Fighting poverty remains tall task, By Erin Rhoda, February 12, 2012, Kennebec Journal: “Scott Labbe, 63, is a retired, former business owner who has lived in Madison for 40 years. When he first moved to town, there were four appliance stores, three stores selling televisions and four furniture stores, he said. One of those stores, Scott’s Appliance, was his. People in Somerset County were not wealthy — he recalled once trading a washer for half a slaughtered cow — but they made a living. Now, he questions how people in Madison and Somerset County make ends meet, considering the shortage of good jobs in comparison to housing payments, food costs, fuel for the car and the expenses that come with raising children. Labbe is on the mark — a recent report says nearly one in five people in Somerset live in poverty. Of the county’s 52,200 residents, 9,700 people, or 18.6 percent, live below the poverty line…”
Poverty-related issues in the news, from the Institute for Research on Poverty