Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, February 9, 1993 TAG: 9302090346
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: By Associated Press
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
REGION LEADS IN POVERTY
Northern Virginia generally has the lowest poverty rates in the state, while Southwest Virginia and urban areas have the highest, according to 1990 U.S. Census Bureau figures released Sunday.Radford has the highest poverty rate in Virginia, although state and local officials say that number is skewed by the presence of 9,500 university students.
In Radford, 4,152 people, or 32.2 percent of the city's population, were living below the national poverty line. The poverty line is defined as $12,675 in annual income for a family of four.
(Blacksburg, home of Virginia Tech, has an even higher poverty rate than Radford, according to census figures released earlier by the Virginia Employment Commission: 37.4 percent. But Blacksburg is a town, not a city, so it didn't make the Census Bureau's list.)
Lee County has the second highest rate in the state, 28.7 percent. Norton had the third highest rate, 26.7 percent.
"The coal area - that whole far southwestern corner of Virginia - and the inner cities of Norfolk and Richmond are what we think of as the poverty pockets," said De Ann Hubicsak, spokeswoman for the state Department of Social Services.
Norfolk's rate was 19.3 percent and Richmond's rate was 20.9 percent.
Roanoke's rate was 16.1 percent, while Roanoke County's was 4.1 percent. Salem's was 5.2 percent.
Poquoson's 2.8 percent rate was the lowest statewide, followed by Loudoun County with 3.1 percent, Prince William County with 3.2 percent and Fairfax County with 3.5 percent. Poquoson is on the Peninsula; the other three localities are in Northern Virginia.
Hubicsak says the low rates can be misleading because the data do not accurately reflect true poverty in places such as Northern Virginia, where the high cost of living, especially for housing, skews the poverty figures.
"Northern Virginia, as prosperous as it is . . . is really a bad place to be poor," she said.
Virginia's 10.2 percent poverty rate was below the national rate of 13.1 percent.
New Hampshire, at 6.4 percent, had the lowest percentage of residents below the poverty line. Mississippi had the highest rate at 25.2 percent.
Some information in this story came from an earlier story by staff writer Kevin Kittredge.
\ POVERTY IN VIRGINIA\ NUMBER OF POOR, PERCENTAGE OF POPULATION, NATIONAL RANK
LOCALITY POOR RATE RANK
Bath County 679 14.2 1,758
Bedford County 3,162 7.0 2,954
Bedford 927 16.4 1,351
Bland County 593 10.0 2,581
Botetourt County 1,511 6.2 3,013
Buchanan County 6,770 21.9 637
Buena Vista 870 14.4 1,712
Carroll County 3,694 14.1 1,785
Covington 909 13.1 2,000
Craig County 425 9.8 2,612
Danville 9,795 19.0 958
Dickenson County 4,518 25.9 374
Floyd County 1,673 14.0 1,808
Franklin County 4,228 11.1 2,363
Galax 1,200 18.8 984
Giles County 1,974 12.2 2,145
Grayson County 2,461 15.3 1,537
Henry County 5,241 9.3 2,697
Highland County 358 13.6 1,892
Lexington 853 18.2 1,065
Lynchburg 9,889 16.4 1,351
Martinsville 2,504 15.6 1,477
Montgomery County 14,381 22.1 623
Norton 1,132 26.7 337
Patrick County 2,352 13.6 1,892
Pulaski County 4,480 13.4 1,940
Radford 4,152 32.2 139
Roanoke County 3,164 4.1 3,106
Roanoke 15,238 16.1 1,395
Rockbridge County 2,460 13.6 1,892
Salem 1,116 5.2 3,067
Smyth County 5,219 16.7 1,296
Tazewell County 8,609 19.0 958
Wise County 8,439 21.6 666
Wythe County 4,375 17.5 1,175
Source - 1990 Census
Memo: shorter version ran in the Metro edition.