In 2001, at its General Assembly, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship launched Together for Hope as its rural poverty initiative. The commitment was specific: “20 years of offering hope to people in and around 20 of the poorest counties in the United States.” Twenty-five years later, the work has continued past that original timeline and grown well beyond the original map.
“The people who live in these communities hold the gifts that will lead the way.”
Twenty counties, five regions
The first twenty counties were all rural, spread across seven states and five regions: Appalachia, the Black Belt, the Mississippi River Delta, the Rio Grande Valley, and the High Plains. From the beginning, the plan was to work alongside local residents, state and regional CBF groups, churches, and other organizations. The work would build on resources already in each community and support community members as they led.
The work grew quickly. By 2003, Together for Hope was active in 8 of the 20 counties, and within a few years it had reached 17. In 2004 alone, more than 4,500 volunteers helped with home repair, health care, literacy, food access, job training, and economic development.
Listening first in Kentucky
Some of that early work continues today. In Kentucky, the Kentucky Baptist Fellowship (now CBF Kentucky) led the effort under the name Mountain Hope. Extreme Build has built a home in McCreary County nearly every year since 2003.
In Owsley County, Emma Quire, a lay missions leader at First Baptist Church of Frankfort, insisted that her church begin by meeting people, listening, and building relationships. In 2003, the church bought an old motel and turned it into the Emma Quire Mission Center. Emma was practicing asset-based community development before most of us had a name for it, and her approach still shapes how Together for Hope works with communities.
A wider lens
In 2016, Rev. Dr. K. Jason Coker joined Together for Hope as executive coordinator. Jason grew up in Shaw, Mississippi, and he widened the organization’s focus to the USDA’s definition of persistent rural poverty. That definition covered 301 counties at the time and now covers 338.
Civil Rides followed, carrying cyclists through civil rights history. In 2018 riders traveled from the Lorraine Motel in Memphis to Jackson, and in 2019 they rode from Montgomery through Selma to Birmingham.
Together for Hope today
Today, Together for Hope is a 501(c)(3) national rural development coalition serving 338 persistent rural poverty counties across 30 states, home to about 6 million people. More than 150 grassroots organizations and strategic partners make up the coalition across four ethnogeographies: Appalachia, the Black Belt, the Delta, and TNT4C (Texas, Tribal Nations, and the Four Corners). Their work centers on four Priorities of Hope: education, health and nutrition, housing and environment, and social enterprise.
Emma Quire’s conviction in Owsley County still guides the coalition: the people who live in these communities hold the gifts that will lead the way.
Where It Began
The original 20 counties, along with the six added in the years that followed:
- Alabama: Perry
- Arizona: Cochise
- Arkansas: Lee, Phillips
- Kentucky: McCreary, Owsley, Powell
- Louisiana: East Carroll, Tensas
- Mississippi: Bolivar, Holmes, Sharkey, Sunflower
- North Carolina: Halifax
- South Carolina: Allendale
- South Dakota: Buffalo, Oglala Lakota (formerly Shannon), Todd, Ziebach
- Texas: Dimmit, Hidalgo, Maverick, Presidio, Starr, Willacy, Zavala
Partners From the Beginning
With gratitude to the organizations who have been partners since our earliest years:
- KidsHeart with Jorge and Rosa Zapata, Rio Grande Valley, Texas
- Early partners in Eagle Pass and Presidio, Texas
- Emma Quire Mission Center, Owsley County, Kentucky
- Extreme Build, McCreary County, Kentucky
- First Baptist Church on St. Clair, Frankfort, Kentucky
- Harvest Fellowship, Mississippi
- Local partners in Oglala Lakota County (formerly Shannon County), South Dakota
- Sowing Seeds of Hope, Perry County, Alabama
- Together For Hope Arkansas
- Together For Hope Louisiana
20 years of Together For Hope: https://hope.cbf.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/tfh-20.pdf
