ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, November 15, 1996 TAG: 9611150035
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: ROBERT FREIS STAFF WRITER
Montgomery County faces a dismal social services paradox of more needy people and fewer helping hands, a newly released report says.
The various stresses of modern life, an aging population, changes in the workplace and shifting of financial responsibility for social services from national to local governments have combined to stretch local resources to the breaking point.
Even in Southwest Virginia's most prosperous county, the Montgomery County Human Services Commission says poverty is up 33 percent over the past decade, driving deeper wedges between the haves and have-nots.
Traditional means of caring for family members and neighbors are disappearing. Community groups, churches, volunteers and social service agencies are finding they cannot fill the void.
The report, presented Wednesday to the county Board of Supervisors, poses a formidable dilemma for local leaders who must decide how to achieve more with less, said Stephania Munson, director of county Human Services.
"These are hard, tough decisions."
Within the 64-page report are a number of examples of how the local safety net is fraying:
* Montgomery County's Community Shelter for the homeless says it is meeting only 25 percent of the local need for emergency housing. Also, families housed in the shelter are st aying twice as long -six months on average -because they can't find jobs that pay above minimum wage.
*Legal Aid Society of the New River Valley served 1,900 clients during the past year but had to turn away about 1,300 others it couldn't handle. Now, with federal sources of funding drying up, Legal Aid may have to ask local governments for money for the first time.
* Big Brothers/Big Sisters of the New River Valley has many more children to be matched than they have adult volunteers. Volunteers are already "stressed and stretched," many because of job insecurities. The agency also says it is seeing more children of parents who are in jail and more families with children of "multiple fathers."
* United Way of Montgomery, Radford & Floyd says more agencies are seeking private donations as government sources of funding end. Presently United Way provides financial support for 36 agencies, an "unusually large number" for its size, and 10 others are on the waiting list.
* The Free Clinic of the New River Valley says it sees a number of depressed and suicidal people overwrought because of "lack of resources and inadequate income." The Mental Health Association of the New River Valley says the local rate of depression and anxiety is "startling."
* Consumer Credit Counseling Service saw an 18 percent increase in clients during the first six months of 1996. Many are "young, educated people who have gotten themselves into indebtedness that will take many years to rectify."
* "The pace of life has speeded up," said the 27th District Juvenile & Domestic Court Services Unit. "Adolescents have cars, they're hard to control, more activities, stress on kids to learn faster and learn more, and social challenges are greater. Families seen by Court Services Unit often are financially poor, and often their children are acting out their anger about this."
* New River Valley Area Agency on Aging said social services agencies would generate more clients if the agencies were better known. "But if you are too visible people demand more services than you can financially provide."
* New River Community Action has waiting lists for programs such as Head Start, and says low-income clients feel "a sense of panic" over welfare reform. The attitude that problems of the poor can be adequately met through work by churches and private organizations is outdated, because those resources have been "accessed to the maximum extent possible."
Munson said she's most concerned about the fate of two local groups: the indigent elderly and "working poor" families with children.
The county Department of Social Service's Adult Protective Services reports an increasing number of investigations of complaints involving the elderly, many of them involving isolated or frail older citizens. The agency's caseload is comparable to those of much larger communities such as Fairfax or Norfolk, the report says.
The number of "working poor" has grown over the past 15 years, as the local economy has phased from full-time employment to part-time jobs without benefits, the report says. "For the working poor, with health care costs and fees for child care, how does someone who earns minimum wage who has a child pay for even minimal health care?"
"Perhaps the most outstanding need is job training for positions with the potential to pay people a decent wage," the report says, adding that fast-food jobs are readily available but do not provide workers with enough weekly hours for health insurance or other benefits.
Members of the Board of Supervisors received the report with little comment.
"How are we going to handle the increased need for services? Good question," Board Member Mary Biggs said.
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