Group aims to help lift people out of poverty

from Columbia Daily Tribune

By T.J. GREANEY of the Tribune’s staff

A new group is bringing together people with vastly different life experiences in what it hopes will be an innovative approach to fighting poverty in Columbia.

"The war on poverty is not working, and it’s been going on since the ’60s," said Adam Tipton, community services supervisor at the Boone County Family Resource Center. "This is something new."

Tipton and eight others met last night around desks in a classroom at the Boone County Family Resources Center on Wilkes Boulevard. They’re attempting to form the first local branch of Circles, a national anti-poverty movement that is showing promising results in towns across the Midwest.

Circles works on the simple principle that it takes a village to bring a family out of poverty. The program, which originated in Ames, Iowa, recognizes that the "circle" of people living in poverty is vastly different than the networks surrounding middle-class people. "A lot of times in our society, it’s who you know that matters," Tipton said. "And knowing some people might help you get the job you want or just building friendships, period, helps."

Circles attempts to pair poor families with a small network of people from the community who will take an intensive interest in helping them succeed. These "allies" are, according to supporters, average people willing to reach across economic and racial lines to make themselves available when the car breaks down, when the babysitter cancels at the last minute or when tax forms need to be filled out.

All in all, a network of as many as five people will surround the family for an average of 18 months, meeting weekly. The results in other places have been heartening. In Ames, 58 families that enrolled in the program left welfare and saw their income increase by 30 percent. In Itasca County, Minn., 70 percent of families participating left welfare, and family incomes increased by $725 per month, according to material provided by the organization.

But the program does not work without dedicated backers, and Circles is just beginning to attract them.

Steve Harris, a hulking man who wears a bowler hat cocked to the front, says he knows poverty and its consequences. He grew up poor and spent 18 years in prison before his release in 2005.

"I’ve seen both sides of the poverty issue," he said. After he was released, he lived on the streets and bathed in Stephens Lake Park before he got a helping hand from some generous people in Columbia. He believes Circles could offer others the same kind of assistance.

"There’s people that haven’t been locked up that do what they’re supposed to and still have issues," Harris said, "people who are struggling to maintain a household, and it’s not working. This would help them and guide them. People could show them how to do the household management and the budget. This is a big asset for them."

Steve Tatlow of the Boone County Community Partnership said the idea for Circles outreach was particularly apparent to him after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in 2005. About 200 people who were uprooted and relocated to Columbia were in need of all sorts of assistance. "Communities, churches, organizations - they all stepped up and said, ‘We’d like to sponsor a person or a family.’ And in many cases what that was, was a circle that wrapped around a family," Tatlow said. "Those people" in a circle "were the most quickly re-acclimated, and most quickly resettled."

Dave Whelan, the Columbia group manager for Commerce Bank, also is betting on Circles. The son of a carpenter and the youngest of 13 children, he said he knows how tough it is to break out of the poverty cycle.

"When you’re in these situations, they don’t have the resources that you and I do," he said. "If you break down in the middle of the night on the highway, you can call a friend or a co-worker to come help you. These people don’t necessarily have those resources," said Whelan, who recalls that joining the military was his way of forming a new circle and earning money to go to college. "They don’t always have the networking abilities. They don’t have the same luxuries."