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By John K. Woodruff, League staff
WASHINGTON, D. C.-Déjà vu may have been a strong feeling here. Indeed, progress has been reported in the eight-state area of concern since this diverse group came in 1999 to draw attention to the severely impoverished Mississippi River Delta. Still, needs are rampant, just as they were in 1999. So this group-including many who were here five years ago-returned May 17-19 to appeal to Congress and the President's administration once more about there being so much remaining to be done. The participants agreed that the needs continue to be so pressing that the Mississippi Delta Grassroots Caucus needs to meet yearly instead of every five years in the nation's capital to press Congress and perhaps to hold fall meetings, as well, in the Delta. The Mississippi Delta's seven states stretch from the southernmost tip of Louisiana to southern Illinois and western Kentucky; an eighth state, Alabama, has been added because of its similar problems of poverty. The group calls itself the Mississippi Delta Grassroots Caucus and is composed of municipal, county and state officials, educators, farmers, business leaders, nonprofit organization representatives, health care, housing and transportation experts and others who want more help for the impoverished areas. Forty-two of the 240 counties and parishes in the Mississippi Delta area are in Arkansas. "I can't believe people still live like this," a first-time visitor to the Delta told Peggy Wright when she took him a few years ago to Hughes, Ark. "He cried," Wright said at a closing day meeting at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. She is director of the Delta Studies Center at Arkansas State University, Jonesboro. A board member of the Lower Mississippi Delta Service Corps and an activist on other fronts, Wright recalled that she testified in 1989 as a housing director for help for the region, yet "in 2005 we still have some of the same conditions we testified about," she said. "I don't want to come back in 2010 and nothing has changed." Other Arkansas officials were present at the Caucus meeting, including Star City Mayor Gene Yarbrough, president of the Municipal League, Marvell Mayor Clark Hall, Osceola Alderman Tommy Baker, who was Municipal League president when he made the 1999 Caucus trip to Washington, Blytheville Mayor Barrett Harrison, several county judges and others. The Caucus's 1999 appeal to congressional and White House officials helped establish the Delta Regional Authority (DRA) two years later. Funding of $2 million for the DRA last year has been recommended to triple to $6 million in President Bush's 2006 budget. That still is a decrease from the 2001 funding of $20 million. While Caucus participants were pleased with the increase, they note that the amount still is piddling compared to the needs of the region and that the similarly constituted Appalachian Regional Authority received $66 million this year and the Denali Commission that serves Native Americans in Alaska received $67 million. U.S. Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) of Helena, describing herself as "a child of the Delta," urged continued investment in institutions such as schools and hospitals already part of the Delta, continued local leadership by Caucus participants and the development of dreams to guide what the Delta can be. Lincoln said that she began working in 1992 when she went to Washington to establish a Delta Regional Authority. She was a key sponsor of its creation. U.S. Senator Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) endorsed the $6 million DRA appropriation by the Bush administration and said he would oppose budget cuts in education and agriculture that adversely affect the Delta. "It's now critical for the federal government to consider the Delta's future and to make vast improvements in the region's highways, education and infrastructure." The funding of Interstate 69, which would reach from Laredo, Tex., to the Canadian border at Port Huron, Mich., is among the Caucus's priorities since its suggested corridor crosses much of the Delta region in Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana and western Tennessee and Kentucky. A $7.3 billion expenditure would complete I-69 in Tennessee, Kentucky and Arkansas and finish portions in Mississippi and Louisiana and begin construction in other areas. "I-69 traverses some of the nation's most impoverished areas that are badly in need of job creation," Lee Powell, coordinator of the Caucus meeting and Caucus consultant, said in a memorandum. "For many of the Delta areas, the numbers of people living below the poverty level far exceeds the national average." Powell served as an economic development advisor in former President Bill Clinton's administration. The national nonprofit Housing Assistance Council (HAC) reported in April that the lower Mississippi Delta "has a higher concentration of poor African Americans than any other region in the country." It said, "Over one-third of the region's African-American residents live in poverty" and that in the non-metropolitan Delta areas, black poverty is 41 percent. Of the female-headed households with children, 47 percent are below the poverty level. "Poverty and hopelessness have no place in 21st-century America," former President Clinton told the Caucus by letter. He was pleased with the Caucus's continued monitoring of the Delta, noting that he had experienced its "untapped potential" as governor and president. The Caucus, with its diverse participation, he said, "can provide invaluable counsel to our nation's lawmakers and ensure that every point of view is considered when planning for the future." Some other comments during the meeting: · Congressman Marion Berry said that the Delta had the people and adequate water for economic development, but that the people would have to provide for themselves, not the federal government. "The money is just not there. We are a bankrupt nation." Berry said the DRA needed a comprehensive plan for specific areas in the Delta and for the entire Delta. Later, Berry told Lee Powell that the Caucus should continue to seek funding, however. · Star City Mayor Yarbrough noted that his own town was fighting every day to keep jobs from going overseas; the Caucus needs "to create new ways of making things happen," he said. He cited the potential of developing more tourism in the Delta. · Osceola Alderman Tommy Baker emphasized the importance of the Community Development Block Grants program to the Delta and its municipalities. He repeated the National League of Cities recent theme, "No cut, no move," in reference to the Bush administration's budget plan to cut the program by a third and move it from Housing and Urban Development to the Commerce Department. He said the program is effective and all the money has been accounted for. · Former Clinton administration Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater commended the governments for working together in the Delta. · Rex Nelson, communications director to Governor Mike Huckabee, said the DRA was bipartisan and worked as a team. He said that the DRA's increased appropriation from $2 million last year to $6 million for the 2006 while 150 other programs in the president's budget were cut "is recognition of the importance" of the Delta. Nelson favored the Caucus's meeting annually in Washington to bring the Delta's needs to congressional attention. "We need to be the squeaky wheels," he said. The spotting of the ivory-billed woodpecker, thought to be extinct, in the Arkansas Delta's Cache River National Wildlife Refuge, as revealed in news reports in April, drew a few sarcasm-tainted remarks over $10 million being proposed by the Interior and Agriculture departments to protect the bird. More money is expected. "It's probably a real nice bird," Congressman Berry said to snickers and giggles. "It seem to be doing OK without our help." Then, he got applause with the remark, "I'd question spending $100 million protecting that bird. I'd rather spend $100 million protecting our children."
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