For our inaugural One Good Resource offering, CLICK HERE for an editorial from a recent edition of The Anniston Star. Tax reform, constitution reform, and legislative challenges are all touched on in one fell swoop. It’s not necessarily a happy message, but it is helpful in consolidating the core systemic issues that impact low-wealth citizens of our state.
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To access this week’s One Good Resource offering, CLICK HERE for an excellent basic resource from the Kaiser Family Foundation. This link will take you to a map of the U.S. Click on Alabama and then Go. You’ll be taken to a page which gives a lot of basic numbers about poverty, comparing our state to the nation.
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To access this week’s One Good Resource offering, CLICK HERE for a very valuable publication from Alabama Arise. This link will take you to Arise’s home page. Scroll down a little bit under “What’s New” to the link for Bridging the Gap, an examination of many working families in our state have been left out of recent economic advances. You’ll want to download, read, and keep on file this outstanding study of financial realities in Alabama!
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With all of the current buzz in the media about young people's influence on the current election, we thought we would share with you another way young people can begin to exert their influence over the future of Alabama.
On January 31st, 2008, the Alabama Citizens for Constitution Reform (ACCR) Foundation launched the inaugural High School Constitutional Reform Education Contest. The purpose of the contest is to provide students an opportunity to express themselves and, in the process, learn more about the 1901 Constitution. High school seniors throughout Alabama can submit an essay or multimedia entry based on this year's theme: "Who needs a new constitution?" Please click here to download the contest information sheet, guidelines and entry form. The deadline for submissions is Friday, March 14, either by midnight via e-mail or postmarked by that day by US Postal Service.
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The Alabama Faith Council had its “public launch” this week in Birmingham. Over 250 folks turned out to talk about inter-faith dialog and action. Go to the AFC’s website to learn more about the group’s work. In particular, you will want to click on “AFC Issue Statements” to see what positions the group has taken so far. Also click on “AFC Work Groups” for resources on a variety of concerns.
(By the way, APP is part of this work as both Nick serves on the steering committee and both he and Becky are part of the poverty work group.)
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"Federal Poverty Level." This ambiguous phrase is heard many times in discussions concerning policies and practices that affect persons of low-wealth. But what exactly does it mean? The US Department of Health & Human Services recently published their 2008 Poverty Guidelines.
This site & the links you'll find there are full of information about how the federal government (and therefore federal/state agencies, non-profit service agencies, and other groups) set their income caps and limits for who can receive assistance.
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Last week brought the release of The House Task Force on Poverty Report. The report is found here and is also available on our website. The report is the culmination of the work of the task force (on which Nick served) and makes public the legislative priorities of the task force as well as recommendations for change.
*This week is One Good Resource Plus. There were two editorials printed this week about the report from the House Task Force on Poverty. The first one, found here, was written by the editorial board of the Birmingham News. The second one was written by the co-chair of the Task Force, Rep. Patricia Todd (D-54). (The only version online appears to be truncated - we'll try to get the whole editorial up on our website soon!) Both speak to the work of the task force, and the challenges before the legislature to decide how they will respond to what the task force recommended.
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This week's OGR is the website www.spotlightonpoverty.org. This website contains a wealth of information, and we kinda feel like we're cheating by calling it ONE good resource. Not only is this a national site - highlighting what the presidential candidates plan to do about persons living in poverty in America - but it provides local resources through the Data On Your Community link. You could spend hours reading all of the reports, interviews & programs highlighted on this site - take a few minutes to learn something new today.
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Here's a link to a recent opinion article published in USA Today. Written by Buzz Thomas, a widely experienced attorney with Alabama roots, the article speaks first to the faith community about how new approaches to poverty are now necessary. But Buzz also has a lot to say about education, giving examples from his own work with a foundation in Tennessee that he heads. Interesting stuff, and loaded with links to other helpful information. You can take a lot of time with this one if you choose!
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This week brings our own news:
Alabama Poverty Project presents
"Poverty and the Alabama Faith Community"
Thursday, April 10, 2008 at 10:30 am (Registration at 10 am)
Byrne Hall - Spring Hill College, Mobile.
"Pastors and other faith leaders all have concerns related to poverty," says Nick Foster, executive director of APP. "They want to know how best to address poverty, especially close to home. With this event, Alabama Poverty Project wants to provide the kind of resources that give these leaders the opportunity to speak knowledgably on the issues and to lead their congregations to be effective in alleviating poverty."
If you are interested in attending, please email Becky at assistant@alabamapoverty.org.
More information on our website.
