By GINNY MERRIAM /of the Missoulian
The driving agent underlying all the social problems in Missoula
County is poverty, human
services providers said Thursday in Missoula.
"Poverty is not an inner-city issue," Kelly Rosenleaf,
executive director of Child Care Resources,
told a group gathered by the United Way of Missoula County. "We
have a tremendous problem
with poverty in Montana."
Complicating the poverty in Missoula is the difficult housing
market, said Jim Morton, executive
director of the Human Resource Council. The extremely low rental
vacancy rate of 2 percent or
lower means people tolerate poor conditions and make other sacrifices
to avoid losing their
housing.
"It colors everything," he said.
Rosenleaf is a member of a committee of the local United Way
that released a report Thursday
on social indicators in the county. The report presents data gathered
in five problem areas:
poverty, homelessness, child abuse and neglect, kids at risk and
elderly at risk. It then compares
Missoula's readings to those of nine similar cities in the West:
Great Falls, Billings and
Bozeman in Montana; Bellingham, Wash.; Eugene, Ore.; Eureka, Calif.;
Flagstaff, Ariz.; Grand
Junction, Colo.; and Rapid City, S.D.
"I think this makes this report unique," said United Way executive director Judy Wing.
Work on the report began 18 months ago in an effort to look
at the challenges for human
services agencies, many of which the United Way helps fund.
"This is not an exhaustive study," said Don McCammon,
a Missoula engineer who is
co-chairman of the committee that did the study. "We're just
trying to get some arms around the
issues in Missoula."
McCammon presented the report to about a dozen human services
professionals and asked for
their reactions.
Figures showed that only two of the cities have higher rates
of child poverty than Missoula;
Eureka and Flagstaff exceeded Missoula's rate of 23 percent of
children living in poverty. And
poverty in Missoula increased through the 1990s after staying
below the rates for the state and
the nation through the 1970s and '80s.
Among the 10 cities, Missoula has the highest rate of homelessness.
At 52 homeless people per
every 10,000 residents, Missoula's rate of homelessness is 6.5
times that of Great Falls. Housing
costs are often seen as a factor, said McCammon, though Missoula's
median cost of a home is
comparable to the other communities at $130,000.
However, Montana's wages are low, and about 46 percent of Missoula
residents cannot qualify
for a home purchase through traditional means, the report says.
A family of four living in
Missoula on the federal definition of poverty - $17,650 - spends
40 percent of the household
income on housing.
McCammon said it's important to know that 75 percent of Missoula's
homeless people are from
Missoula, not train-riding transients.
In the area of child abuse and neglect, Missoula County saw
228 substantiated cases of child
physical and sexual abuse in 2000. More children were placed in
foster care. The report authors
could not unearth comparable figures for the other cities.
Missoula also has the highest high school dropout rate in the
state, though it is improving.
Organizations such as Flagship and Big Brothers Big Sisters help
by giving young people
quality adult time.
Of Missoula's 11,800 senior households, 17.8 percent, or 2,100,
are in poverty. Missoula Aging
Services staff members know that poverty causes some seniors to
have to choose between
prescription drugs and food. Poor physical health leads to less
mobility and then social isolation
- thus intertwining social problems.
Problems can run the life cycle, said Susan Kohler, executive
director of Missoula Aging
Services.
"The greatest indicator of poverty in old age is poverty in youth," she said.
As well, children in poverty are the most likely not to graduate
from high school and then the
most likely to be poor. They're also the most likely to stay in
Missoula because their
opportunities are limited, said Wing.
Hopes for the report are that it will keep Missoula's problems
at the forefront and help United
Way and other agencies balance their priorities, Wing said.
"We hope it will begin a conversation with all the community," she said.
Reporter Ginny Merriam can reached at 523-5251 or at gmerriam@missoulian.com.