By Dave Ranney
KHI News Service
TOPEKA — Television and radio talk show host Tavis Smiley will address this year’s Kansas Conference on Poverty in Topeka on Friday.
“He was one of Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world back in 2009,” said Tawny Stottlemire, one the conference’s organizers. “So it’s really cool that he’s going to be here.”
Smiley also leads the Tavis Smiley Foundation, which last year launched “Ending Poverty: America’s Silent Spaces,” a $3 million, four-year campaign aimed at helping communities alleviate poverty.
Smiley is scheduled to speak during the conference’s closing luncheon, from noon to 2 p.m. at the Capitol Plaza Convention Center, 1717 S.W. Topeka Blvd.
More than 350 people – a mix of program directors, social workers, front-line case managers, and consumers – have registered for the two-and-a-half day event, which begins Wednesday.
“We’re here to raise awareness and inspire action,” said Stottlemire, who’s also executive director at the Kansas Association of Community Action Programs. “We want people to come learn the facts about what’s really going on in their communities and not just rely on what they see on television or read in the popular media.”
Low-income Kansans, she said, are “ready to be heard. It’s time to turn off the bully pulpit and hear from people who know what works and what doesn’t work, people who know that the best way to invest in communities is to invest in people.”
Also addressing the conference will be Enid Borden, chief executive at the National Foundation to End Senior Hunger since July 2012. She had a similar position with the Meals on Wheel Association of America for 22 years.
Borden will speak during Thursday breakfast session, which begins at 7 a.m.
The Thursday luncheon will feature a noon screening of the HBO documentary “Paycheck to Paycheck: The Life and Times of Katrina Gilbert,” part of a Maria Shriver-produced project on the increasing numbers of women in poverty.
Gilbert, a single mother from Tennessee, will take part in a question-and-answer session after the screening.
Other sessions will address effective advocacy, fundraising practices, tax policies, financial wellness, domestic violence, suicide prevention, substance abuse, human trafficking, trauma-informed care, Medicaid expansion and veterans issues.
The conference, now in its 11 year, is underwritten by several public and private organizations, including the Topeka Community Foundation, United Way of Greater Topeka, St. Francis Community Services, Community Health Council of Wyandotte County, Kansas Center for Economic Growth and Amerigroup.