Memphian works hard to help women get out of poverty

By Jane Roberts (Contact)
The Commercial Appeal
Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Around the world today, poverty is in the spotlight, thanks to a 1993 United Nations proclamation that set aside one day a year to look at its effects and root causes.

In Memphis, the image of poverty is very similar to the faces of the poor in every developing country and urban center in the world: It is overwhelmingly female, for one thing, and it includes countless dependent children.

Nikki Boertman/The Commercial Appeal

Today, she is in Amsterdam, chairing her first meeting of the Women's Funding Network, an international group of philanthropists dedicated to helping women achieve self-sufficiency and their own brand of philanthropy.

She was elected chairman, in part because the work the Women's Foundation is doing to help women in public housing here has made Memphis a national model for dealing with the kind of poverty that cripples women and eventually whole communities.

"Eighty percent of people in poverty in Memphis and Shelby County are women and children," Bright said. "When you look at those who are in the greatest need and challenged in various ways, it will be the face of a woman at almost any age."

Over five years, the foundation has committed to raise $7.3 million to help residents of the former Dixie Homes and Lamar Terrace -- 90 percent of whom are single mothers -- get job training and find support networks.

"What makes the difference is what we do with the people's lives," said Robert Lipscomb, director of Memphis Housing Authority, which is spending in excess of $170 million to rebuild the gutted public-housing communities."We can redevelop the land and buildings, but we have to make sure the human capital is redeveloped as well."When the city has built other housing, including College Park in the LeMoyne-Owen neighborhood, federal and state grants covered child care and job assistance. The new housing grants did not.

When Lipscomb approached the Women's Foundation through board member Gayle Rose, "they stepped forward like no one else," he said."They've helped raise the money and taken on a much broader role as far as mentoring. It's a great partnership."In two years, the group has raised about $4.9 million from local philanthropists, including $3 million from the Methodist Foundation, which also pledged to hire 100 residents."

The project Robert was laying out was a transformative model, with partnerships at every level," Rose said. "I felt like it would really match the Women's Foundation mission."

Rose is a charter member of the Women's Foundation, started by philanthropist Mertie Buckman in 1995 as a way to help women specifically, but also to increase the level of female-led philanthropy in the community.

Last week, the foundation gave $519,000 in its annual grants to Memphis groups that help women and girls, a record. The number of donors has grown from 300 to more than 2,000.

Bright is surely aware of the impact. When she drives through the new public-housing areas off I-240 and Poplar, her eyes water with possibility.

"We've purposefully worked too save these trees," she says as she gives prospective donors a tour in the shade-dappled light of the new construction, including Phase I of University Place, opening in early 2008.

"We're committed to surrounding these women with what they need to be successful, from job skills to a network of friends."

When people ask why she has made women the center of her work, she answers with the voice of a diplomat.

"Because women make sustaining, healthy communities a real possibility. They care, they are involved.

"Helping is in our DNA; we are wired this way. It's a natural part of our action, like being a mother."