***One Good Resource is now on our website! You can search by date, or by topic. Check it out!***
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With the first of April comes the countdown to Tax Day: April 15. While this day brings fear to the best of us, "thanks to college students across the state, this year's tax season was less of a burden for many working families in Alabama. More than 260 students from 12 college campuses prepared over 1,400 returns for working families, helping them to secure $1.7 million in tax refunds and saving them $280,000 in commercial tax preparation fees. SaveFirst is a tax preparation and financial literacy program provided by Impact: An Alabama Student Service Initiative." (From the VOICES for Alabama's Children March newsletter.)
The Children's Defense Fund has a great resource to determine how much is lost due to Refund Anticipation Loans and preparation fees. Those numbers are extraordinarily high in Alabama. A map that shows those numbers can be found here.
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This week the PBS program NOW asks, "Are some states raising revenue by taxing the poor?" Producers did some work in Alabama during the production of this episode, sending a camera crew to Montgomery for Alabama Arise's Lobby Day in February. We understand the show will be broadcast on Alabama Public Television this Friday, April 11 at 8:30, following the Alabama-focused For the Record at 8:00.
If you miss the broadcast, though, you can view the show at the NOW website (most likely after Friday) at their website: http://www.pbs.org/now.
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After some of the "heavier" OGR's lately, we thought we'd share just a "bite-size" portion of resource this week. Last week, a report was released by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and the Economic Policy Institute, two Washington D.C. research groups. This report revealed that the gap between Alabama's richest and poorest families is the nation's second widest, and has grown in the last decade by the second highest amount.
There was a story about this report in the Birmingham News last week. Check it out. This is an important snapshot of Alabama's personal economies, one that informs the view of our economy as a whole.
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Last Friday, Nick attended the third anniversary celebration of the Black Belt Action Commission, an initiative of Governor Bob Riley's to facilitate the partnering of interested and concerned groups across the state. Here's the mission statement: "To measurably improve the quality of life in Alabama's Black Belt region by actively working with all citizens of Alabama and any other supportive parties."
The commission is having positive effects and deserves our continued support. APP is one of those partners taking part. Take a look at the commission's website to learn more about this initiative. You may want especially to click on the 2nd Annual Report found on the home page.
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You may not know about the Center for Demographic Research, housed at Auburn University, Montgomery, a member of APP's Higher Education Partnership. Dr. Yanyi Djamba directs the center's activities, collecting, maintaining, and analyzing socio-demographic data about our state.
Check out CDR's website and look around for a while, especially at the Publications page. There is a lot of information here! We might recommend taking a look, for instance, at the "Sweet Home Alabama" report on housing. Look first at the data at the end of the report, and then read those parts of the report that are of particular interest to you.
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May 9
We have been collecting books at the APP offices, and now they're listed for purchase (through booksamillion.com) on our website.
Here's one review for your weekly bit o' information:
Alabama in the Twentieth Century
Wayne Flynt - October 2004
Alabama is a state full of contrasts. On the one hand, it has elected the lowest number of women to the state legislature of any state in the union; yet according to historians it produced two of the ten most important American women of the 20th century--Helen Keller and Rosa Parks. Its people are fanatically devoted to conservative religious values; yet they openly idolize tarnished football programs as the source of their heroes. Citizens who are puzzled by Alabama's maddening resistance to change or its incredibly strong sense of tradition and community will find important clues and new understanding within these pages.
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We've told you before about the Center for Demographic Research, housed at Auburn University, Montgomery, a member of APP's Higher Education Partnership. We want to share with you another fruit of their work.
In fact, we have previously recommended taking a look at the "Sweet Home Alabama" report on housing, found on their website. We're making it easier for you, with a link to the report on the APP website. You can find a wealth of information here, including (on page 50) a statewide profile of Alabama's housing situation. Then look at the county-by-county numbers. And don't miss the data on vehicle and telephone accessibility.
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42 percent of children born into the poorest families remain in the lowest income bracket as adults. Of those born into the wealthiest families, 39 percent will stay at the top.
These are part of the findings of a report from the Pew Charitable Trusts - "Getting Ahead or Losing Ground: Economic Mobility in America." The report addresses a basic assumption by many, that there is ample opportunity to move out of poverty to greater wealth. Is that true?
We'll leave it up to you to sift through the reports, and to come to your own conclusions. We just wanted to share them with you! Click here to get started.
***We welcome Laura Buckner to the APP. Laura is a Hess Fellow from Birmingham-Southern College. Laura will be with us through the summer, focusing on Alabama Possible, our 4-day poverty camp.
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