The coastland times. [volume] (Mnateo [i.e. Manteo], N.C.) 1947-1959, 1959-02-13
COUNTY
REPORT
DAVID STICK
Dure County Commissioner,
Atomic township

Dare County Commissioner,
Atomic township
Because so much of the time at
the regular monthly meetings of
the Board of Commissioners has to
| be devoted to routine matters, the
new Board has found it necessary
to hold special meetings from time
to time in order to learn how each
of the county departments oper-
ates.
Last Saturday the Board met for
several hours with Mrs. Goldie
Meekins, County Superintendent of
Welfare, and for the first time the
new members We're able to get
some insight into the complex well
fare program:
i. To me it was a discouraging ex-
perience, for it develops that an
average of one out of every ten
permanent residents of Dare
County received Welfare assist
ance last year, and that total of
approximately $150,000.00 was
spent over the twelve-month period
for the welfare program in this
one small county.
The Welfare program as it now
exists is an outgrowth of what
was known during the years of
North Cardinals growth as the
"pauper rolls" or "poor relief"
The original idea was that county
money would be used to provide
the bare necessities of life to those
individuals who because of illness,
accident or similar ill luck were in
dire need of food, clothing or shell
ter. During the depression of the
1905, however, the Federal Gov
eminent assumed a share of the
responsibility for caring for desti-
tute people, and since then a vast
complex of related welfare serv-
ices has grown up, with the Fed
eral, State and local governments
sharing the expense.
Many improvements have result
} ed from this organized program.
Standards have been established
for determining how much as
sistance is needed in a given set of
circumstances. The administration
has been taken away from the
realm of politics and turned over
to professional welfare workers. AS
a result it is probable that we will
never again see a situation in
which Americans by the thousands
are destitute and dying from want
of the bare necessities.
But there is another side to this,
by which the disadvantages
threaten in time to offset the i'm
provements. For whereas in earlier
days there was a general feeling
of shame at being on the pauper
rolls, and people accepted poor re-
lief only as last resort, we have
now reached point where many
, people seek relief and look on well
fare assistance as an inalienable
and permanent right instead of a
temporary program of assistance
to tide over the lean periods.
l have long believed in what
choose to call the integrity of the
individual, by which the first and
foremost aim of every adult and
responsible person should be to
provide the necessities for himself
and those dependent on him. 1t is
my belief that when an Individual
is unable to accomplish this, it is
the responsibility of his neighbors,
family and friends to try to as
sist him. Only when the problem
becomes too big for the individual
, or his neighbors to handle, should
they turn to government, and then
they should turn first to the gov
eminent closest to them, which in
our case is the county. Finally, l
feel that only when the individual,
his neighbors or his local govern
i ment cannot take care of what is
needed, should the State be asked
to help, and only when it is too
big for the State, should the ma
/, tional government be called on.
, 1t is my belief that this philoso-
ply of the integrity of the indi-
, vidual should apply to all phases
: of human endeavor, but l seem to
be in very small minority, for it is
=, fast becoming the custom in Amer
lea, as it is already in the commu-
nistic and totalitarian countries,
to go first to the central or federal
government whenever anything is
needed.
Our Board is determined to in
vestigate the program fully, with
1.-The hope that economies can be eff