Poverty is becoming an issue of growing concern in Texoma as the Texoma Council of Governments, and other agencies, are seeing an increase in families below the poverty line in Grayson County.

Even with jobless numbers improve, the number of residents in Grayson County who fall under the poverty line has increased. This comes despite a decrease across the state.

The poverty rate across the state of Texas dipped to 14.7 percent, down from the previous year’s 15.6 percent, says a report by the U.S. Census Bureau. Grayson County, meanwhile, went from 12.5 percent in 2016 to 13.7 percent in 2017. Grayson County still remains lower than the state.

Things are even worse for Hispanics. The percentage of Hispanic residents in Grayson County in poverty was 32.5 percent, compared to 22.5 percent for the state.

The Salvation Army is one of the agencies in the county that provides assistance to people facing financial hardships.

B.K. Schlesinger, social services director for the Salvation Army of Grayson County, said she has been getting an increase in residents seeking assistance.

“We have had a good increase of people coming to the food bank. We are also dealing with more people needing help with utility payments,” Schlesinger said.

Among those who fell under the poverty category, 2.2 percent had worked full-time the entire 12-month period in the report. The rate of those who were below poverty and had not worked full time the entire 12 months was 32.3 percent.

Forty-five percent of those below the poverty line were classified as having not worked at all in Grayson County. The rate was 49 percent for the state.

Schlesinger provided some insight into why poverty could be increasing despite a low unemployment rate.

“While the jobless rate is very low, the jobs that are available are typically minimum wage jobs. Even at 40 hours a week, a minimum wage job will not pay for rent and utilities on a 1-bedroom apartment. That’s just not enough income. Our skilled labor force is doing really well. But if you are unskilled you are not going to be able to get the kind of job to have a comfortable living,” Schlesinger said.

More families impacted

Children are especially susceptible to the effects of poverty, Schlesinger said. In Grayson County, the percentage of children in poverty was 22.5 percent for children between the ages of 5-17. That is a significant increase from 15.3 percent in 2016. Statewide that number is 20.2 percent for children in the same age group. The U.S. Census Bureau uses various factors such as family size and income level to determine if an individual is considered below the poverty line.

“We are serving about the same number of children each year. I am concerned about making sure we have enough food from our food drive. For the first time ever, we have begun running short on things this year. We have had to supplement that food more than in the past,” Schlesinger said.

Annette Limoges, executive director for the Grayson County Shelter, said her agency is seeing an upward trend in families with children seeking assistance.

“We have been totally full for nearly a year-and-a-half. The length of time they stay is what has increased. We tell people we are a 21-day facility. In 2017 our average stay was closer to 48 days. We have also seen more families with children than from the previous year, an increase of 15 additional families,” Limoges said.

Limoges said the shelter has been at or near capacity for the last four years. She said the length people stay has increased in the last 18 months and is expected to follow the same trend into this year. For the first six months of 2018, those numbers were already higher than the previous year, suggesting things are still getting worse for some families.

TCOG recently addressed many of these concerns in their 2019 to 2021 needs survey. In that report TCOG recognized the increase in children in poverty, calling it alarming.

“This issue of child poverty is pervasive throughout the region. In fact, 22.4 percent of children in Grayson County live in poverty,” the report says. “One … trend found across all three counties is the percentage of age 18 to 34 years living in poverty; in the case of Grayson County, 19.4 percent. This trend is disturbing, as individuals in this age category are beginning careers, building families, and having children.”

There were two census tracts in Grayson County that had even higher rates than the average.

In Sherman, the region with the largest percentage of children in poverty lies on the easternmost side of the city. The poverty rate for children in that area was 46.3 percent, compared to the county’s 22.5 percent. The northernmost tract in the Denison are, which goes from the city limits to Lake Texoma, has a poverty rate for children at 43.5 percent. The TCOG report indicated the number of children in poverty was higher among single mothers with multiple children, and especially higher for Hispanic families.

Lack of affordable housing compounding problem

The TCOG report says affordable housing is a major problem people below the poverty line. The number of available, affordable housing options for low-income families hasn’t kept up with demand, the report said. Specifically, TCOG believed better educated, upward mobile workers were moving into the county, increasing the demand for homes while also pushing up rental rates.

Limoges said she has been having difficulty finding permanent homes for several of those staying at the shelter. Schlesinger echoed that sentiment saying the Salvation Army has been struggling to find affordable homes for a lot of the families seeking assistance due to a shortage of low-income housing in the county.

According to the census data, the number of men in the 35 to 64 age group in poverty had increased from 10.5 percent in 2016 to 11.8 percent last year. This is also a reversal of the state’s downward trend, from 11.4 percent in 2016 to 10.7 percent last year.

“Our largest number of homeless adults are men age 45-65; we are also seeing an increase in the 18-22 range who are homeless,” Schlesinger said.

Right now, Limoges said the shelter has been seeing an increase of individuals from out of state, and the shelter is preparing to see more following the hurricane evacuations.

Source: https://www.heralddemocrat.com/news/20181007/as-texas-rate-trends-downward-poverty-rate-up-in-grayson-county

Healthcare and mental health needs are the biggest challenge facing impoverished Cooke County residents, according to an analysis of community needs released late last week by the Texoma Council of Governments.

The regional council released its 2019-2021 Community Needs Assessment Aug. 23. In it, five major areas are listed for each of the region’s three counties — Cooke, Grayson and Fannin. The report is meant to help form a more complete picture of poverty in the Texoma region so as to better address it.

