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November 26, 2006

Governor Kaine’s ‘Return to Roots’ campaign renews optimism in region for family with deep local ties

By CHARLES OWENS The Bluefield Daily Telegraph Sun Nov 26, 2006, 08:02 PM EST

BLUEFIELD, Va. — A casual conversation over a campfire in North Carolina has led to a long-awaited homecoming for a Ohio family with deep roots in Southwest Virginia.

Keith Brown, a 1983 graduate of Graham High School, is returning home in January from Cincinnati with his wife Julia, and their 23-month-old daughter Wendy, as part of Gov. Timothy M. Kaine’s “Return to Roots” campaign.

Brown, a graduate of Emory and Henry College, left Tazewell County shortly after graduating from Graham High School, more than 20 years ago. Brown is a programmer analyst, and Julia is a technical writer. Both have accepted positions with software developer CGI at its new Lebanon operation.

“Sometimes it just seems surreal because we were conditioned when we were going through high school and college that there were no opportunities, and in order to be really successful you had to move away,” Brown said. “But some of my friends who I graduated with from high school still live in Bluefield. But also it’s a huge risk for the family. We are now in our 40s, and we are getting a family going, and to uproot everybody just to move back to an area because we love it, and it’s beautiful.”

Brown first learned of the Return to Roots campaign during an annual camping trip with family and friends. During the trip, he asked his best friend, “What’s going on in Southwest Virginia these days?” The friend told Brown about the Return to Roots campaign, and helped to put him in touch with the project’s leaders who in return helped to map the family homecoming.

“For 20 some years, we go on a camping trip, and sitting by a camp fire, we talk about our area,” Brown said. “From that dialogue, it started the whole process.”

Kaine launched the Return to Roots campaign earlier this year with a goal of reaching the estimated 15,000 alumni who have graduated from Southwest Virginia’s high schools in the last 20 years, but have since moved away from the region. The campaign aims to reach those alumni, and to inform them of new job openings and opportunities available in Southwest Virginia.

“The Return to Roots program concentrates on the people who grew up here, and understand our area,” Brown said of Southwest Virginia. “Someone who grew up there will have a vested interest in its success. The Return to Roots program says you can come back and make a difference.”

Brown expects to be back home in Southwest Virginia by January. Although he wanted to move back to Tazewell County where his parents and other family members still live, he realized Russell County was the correct choice for a home.

“That was the first thing that came to my mind,” Brown said. “It would be easy for me to live in Tazewell County. The family is there and I love Tazewell County. But we decided if we are going to accept the Return to Roots idea that we needed to live in Russell County and become a part of that community as contributing members of the society in order to make this idea work.”

Brown said state officials in Virginia worked closely with him, and continue to e-mail him every week.

“Keith told us he longed to get back home after living away for 20 years,” Shannon Blevins, project manager of workforce services with the Virginia Department of Business Assistance, one of the key organizers of the Return to Roots program, said. “We certainly hope we have many other success stories to report in the coming months as more Southwest Virginia natives become aware of what Return to Roots is and seek out employment opportunities.”

Blevins said the career seekers section of the Return to Roots website is now fully operational. It can be reviewed at www.returntoroots.org. Those alumni hoping to return home to Southwest Virginia can register at the website, post resumes and apply directly to companies listing job openings.

“I urge companies to register and post their job openings,” Blevins said. “The Return to Roots portal for reaching this potential workforce is ready to do just that.”

— Contact Charles Owens at cowens@bdtonline.com