IT'S TIME TO END NEGLECT OF MISSOURI CITIES

There was a time when riverboats ruled the Mississippi, farmers plowed with oxen or mules and the soda fountain at the corner drug store was the local hot spot.

-- Official State Manual

The quotation above appearing in the current edition of the Missouri "Blue Book" came from an introduction written for the publication by Secretary of State Roy Blunt, who prefaced a section entitled "Vanishing Missouri." Included in this portion of the book were photos of Missouri life in a simpler age, an earlier era spanning the first decades of this century, from such communities as Independence, Brookfield, Agency, Odessa, Cape Girardeau and Dutzow.

There was not much difference between urban and rural Missouri at the turn of the century, not much to differentiate existence in St. Louis from lives in Odessa or Dutzow. Modern conveniences were pretty well unknown throughout the entire state, and except for the fact that some earned their living from farms and others from factories, there was little else to distinguish these groups. All of that was to change, particularly following World War II as the factories became more modern and the farms more mechanized.

We recently noted a Wall Street Journal story on urban life in Missouri, focusing on the hazards now attached to urban living, particularly in the state's metropolitan core neighborhoods. Citing both the danger and despair that now grips much of the state's urban population, we noted the need for Missouri to adopt programs designed to restore these core neighborhoods, guarantee the safety of their residents and provide new opportunities for them to lift themselves up from below-poverty levels.

As the above sentence from the state's "Blue Book" reminds us, life has changed dramatically in the other half of Missouri as well. No, indeed, farmers no longer use oxen or mules. They now use equipment that costs as much as factories at the turn of the century. And the corner drug store in outstate Missouri, if indeed one still stands, no longer dispenses Coke or ice cream sodas.

Outstate Missouri has been transformed as dramatically as has urban Missouri. Some rural communities have grown, after successfully attracting industrial jobs that also brought new retail businesses and new shopping centers. Many rural communities across Missouri, however, have not grown, and many are much smaller and much poorer than they were a decade or so ago. Others have all but disappeared, losing scores of businesses, banks, medical services and even churches and schools.

Unlike the urban decline, at least some of the diminishment of rural Missouri was both expected and predictable, even if it exceeded the degree of both. Mechanization of agriculture was bound to bring with it a lowered manpower need and an increase in farm-unit size. Those communities that succeeded in implementing these declines with new industrial jobs were able to retain and expand populations, retail services and religious, medical and educational institutions.

As noted, however, many outstate communities were unable to balance industrial growth with agricultural downsizing. Some were able to attract enough jobs to keep the weeds from overtaking the city square, and a few more have been able to maintain at least minimal medical services and educational facilities.

But the problems of outstate Missouri have barely been addressed, certainly not to the degree accorded those of large cities. State officials found nothing wrong in trying to solve urban ills by providing huge sums of taxpayer money for such facilities as football stadiums, convention centers and other recreational projects that strain the credibility of those leaders who declare they are interested in all of Missouri. We saw no proposal in Jefferson City to provide similar funding for projects in rural Missouri, although there are systematic attempts to distribute federal funds to every section of the state to meet public service needs.

Just as Missouri's cities need an urban policy, so do Missouri's outstate areas require state programs that will meet some of the pressing needs of nearly one-half of the state's residents. We need intelligent programs designed to attract jobs, and skilled workers, to every section of the state. We need carefully planned projects designed to utilize Missouri's natural resources, including its varied rich soils, to supplement agricultural income. We need to assure residents living in all 114 counties that they will have adequate medical services,

even if it means subsidizing physicians to serve sparsely populated sections. We need to develop alternatives to poorly financed schools in tiny hamlets that are being maintained to boost civic pride but which are detrimental to the educational progress of children. We must have programs that will instruct local community leaders on ways of developing better services, attract new businesses and develop civic facilities.

Just as we urged this year's state candidates to address the woes of our large cities, we also call on these men and women to fashion programs that will benefit the other half of Missouri, a section that has its own problems, its own needs and concerns. Outstate Missouri is often overlooked in Jefferson City except when it comes time to collect taxes and elect governors and other officials.

It really is time to end this neglect as well.