Poverty: The Widening Gap
October 1989

In the mid-1960's, President Lyndon Johnson waged a war on Poverty to attain what he envisioned as the Great Society, yet the percentage of blacks attaining middle-class status fell from 32 to 29 percent from 1969 to 1984, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures.

According to Howard Hunter, (D.-5th District) member of the N.C. House of Representatives, poverty is more than just a financial condition. He defines poverty as a multi-faceted problem, saying "Poverty occurs when the federal government does not encourage a minimum wage sufficient for an individual to maintain a family, or when the state pays employees below the federal poverty level; but poverty is also living in a world where you're put down in a ditch and just left there. Some people can't rise above that-that's poverty of the spirit."

Atha Staton, director of services for Robeson County Social Services, says that the impoverished person, "could be a mother that can't get a job, and can't get daycare. She loses the stamina to look and search."

Suggestions to remedy the multi-faceted problem include instilling a sense of determination in the black youth, giving students the coping skills they need to survive in the world, encouraging black youth to go to college, providing more psychological support services in the schools, and convincing the black youth that they must be "the best they can be".

The comments made by the four panelists and the heated questions formed by an audience living in one of the poorest counties in North Carolina brings into sharper focus the widening gap between rich and poor in the eighth BLACK ISSUES FORUM, "Poverty: The Widening Gap." The program was taped before a live audience on Oct. 6 at Pembroke State University in Pembroke, N.C.

PANELISTS

Dr. Ruth Woods, associate superintendent of Compensatory Education Services in the public schools of Robeson County

Atha Stanton, director of services for Robeson County Social services

Rep. Howard Hunter, Jr., (5th District)

Rep. Nick Jeralds (17th district)

The hour-long panel discussion will again be moderated by Valeria L.Lee, chair of The University of North Carolina Center for Public Television and program development officer at the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation.