[Massachusetts] Study: Poverty high in region

from The Republican

By STAN FREEMAN
sfreeman@repub.com

Impoverished once meant jobless, but increasingly in the Pioneer Valley, even the employed are poor.

New figures show the Pioneer Valley has a dramatically higher percentage of low-income students in its schools than any other region of the state, with working poor families accounting for many if not most of those children. According to figures from the University of Massachusetts Donahue Institute, 40.2 percent of students in schools, grades kindergarten through 12, in Franklin, Hampshire and Hampden counties in the 2004-2005 academic year were from low-income families.

Low income was defined by the study as $34,872 for a family of four.

No other region of the state had even 30 percent low-income students.

"The figures are striking. We were surprised," said Eric T. Nakajima, senior research manager at the institute.

"Chicopee, Holyoke and Springfield are known to have quite high concentrations of low-income families, but in fact there is a wide distribution of school districts in the valley that have a high percentage. Even in rural areas, you sometimes get a high percentage," he said.

In 2004, the poverty level was defined as an income for a family of four of $18,850 or below. Low-income was defined for the UMass study as a household income for a family of four at or below 185 percent of the poverty level, or $34,872.

Federal census figures show that in 2000, 12.4 percent of the three counties' residents were living in households at or below the poverty level. The fact that nearly 40 percent of students were from low-income households implies that most were from families whose income was above the poverty level but below the low-income level.

"That group is almost certainly the working poor," Nakajima said.

Gail D. Pisacane, who has worked for 23 years with the Valley Opportunity Council, which offers financial aid to the region's poor, said, "When I started, I would say maybe 20 percent of our clients were working poor. Now I'm going to say, without a doubt, 50 percent."

"People have one vision of what poverty is like. They think of people who are on welfare. But many poor people are out there working hard, at least 40 hours a week, often working more than one job, just to make ends meet," she said.

U.S. Rep. Richard E. Neal, D-Springfield, said the figures are a "real challenge to educators" and he called for greater federal investment in public schools.

Timothy W. Brennan, executive director of the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission, said the widespread poverty in the region "is why there is a great need for assistance out of Boston, assistance for more programs that will generate additional jobs, particularly those with a career ladder, rather than minimum-wage jobs."

As expected, the region's larger cities, Holyoke and Springfield, had the highest rates of low-income students, 76.3 percent and 75.8 percent respectively. However, some small communities also had rates much higher than the statewide average, which was 27.8 percent. Orange had a rate of 48.7 percent; Rowe, 44.3 percent; and Ware, 42.3 percent.

The school districts with the lowest rates, all below 7 percent, were Longmeadow at 4 percent, East Longmeadow at 6 percent, Whately at 6.6 percent and Hampden-Wilbraham at 6.8 percent.