwards replied, “The government has not been responsible to the incredible unsafe working conditions, and politicians are responsive to large corporations. God Bless the UMW for speaking out for them. America needs a president with backbone to stand up for the regular working people.”

Edwards' father was an uneducated textile worker and Edwards, a father of four whose wife is battling breast cancer, was the first in his family to go to college. As an attorney before turning to politics, Edwards has a history of standing up for those harmed by large corporations, making millions in the process.

The same corporate voices in China are responsible for the genocide which America admitted was occurring in Africa, but did nothing to stop, said Edwards to Mayking resident Carrie Lee's inquiry about why we could not help those in Darfur and those dying from AIDS.

Addressing an issue affecting her, Whitesburg resident Brittany Hunsaker said, “I can't go to the doctor because I'm a college student and I don't have a baby. Our priorities are really messed up.”

Edwards didn't miss the opportunity to propose his plans for universal healthcare, gaining applause from the crowd with the passionate statement to Hunsaker, “You should have healthcare.”

“It makes you wanna vote for somebody who cares enough to come here,” said Linda Jenkins, of Jenkins, who came out to see the good-looking man who wanted the Democratic presidential spot in 2004, but settled as John Kerry's running mate.

“I wanted to get one look at him,” Jenkins said.

However, the promises of alleviating poverty within 30 years for an area America first looks to when talking about the poor will be hard to keep.

The Big Sandy Area Community Action Program (BSACAP), one of the state's 23 nonprofit community action programs formed to fight the War on Poverty, has been dishing out money to assist those qualifying for services - those at or below the poverty line - for more than 40 years.

The daily operations of the program serving the five Big Sandy counties - which also has a presence in Lawrence, Lee, Breathitt, Owsley and Wolfe counties - requires 80 employees to operate 19 programs with a funding of nearly $14 million in the 2005-2006 fiscal year, according to its grant application.

According to the 2000 Census, Pike County held 43 percent of the population of the area serviced by BSACAP.

Another community action program, Christian Appalachian Project (CAP), operates the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LHEAP). In November and December 2005, CAP disbursed $1.1 million to 10,034 applicants and paid $2.1 million for 12,749 of the area's disadvantaged January through April 2006.