After healthcare and mental health services, Cooke County’s other four greatest needs include utility assistance, transportation, affordable housing and food, according to the report’s executive summary.

The needs were derived from studying census and demographic data as well as from conversations with focus groups in each area.

Though the nature of Cooke County’s poverty was no surprise, finding out where impoverished families were located did help TCOG leaders understand the area better.

“We were a little bit surprised by how concentrated it seemed to be in Gainesville,” Randy McBroom, TCOG deputy executive director, said. “We kept looking at different indicators and they kept showing up the same couple of census areas over there. So it was a little bit surprising in that. I thought it would possibly be spread out more.”

Poverty, especially child poverty, was concentrated in central and south Gainesville, TCOG found through studying census estimates. About 55 percent of children living in one tract in south Gainesville extending into unincorporated area are impoverished, while another tract in central Gainesville has one of the three-county area’s highest concentrations of impoverished children, 64 percent. Less than a quarter of children living in east or west Gainesville are in poverty, according to the estimates.

Overall, McBroom said, Cooke County is doing about average for Texas.

“Just because these areas have some higher rates of poverty doesn’t necessarily mean they’re blighted areas or something like that,” McBroom said. “These are aggregates… but it helps us to get ideas of trends, who is more likely to be in poverty and where they’re more likely to live.”

In Gainesville as well as across the region, children are more likely to be in poverty than other ages. Children in female-headed households are especially vulnerable, according to the report.

Established in 1968, the Texoma Council of Governments promotes economy and efficiency in the coordinated planning and development of the tri-county region through its community and economic development activities, according to a press release about the report.

Either directly, or through contractors, the Council provides housing, utility assistance, and weatherization services for low-income citizens in the region and assists the elderly through a variety of Area Agency on Aging programs.

The full Community Needs Assessment is posted on the TCOG website at www.tcog.com.

Source: http://www.gainesvilleregister.com/news/local_news/healthcare-among-challenges-for-area-s-impoverished/article_147241d6-ad6f-11e8-b143-3f07ffc61265.html

SHERMAN, August 23, 2018 –Texoma Council of Governments (TCOG) announced it has published an updated regional needs assessment for Cooke, Fannin and Grayson counties. This report contains information as it relates to poverty, housing and employment, along with survey and focus group data. The needs assessment follows guidelines set forth by the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs and is funded through a Community Services Block Grant designed to identify priority populations and issues in the TCOG service area. The assessment is revised every three years.

“We hope the results of this needs assessment clearly demonstrate the conditions and correlates of poverty in each county within the Texoma region, as well as the region as a whole,” explained Dr. Randy McBroom, Deputy Executive Director of TCOG. “We take the process and the accompanying results very seriously. The Community Needs Assessment is more than a check-off or a placeholder for a grant application.”

Data sources for this assessment included the US Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, 2012–2016 (ACS 2016), with 2016 estimates used whenever possible, as well as Community Commons maps, with data usually from the ACS 2016. The study took two overlapping approaches to understand poverty in the region: demographic (who is more likely to be in poverty) and geographic (where are higher rates of poverty).

The report shows that while aggregate data for poverty does not differ much from Texas and US figures, a different and more concise picture of poverty in the region emerges when disaggregated by age, race/ethnicity, education level and family composition. The report identifies that children under five are most vulnerable to living in poverty, with a prevalence of childhood poverty common in all three counties. Poverty rates are higher for people of color and female-headed families. There are “pockets of poverty” throughout the region.

After analyzing the data, TCOG reports five major needs categories including medical/mental health, housing issues, transportation issues, utility assistance, and food insecurity. The assessment concludes with county strengths and weaknesses, trends, barriers to addressing needs, prioritized needs and suggested actions.

A full report of the Regional Community Needs Assessment can found online by visiting www.tcog.com.

The Texoma Council of Governments is a voluntary association of the local governments in Cooke, Fannin, and Grayson Counties. Established in 1968, the Texoma Council of Governments promotes economy and efficiency in the coordinated planning and development of the tri-county region through its community and economic development activities. Either directly, or through contractors, the Council provides housing, utility assistance, and weatherization services for low-income citizens in the region and assists the elderly through a variety of Area Agency on Aging programs. The Council also facilitates the delivery of grant funding for homeland security and criminal justice.

This 2018 Community Needs Assessment was conducted following guidelines set forth by the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs; however, additional information on poverty is included in the report so that there is a more complete picture of poverty in the Texoma Region, and in Cooke, Fannin, and Grayson Counties. The Texoma region consists of these three counties in north-central Texas. Grayson is the most populous and most urban, while Cooke and Fannin counties have a smaller population and are more rural.

A mixed-methods approach was used to collect data for this assessment. These methods were both qualitative (TCOG Client Lifecycle study, focus groups), and quantitative (US Census data, an organization survey, and regional 2-1-1 call assistance data). Data sources for this assessment include the US Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, 2012–2016 (ACS 2016), with 2016 estimates used whenever possible, as well as Community Commons maps, with data usually from the ACS 2016.

The data indicate five major needs for the region, and for each county. These needs are 1) medical/mental health care providers and facilities, and more access to those that exist in the region; 2) safe, affordable, adequate housing; 3) available, accessible, reliable and affordable transportation (both public and private); 4) additional resources/programs that provide utility assistance, especially emergency assistance; and, 5) available, nutritious, affordable food (food insecurity and food deserts). Needs stemming from childhood poverty and the availability and access to early childhood education also are noted as needs. County needs are prioritized somewhat differently (below).

The Assessment concludes with county strengths and weaknesses, trends, barriers to addressing needs, prioritized needs and suggested actions.