Rural Ga. Hasn’t Just Lost Tons Of Jobs; It Lost Well-Paying Ones

Rural Georgia hasn’t just lost tons of jobs, it has lost the well-paying ones

Sharona Holmes waits for food pantry volunteers to pass her a bag of nonperishable groceries from behind a counter at what used to be a small storefront in Berrien County, Georgia, about four hours south of Atlanta down I-75.

There’s barely room for a single refrigerator at the Caring Place food pantry, and volunteers squeeze past each other to help people who come inside.

Holmes will get some canned potatoes, peanut butter and boxed mac and cheese, but she’s most excited about the grits.

“There ain’t nothing beating them jokers right there,” she says, pointing to a 10-pound bag of the small, white granules. “I’m telling you, my babies love it because it don’t take very long for them to get done.”

Holmes cares for her two grandchildren and says with some butter, salt and pepper on top, the grits make for a quick, affordable snack.

Recently, Holmes has gotten regular, monthly help with groceries from the food pantry.

She works for $7.25 an hour at a nearby Subway and says the minimum wage isn’t enough.

“What does that pay? That don’t even pay your rent,” a visibly frustrated Holmes says. “By the time you do that, the doggone lights is due, then your water is due, and when you got time for gas or food — at the least, gas or food — or toilet tissue? I mean, do the math. It ain’t there.”

Holmes worked better-paying jobs on a nearby blueberry farm, and in a few factories, making $10 or $11 an hour, but then her hand got smashed at a timber mill.

Holmes says she doesn’t have health insurance and can’t afford to see a doctor.

“If I go to the doctor, they’re going to find a billion things wrong with me. They’re going to put me on a bunch of medication that I cannot afford. So, then I’m going to be upset about not being able to afford it. Why can’t I just live happy? Get a stomachache take Pepto. You get a virus, drink some Gatorade.”

A food pantry volunteer puts donated clothes on a plastic hanger nearby. Growing increasingly exasperated about her health care situation, Holmes continues.

“Start out with a stomachache, and, before you know it, you’re dying of cancer. And you’re poor. You can’t afford this stuff they want you to do. Then you get depressed, you can’t even live happy no more. So, why not just take care of what needs to be taken care of. Live your life. When you do die it is your time to go, whether the doctor says you’re dying or not, it’s your time to go. Why can’t I live life without worrying about all that?”

Holmes has been applying to jobs that pay more than Subway and could make her health care more affordable, but they’ve become harder to find

That’s because in just seven years, between 2007 and 2014, Berrien County lost over a quarter of its jobs.

Much of rural Georgia is aching for jobs that pay even just a few dollars above minimum wage. The companies that shrunk, or moved away during that seven-year-period offered the kind of jobs that can make someone middle or upper class. The kind of jobs Holmes is hoping to find.

The Beginning Of The Decline

In Berrien County the economic decline began in the ’70s, when the tobacco industry slowed.

“Just about anybody that grew up here in this community was involved in tobacco,” says Bryan Shaw, sitting at a cluttered desk in the old Berrien County Courthouse surrounded by maps and file cabinets.

The volunteer with the local historical society looks at some old photos of the square around the courthouse when it was packed with people, and hundreds of cars.

“They’d have a big drawing at the end of the tobacco season and they’d give away a new truck and that brought in the whole — I mean all those farmers and all their families,” Shaw said.

Today, it’s hard to find someone walking on the square, passing the few remaining businesses.  Even during rush hour, only a few semi-trucks and cars pass through.

A luxury boat company, the school system, and the nearby Moody Air Force Base create most of the county’s jobs.

This downtown is probably not where the jobs will come back.

“They Don’t Even Help Us Out At All”

About a mile outside of town, Nick Lacey puts his hope in 50 acres of dirt.

“There’ll be a road in here; there’ll be an asphalt road. And we’ll sow it with grass so it doesn’t erode,” Lacey says, pointing across the flat piece of land. A backhoe sits idle about 50 feet from the road.

Lacey heads the Berrien County Development Authority. It’s turning the land into an industrial park.

In 10 years, Lacey hopes factories will cover all this dirt. Factories that would probably pay workers more than minimum wage.

But first, the county has to get that road and other infrastructure set up.

Only then, will Berrien County be on the state’s list of places it sends companies that want to open up in Georgia.

“They don’t even help us out at all, and I don’t blame them,” Lacey says. “’Cause we weren’t doing what we should have been doing. And now we’re getting to the point where we’re doing what we should be doing, and what we should’ve done 10 years ago.”

Lacey says a lot of factors keep rural areas like Berrien County behind: the tax structure, a lack of health care and slow Internet are just a few. He says too much money and too many people are moving to urban areas.

“Young people are moving to places like Atlanta because that’s where the jobs are really being created,” he says.

Lacey just hopes he has something to celebrate eventually, maybe on these 50 acres of dirt.

Holmes, the woman who works at Subway, is hoping some new factories will come to Berrien County and give her a better-paying job.

Holmes says she’ll keep leaning on her family as she works to survive on $7.25 an hour.

“We kind of inspire each other to keep each other going, but it’s hard. It’s hard, and a lot of people don’t have the willpower to keep going,” she says.

While she may not love her job, Holmes says it’s the job that’s available, and she’ll do whatever she can to keep it.