Nashua Telegraph, Friday January 12, 2007

							Nashua Telegraph, Friday January 12, 2007

Study reveals 1 in 10 children living in poverty in New Hampshire
By Kevin Landrigan, Telegraph Staff

ENLARGE PHOTO                                  Hundreds of children are in poverty-stricken families a short
Staff photo by Corey Perrine                   drive from some of the Nashua’s most affluent, well-
Stephen Michon of The Dignitas Group of        manicured neighborhoods.
Nashua analyzed much of the data that
went into the Kids Count report. The study     Authors and experts say the 2007 edition of the Kids Count
highlights child poverty and New               book offers this as one striking example of the “two
Hampshire’s divide between the poor and        economies’’ that exist in New Hampshire – the average one
the wealthy. The closing of Batesville         that’s high-income, well-educated and glowing that obscures
Casket Co., shown behind him, last year        the other: poor, under-educated and struggling.
is an example of the erosion of middle-
wage jobs in the community, he said.           Stephen Michon is senior partner of The Dignitas Group,
Order this photo                               which did critical data analyses for the Children Alliance of
                                               New Hampshire, producer of the annual Kids Count.

“People always refer to the North Country, and it’s a struggling place. I was stunned myself to learn in
Wards 6 and 7 in Nashua, just outside the downtown, there are more children living in poverty than in all
of Coos County,” said Michon, a former Democratic legislator.

“Nashua is relatively well off, but there are pockets of high child poverty in it.”

For example, New Hampshire has, on average, 18 percent of its children receiving a free or reduced-
price lunch due to the family’s low income.

At Dr. Norman W. Crisp Elementary School in Nashua, 74 percent of children get the subsidized lunch.
The rates at Ledge Street School (69 percent) and Amherst Street School (66 percent) are nearly as
high.The report includes several signs that despite New Hampshire’s relative wealth – sixth highest in the
country in per capita income – the number of families with serious financial problems are growing.

They concluded one in 10 New Hampshire children, or 28,000, are living in poverty that the federal
government defines as a family of three that earns no more than $16,090 a year.

The rate has doubled in the past five years.

Children who live with a single parent make up a staggering 68 percent of the children who live in poverty.

Real, median family income has declined 10 percent over the same period of time.

“There has been a significant increase in the financial pressure and financial pain for children across this
state,” said Ellen Shemitz, president of the Children’s Alliance.

“Child poverty is not getting better, it’s getting worse.”

The Children’s Alliance will release Tuesday its action agenda on issues for the Legislature to consider.

Support for more state aid to income and property-poor school districts is likely to be on the list.

“We haven’t achieved educational opportunity in all schools,” said Dr. Grant Cioffi, education professor at
the University of New Hampshire and a contributing expert to the project.
“As much as people don’t want to hear that, it remains a funding issue.”

What’s unique about this edition is it examines and ranks all 233 communities on a well-being index
based on seven factors ranging from child death, school dropout and teen birth rates to median family
income and the percentage of single-parent households.

The Telegraph obtained a spreadsheet that broke down further than the report itself the relative well
being of area communities.

Locally, Amherst (2), Hollis (3), Brookline (5) and Mont Vernon (7) all rank near the top. Hanover, the
Upper Valley home of Dartmouth College, leads the state.

Nashua’s ranking at 171st is the lowest and would be in the bottom 20 percent of communities except its
median income of $61,000 is well above the statewide average of $55,000, Michon said.

The North County town of Stratford ranked last at 233rd.

“Fundamentally, we are talking about the tale of two economies, and in Nashua they both exist, the
affluent and those really having a hard time getting by,” Michon observed.

The statewide average of single-parent households is 19 percent. Nashua has a third more than that with
26 percent.

Nashua’s most recent teen birth rate was 50 percent higher than the statewide average.

There were 1,904 Nashua children living in poverty, and the rate is almost what is found in the typical
community.

Catherine McDowell, executive director of the Family Resource Center in Gorham said this town-by-town
analysis explodes the myth that all of New Hampshire’s children live in a reality where everyone is above
average.

“The data about New Hampshire at the aggregate is very positive. It’s rosy,” McDowell said.

“There are pockets like the North Country and elsewhere where there is real dire poverty, and we are not
addressing it.”

Rep. Tim Robertson, D-Keene, supports an income tax and called on these child advocates to press for
one as the solution.

“Most of this is driven by a lack of money,” Robertson said.

“We all know how to solve this. We just haven’t got the guts. We need people like you to give us a little
backbone.”

University of New Hampshire’s Whittemore School of Business professor and economist Ross Gittell said
change lies in changing the words used in political debate.

His closing words won applause from the St. Paul’s Church Center crowd of policymakers and advocates
invited to get the first glimpse at the report.

“We have to change the discourse. It has been how do we limit state spending. The dialogue should be
how should we invest in our children,” Gittell said.
Kevin Landrigan can be reached at 224-8804 or klandrigan@nashuatelegraph.com.