Bloomington organizations help with high poverty rate

In Monroe County, 29.6 percent of people are living below the poverty line.
Nationally, that number is only 12.4 percent, according to the most recent Census information from www.americantowns.com.

City Council Member Isabel Piedmont-Smith said Bloomington has a higher rate because the number of college students who don’t work and receive money from their parents.

However, because of the economy, people in the Bloomington community aren’t getting pay increases and are even losing their jobs, which is part of the economic trends of the whole country, Piedmont-Smith said.

People living in poverty rely on community programs for basic necessities. The nonprofit social service organizations have seen a greater number of people needing assistance, Piedmont-Smith said.

In order to help fund these social service agencies, the city created the Jack Hopkins Social Services funding program in 1993. The amount available in the fund will increase from $200,000 this year to $220,000 next year, Piedmont-Smith said.
“I think Bloomington is not among the worst cities in the country as the city has built up some reserves,” she said.

One agency that receives money from the Jack Hopkins program, Monroe County United Ministries, Inc., provides basic need assistance for people in crisis to help them get back on track, Development Coordinator Rebecca Stanze said.
Stanze said although the increase in resources is helpful, it doesn’t necessarily match up with the ministries’s increase in need.

“We have seen an increase but not just recently,” she said. “For about the past six years now, we saw an increase in clients. It is not a recent, dramatic thing. It has been building for some time.”

The unemployed aren’t the only ones seeking help. About a quarter of the people who come to the ministries for food, clothing and help with unexpected expenses are employed, Stanze said.

“They are employed but are not able to have ends meet because wages are so low,” she said. “This community has lost high paying jobs in the past couple decades.”

Hoosier Hills Food Bank, a nonprofit organization that collects and distributes food to about 100 other food programs in the area, has seen a significant increase in the need of food, Hoosier Hills Food Bank Executive Director Julio Alonso said.

“We have distributed record amounts of food in last three years,” he said. “Last year, we distributed 3.1 million pounds, a 29 percent increase over the prior year.”

The community has also noticed the need increase, Stanze said.

“People are still giving at healthy levels,” she said. “We are really impressed with the community response we have seen.”

While Stanze is hopeful for a decrease of families living in poverty in the future, she sees no signs of this happening in the near future.

“Changes are needed at the state level and support is needed,” she said. “It would be great, but I don’t see it happening anytime soon. I see instances of our particular state government not doing everything they can.”