Barry Welsh Statement on Poverty Statistics

By Barry Welsh

Three Indiana cities are among the nation's cities with the highest poverty rate: Bloomington, Gary, and the 6th district city of Muncie. People in poverty lack adequate food, clothing, shelter, and/or health care. In Muncie, 32.6 percent of the people find themselves in that condition, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. More Hoosier cities from the 6th-district might have found themselves on this list had their populations reached 65,000 or more, one of the criteria used to compile those statistics.

The cost of poverty to Hoosiers and to Americans nationwide is enormous. In Indiana we spend millions to provide the poor with food, shelter, and emergency health care. Crime, which always accompanies poverty, costs us millions more. Poverty, however, is not an intractable problem. If we are willing to make some important investments in our future, I believe we can make a dramatic reduction in the number of people living in poverty, and thereby make Indiana a better place for all Hoosiers. Making these investments will pay dividends for us and for our children.
 
We must invest in job training for people who do not have the necessary skills for the modern workplace. But job training is worthless if there are no jobs. So we must find ways to stop exporting American jobs and to make them again available to Americans who want to work.  We must invest in providing health care for people who cannot afford health insurance. Because providing costly, emergency-room health care is one of the resultant and inefficient expenses related to poverty, finding a way to make adequate and affordable health care available to Hoosiers who need it will in the long run save money and reduce poverty levels.
 
For 12 years prior to 2007, Republicans were in control of Congress and they, with 6th-district Congressman Mike Pence prominent among them, have been opposed to every one of the initiatives that might help reduce the level of poverty in Indiana and in the rest of the country. For me, it's embarrassing to hear that Indiana has three of its major cities with poverty rates among the highest in the nation. But it's an embarrassment that we can correct with the right leadership. In 2009, when I take my seat as the Congressional Representative of the 6th district, I will do everything that I can do to see that neither Muncie nor any other Indiana city finds itself in such an unfavorable position.

For more information visit our website at www.barrywelsh.org or contact Communications Director Joh Padgett via email at press@barrywelsh.org or by telephone at (317) 352-5066.

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