Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, June 2, 1994 TAG: 9406020063
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KAREN SAMPLES KNIGHT-RIDDER-TRIBUNE
DATELINE: PINEVILLE, KY. LENGTH: Long
You look at that picture, and you think: Nice kids. They couldn't possibly hurt anyone's feelings.
Accidentally, though, they did.
During a spring visit to Bell County, the teen-agers repaired some leaking roofs, made some friends and started seeing their own lives differently. Then they went back to Ohio, full of enthusiasm, and a newspaper near Cleveland wrote this:
"While there, church members repaired primitive homes, some unfit for animals, and came back with thankful hearts.
```Residents of the mountainous area are elderly, often handicapped people who refuse to leave the huts that were built by their great-grandparents. They have no money or materials, and they usually don't have the physical capabilities to repair their homes,' said Sacred Heart's youth minister, Andy Andino.''
The story went on. People were falling through their rotten floorboards. Homes often were without electricity or running water. Some were filled with "huge bees and wasps."
The reaction in Bell County and surroundings: Ouch.
Pineville's mayor called the story untrue and insulting, partly because it named his city as the group's destination. He wrote an angry letter to the Ohio newspaper, the [Lorain] Morning Journal, and he plans to go there if it's not printed. The City Council voted this month to pay his way.
The Pineville Sun's publisher called the story a cheap replay of the usual stereotypes.
For the Morning Journal, the piece was a simple feature on young people doing some good.
"I would think the story the [reporter] wrote would be based on what she was told," day city editor Joanne Allen said. "Not so much thinking of what repercussions it might have or how it might come across."
Church representatives say they never intended to hurt anyone. They genuinely care about the people they've helped, and if the homes were described in vivid terms, it was partly to illustrate the need for another visit, Andino said. The church depends on grants and donations to pay for the trip.
In recent months, a surge of hand-wringing over the "hillbilly image" has made it especially difficult to say the right thing.
The mayor of Hazard blasted a noted historian for describing Appalachian stereotypes in The Washington Post. A panel at the Eastern Kentucky Leadership Conference talked of an anti-defamation league for the mountains.
Now Pineville's mayor has gone on the offensive. He doesn't deny the poverty, he says, but stories should be more balanced and less condescending.
The controversy also raises a broader question.
Do outsiders, in their role as volunteer workers, have the right to tell the truth- or the truth as they see it- about poverty in Appalachia? Are they obligated to talk about the wealth and the middle-class normalcy, too?
The Ohio story doesn't bother Margaret Messer of Middlesboro.
Several years ago, the same church group repaired her leaking roof and rebuilt her back porch. The story was at least partly accurate, Messer said: Dripping water had rotted some of her floors, and in the bedroom a dresser already had fallen through.
To Messer, the way she was treated is more important than a few words in a newspaper. Even if they did tell a reporter all about it, she can't criticize the teen-agers.
"Lord, they were the nicest people I ever met," Messer said. "They just worked, and they were friendly. Every time they're down in this area, they come back."
Nobody in Bell County or Pineville was offering to help, Messer said, so how can they be complaining now?
In some ways, the controversy is about goals: those of the civic boosters, and those of religious leaders. The boosters want more industry in the region, and they see grim stories as a hindrance. Church organizers are more focused on immediate needs.
"The thing I'm concerned about is that we don't discourage these groups from coming," said Richard Witheride of Interfaith, the organization that was host to the Ohio youths.
While urging volunteers to come, some organizations do ask them not to say much when they get back home.
The Appalachia Service Project, based in Tennessee, recruits hundreds of volunteers each summer. Before they start repairing homes, each group goes through an extensive orientation.
One handout in the volunteer packet is titled "Writing an Article. Please be Careful!"
Workers are given this advice: If your hometown newspaper publishes a story about your trip, the story should not include any information about the families you helped, generalizations about the area or people, or any "facts and statistics about the area."
A story without facts?
"Sounds like a gag order," said Dee Davis, a filmmaker and media critic at Appalshop in Whitesburg.
That's not the intent, said Carolynn Bailey of ASP headquarters. She was not aware of the no-facts dictum and said the handout probably was outdated.
"I think you have to be careful that you don't put people down, that you don't condemn them," Bailey said. "Everybody wants to feel like they have a sense of pride in where they live."
by CNB