New West Virginia non-profit to launch Mother Jones Community Centers

 
PRESS RELEASE
September 5, 2017
Contact: Mari-Lynn Evans (330)289-4514 or
Maria Gunnoe 304-245-8481
NEW WEST VIRGINIA NON-PROFIT TO LAUNCH MOTHER JONES COMMUNITY CENTERS
Centers will launch in Boone County, and will provide much-needed services to communities in Southern West Virginia
Mari-Lynn Evans, award-winning documentary director and producer of The Appalachians, Coal Country and Blood on the Mountain, and Maria Gunnoe, 25-year community organizer, activist and recipient of both the 2009 Goldman Prize and the 2012 Raoul Wallenberg Medal for Human Rights, announced today their newest effort to improve Appalachian young people’s lives and improve communities in Southern West Virginia.
The women, both native West Virginians, announced the launch of the Mother Jones Community Centers – an effort that will seek to provide support and assistance to struggling communities throughout West Virginia. The Mother Jones Community Centers are the product of a newly formed nonprofit founded by Evans and Gunnoe.
The first Mother Jones Community Center will be created in Nellis Elementary School, located in the town of Nellis, Boone County, West Virginia.
Following the recent closings of four Boone County schools, the BARN Community Group, Inc., as well as members of the local community, have cared for the Nellis Elementary school building themselves – but struggle with expensive maintenance and repairs.
In the coming months, the former school will become home to a variety of services for the use of communities throughout the entire BARN area, including Nellis, Brushton, Ashford and Ridgeview. These services will include work training, recreation, educational services, transportation services, a food pantry, free meals, free clothing closet, child day care, drug treatment resource center, Internet access, children’s activities and more. These services were chosen and requested by members of the BARN communities.
“So many communities in Southern West Virginia have been ravaged time and time again – coal jobs are gone, mountaintops are destroyed, and now these communities are ground zero for the drug and opioid crisis,” said Evans. “Now more than ever, the families of these communities – and particularly the children – need a safe place that will provide them with much needed services.”
“The Nellis School is the perfect location for the site of our first Mother Jones supported Community Center,” said Gunnoe. “The school used to be a gathering point for a community, and now, despite the struggles that this part of the state continues to face, it can be reborn into that again. We want to be there to help this community obtain the goals they have set for themselves. We cannot forget a generation of young people simply because our economy has failed.”
Anita Perdue, community member and President of The BARN Community Group INC, said “What’s going on in our little communities is not pretty – but sitting back and doing nothing isn’t an option. One thing is clear – our children and our communities deserve better than what they are getting now. Even with the problems we face, we are a community of good people, who are willing to help, and who know we can do better. I believe we can make a difference.”
In the coming months, and contingent on successful fundraising efforts for the nonprofit, additional Mother Jones Community Center locations will be announced across Southern West Virginia. MJCC will look to other closed schools in the most rural communities to help rebuild opportunities for young people throughout West Virginia.
In describing the nonprofit’s mission, Evans said, “We are fighting for the living, we are standing up for our brothers and sisters, we are following in the footsteps of Mary Harris, Mother Jones, the “Coal Miners Angel.”
Almost a century ago, Mother Jones came to Southern West Virginia to organize coal miners. She is well-known and beloved by West Virginia communities for her efforts to fight for coal miners and their families, including at Blair Mountain, the scene of the bloodiest labor uprising in American history in August, 1921.
“The goal of the Mother Jones Community Centers nonprofit is to improve the lives of the families of Southern West Virginia,” said Evans. “But the community centers themselves are just the beginning – we’d like to assist in retraining laid-off miners to install and operate solar and wind energy on these buildings, and also contribute to improved health care for these communities as well.  It is time for real investment in WV’s rural communities.”
For more information on the Mother Jones Community Centers nonprofit organization, including information about needed donations, please contact MJCC founder Mari-Lynn Evans.