Group says Coles' poverty rate among highest in Illinois

from the Journal Gazette and Times Courier

LATESTCHARLESTON -- A lack of transportation, affordable housing and employment opportunities were a few of the top barriers to poverty in this area identified during a forum Tuesday.

The Heartland Alliance for Human Needs and Human Rights hosted the forum as a way to pinpoint problems and solutions to poverty in the Coles County area.

More than 40 people affiliated with local social service agencies worked in small groups to talk about grassroots efforts that can be made to address poverty in Central Illinois.

The forum, called “Moving from Poverty to Opportunity,” is one of 25 that are taking place across Illinois this year, said Doug Schenkelberg, associate director of policy for Heartland Alliance.

Coles County is in the top 10 areas of the state with the highest concentration of people living in extreme poverty, Schenkelberg said. Cook County does not make the top 10 list.

“This isn’t an urban issue. It happens in urban areas, but it isn’t strictly an urban issue,” Schenkelberg said.

Extreme poverty is defined as a family living at half of the federal poverty level. The federal poverty level for a family of three is $17,170 of income per year, so a family of three living in extreme poverty makes less than $8,585 per year.

In Coles County, families in extreme poverty make up 8.5 percent of the population. The number living below the federal poverty level in Coles County is 14.4 percent.

Although the existence of Eastern Illinois University students does have a small impact on the high Coles County poverty rate, Schenkelberg said it is more of a larger problem having to do with the teen birth rate, graduation rate and employment rate.