South Georgian wants to rally voices for an underheard constituency

Influential individuals and interests, lobbyists who represent them, and politicians who can craft policies advantageous to them are accustomed to the trappings of power and privilege.

The high-altitude (both literally and metaphorically) Commerce Club in downtown Atlanta is the kind of place where such trappings are familiar, and where lobbying efforts like those of Franklin Richards generally are not — at least until recently.

As reported earlier this week by Johnny Kauffman of WABE, the National Public Radio affiliate in Atlanta, Richards was a pretty long drive from home when he spent most of a recent day at meetings in the high-rise environs of the Commerce Club. Richards, of Valdosta, heads the Second Harvest Food Bank of South Georgia, which distributes food to poor people over a 30-county region. He had come to the capital to seek professional lobbying and consultant help on another project dedicated to the needs of rural areas, something he and others in Second Harvest call the Rural America Initiative.

Effective advocacy for constituencies short on economic or political clout is a challenge, to say the least. An organization like Alabama Arise, which depends on donations, foundations and faith community support, is about as close as it comes to a lobby for the poor and underserved. Likewise, as Johnathan Hladik of the Center for Rural Affairs in Nebraska told WABE, there aren’t many advocates for the “average rural person.”

Still, the Food Bank leader from Valdosta wants to broaden the public and political vision of what needs addressing in rural south Georgia, and ideally across the rural United States.

“We’re not in the business of just always feeding hungry people,” Richards told WABE. He said such needs as water, health care, jobs, broadband and infrastructure are critical: “We want to be at the table saying, 'OK, if this is what you’re looking at doing, let us tell you how that’s going to affect rural America.'"

The WABE story notes that the RAI agenda does not include agriculture, which is already well represented by lobbies. The Department of Agriculture — now headed by Georgian Sonny Perdue — oversees the federal food assistance program. Ironically, or so it might seem, USDA food programs aren’t always effective in rural areas, Richards said, pointing to summer meal programs for children that don’t take into account sparse populations and long distances (with related transportation costs) to distribution sites.

Those are the kinds of considerations on which Richards hopes the Rural America Initiative will focus political attention.

"Every time a lawmaker is looking at doing something,” Richards told WABE, “we're hoping we become that phone call that they make and say, ‘Hey Frank, what does this look like in rural South Georgia if we do this?’”

Rural America Initiative isn’t likely to treat lawmakers to golf weekends at St. Simons or luxury boxes at Falcons games, or even lunches at the Commerce Club. But this is a good start.

This story was originally published August 24, 2017 at 5:07 PM with the headline "South Georgian wants to rally voices for an underheard constituency."