CLINTON SEEKS TO BOOST RIVER DELTA AREA ECONOMY

The Clinton administration wants to boost economic opportunities in the Lower Mississippi Delta region.

The area along the Mississippi River covers 219 counties and parishes in parts of seven states. The region extends from Southeast Missouri and Southern Illinois to the Gulf Coast of Mississippi and Louisiana.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater is scheduled to visit Cape Girardeau Monday for the last of four "listening sessions" in the Delta to advance economic development of the region.

A session was held last week in West Memphis, Ark., and sessions are scheduled for Friday in Baton Rouge, La., and Saturday in Vicksburg, Miss.

The daylong Cape Girardeau meeting is scheduled to start at 8 a.m. at the Show Me Center with registration. The session itself is to run from 9 a.m. to 2:40 p.m.

Breakout sessions will be held on human capital development, environmental, natural and physical assets; business and industrial development; and equality and social issues.

"Much work still needs to be done to bring opportunity and hope to the Delta's people and improve the quality of life and together we can accomplish this objective," Slater said.

"The listening sessions are intended to elicit the views of those with the most at stake in the future of the Mississippi Delta Region -- the businesses, institutions, organizations and people who live and work there," he said.

Among the issues to be discussed:

-- Roles for states and communities in the initiative to improve the social and economic conditions in the Delta.

-- Roles for the private sector in the Delta's future.

-- Top priorities that should be undertaken for social and economic improvements in the region.

The listening sessions are the latest in the federal government's efforts to bring prosperity to the sprawling region.

In 1990, the Lower Mississippi Delta Development Commission submitted to then President George Bush an economic development plan for the region.

The commission was chaired by Bill Clinton, then governor of Arkansas.

The 186-page plan included more than 400 recommendations ranging from housing to health care, education to flood control.

The report noted that 8.3 million people live in the Delta area. At the time, the report said the Delta was "the poorest region of the United States."

Then U.S. Rep. Bill Emerson discussed the report at a meeting in Sikeston in August 1990.

Emerson said the plan wouldn't lead to a flood of bureaucracy.

"This is not holding out the carrot of expectations beyond the ability of the state, federal and local governments, working together, to deliver," the late congressman said.

A Clinton administration analysis earlier this year concluded that "compelling problems remain" despite progress.

Since 1990, about 365,000 jobs have been created in the region. All but 29 counties have experienced job growth.

But the administration said many areas of the Delta continue to suffer from social and economic problems.

There have been improvements in transportation. The region has benefited from 700 miles of new or upgraded highways and major port developments in Louisiana.

Improvements also have been made in housing, education and agriculture and business development.

There's been a 3.9 percent increase in the rate of home ownership and 310,000 building permits issued for affordable housing, 90,000 short of the Delta Commission's 400,000 goal.

Since 1990, there's been a 33 percent increase in Head-Start enrollment in the seven states.

This year, those states received nearly $61 million in federal funding to put technology in the classrooms.

Last year, the Labor Department allocated nearly $400 million in job-training funds for the Delta states.

The Department of Agriculture provided $790 million for water and sewer treatment and other needs for Delta communities between 1994 and 1999.

Businesses were approved for $423 million in guaranteed loans, creating or saving 21,400 jobs between 1993 and 1998.

The listening sessions follow the "Delta Beyond 2000" conference that Slater convened in Memphis in July 1998.

At that meeting, the Department of Transportation and nine other federal agencies agreed to fulfill the goals and recommendations of the 1990 report.