Deep Roots, Deeper Commitment
The Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) defines Appalachia as the 205,000-square-mile region that follows the spine of the Appalachian Mountains from southern New York to northern Mississippi. It includes all of West Virginia and parts of 12 other states: Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Maryland, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. 42 percent of the Region’s population is rural, ARC reports, compared with 20 percent of the national population.
According to ARC, Appalachia has come a long way in the past 50 years: its poverty rate, 31 percent in 1960, was 17.2 percent over the 2010–2014 period. The number of high-poverty counties in the Region (those with poverty rates more than 1.5 times the U.S. average) declined from 295 in 1960 to 91 during 2010–2014.
But the Region, while improving, has many areas that remain in great need. The Jones family has deep roots in rural Kentucky and Eastern Tennessee and has experienced firsthand the abject poverty and hopelessness endured by many families in the rural Appalachia towns and countryside from which their families first came. As a result, the D. Jones Family Charitable Foundation has created a special gifting initiative intended to provide support to organizations that are actively working to improve the lives and well being of the people of Appalachia.