Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, January 5, 1995 TAG: 9501070060
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: EDWIN R. FEINOUR
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
During the holiday season, many of us enjoyed the rerun of the Hollywood classic "It's A Wonderful Life." A local banker faces the destruction of everything he has built and the devastating impact this will have on his family and friends. He wonders about the worth of his life and whether he has made any impact on the world. He contemplates suicide, but instead meets an angel who shows him what his family's life would have been like had he not existed.
In so many ways, even after 29 years, TAP remains one of the best untold stories in the Roanoke Valley. The TAP story is known best to those whose lives have been touched and changed by TAP opportunities and caring support, while most of the valley residents are not aware of even a portion of the TAP impact in our community. Books on Roanoke's history omit TAP. Too many might assume that there would be little difference in our valley today if TAP had not been here.
If TAP had not been here, who would have reached out annually to more than 8,000 low-income people to help them toward self-sufficiency through education, health care, decent and affordable housing and employment? Who would have provided a Head Start experience for 17,000 children, remedial education for 4,120 dropouts, and employment training and placement for yet another 11,483 persons?
Who would have had the manpower and resources to start Legal Aid, The Southwest Virginia Development Fund, the Blue Ridge Housing and Development Corp. and the Southwest Virginia Second Harvest Food Bank?
Who would have listened to the rural residents' plea for potable water and indoor plumbing and been able to develop the Virginia Water Project, which has brought safe water and waste systems to more than 45,000 households in Virginia? Which organization would have tackled the problem of helping 27,930 former prison inmates start a new crime-free life had not TAP developed Virginia CARES? Who would have brought together local colleges and school systems to start Project Discovery, which has assisted 7,540 low-income and minority students to seek post-secondary education when college enrollment of these groups was in decline? What would have been the impetus for bringing together the Health Department and private physicians to begin the Comprehensive Health Investment Program, which now has served 2,097 children in the Roanoke Valley with primary-care services?
What would the 1,600 homeless people served by the Transitional Living Center have done if TAP had not existed? Where would they have gone and where would they be now? Which organization would have filled the gap and started services that assisted 6,400 abused women and children had not TAP begun the valley's first Women's Center? To whom would these desperate families have turned?
For sure there would be no Henry Street Music Center and less hope for a revitalized Henry Street. The Harrison School surely would have been bulldozed and the Harrison Museum for African-American Culture would not exist, nor the annual Henry Street festival enjoyed by tens of thousands each year. There would still be drug dealers and pushers dominating the 19th and Melrose shopping center instead of a neighborhood grocery, pharmacy and retail store.
In all likelihood, Roanoke would not be known today for the level of networking and interagency cooperation had TAP not been here. The nature of this local, private agency is to network, to build bridges, to coordinate and cooperate, to make a difference for those who cannot do so with their one voice alone. Its public-private partners include local banks, the Department of Social Services, churches, the Fifth District Employment and Training Consortium, local governments and their various departments, and state department affiliations such as education, health, housing and community development and criminal justice services.
Roanoke has been known for its positive level of race relations. Due credit is frequently given area leaders during desegregation. But what if TAP had not been there to conduct human-relations training with youngsters in the schools during the desegregation process? If TAP had not organized low-income and minority communities to address their concerns with words rather than actions? If TAP had not been there as a model equal-opportunity employer?
Over 29 years, TAP has brought more than $200 million into the Roanoke economy to help provide opportunities for low-income citizens. More than 20 percent of those resources went into the pockets of participants as training stipends and wages. Forty percent went to area vendors to buy vehicles, office equipment, building supplies and more. That $80 million provided $160 million of economic activity in the valley. What would the difference of subtracting that amount of economic activity have meant for the entire community? Who would have paid for the multimillion dollars in cost savings by helping people stand on their own two feet and take charge of their own lives?
As we enter 1995, it is important that TAP be kept on the area agenda. It is important that the Community Service Block Grant, which provides TAP's actual core funding, be protected. These critical dollars, amounting to approximately $650,000 a year, are leveraged by TAP into a $10 million budget. It is important that we all seek to support TAP as well with our dollars, our time and our prayers.
Welfare reform is on the top of the agenda for 1995. Welfare reform means equipping families to earn their own way and become productive, tax-paying citizens. That has been TAP's primary goal through three decades. TAP is and always has been welfare reform. That has been and will continue to be TAP's contract with the Roanoke Valley.
Living in the Roanoke Valley for most of us is a wonderful life. That wonderful life has in no small way been the result of TAP's impact on the 11 jurisdictions in this Southwest Virginia service area.
Edwin R. Feinour, an investment counselor in Roanoke, is a member of TAP's board of directors.
by CNB