Why does the community rally?

Publishers note: Following my report of a recent serious workplace injury, I received a comment from Kate, whose IP address is in the Porthill area, asking a number of pointed questions, including, in effect, why the community rallies at such times. I may be off base, but rather than run it as a comment to the article, I choose to run it as a letter to the editor and see if I can provide an answer.

~ Mike Weland

There are so many unanswered questions here. Where does this young lady work whereby the employer does not have insurance to pay for work-related accidents? Especially in a job that apparently has the potential to permanently maim an employee in such a horrible way? And why is she not receiving workers compensation for her time away?

There are systems set up to help people in this situation, and we all have to pay into those systems. So why is her family having to use a website to collect donations?

Are our systems inadequate? I’m so confused.

I hope she receives the best medical and rehab care possible, and her employers insurance should be paying for 100-percent of it, or should be sued in court for not taking better care of its employees. American citizens deserve better.

~ Kate

Thank you for your comment, Kate, and while I can’t speak for the community, I would like to share my observations as a resident and reporter in Boundary County since 1991.

America has undergone considerable change, and because of its geography, Boundary County is among the last places to transition from what was to what is.

Boundary County is sometimes considered “quaint,” or “provincial” … “unsophisticated” by those visiting for the first time, but that isn’t unique … at one time or another, every community extant was just as bereft of the conveniences of the day and neighbors had only one another to rely on … that’s why communities formed. People in close proximity could better look out for one another, better respond when disaster struck.

Let’s not think of programs, rules or regulations for the moment — there are people here who remember a time not all that long ago before electricity, paved roads, telephones. It was a long way to Boise or Washington DC.

What Boundary County had, and still has that seems off kilter to many experiencing it for the first time, is a strong sense of community. Not because we are in any way better or more enlightened, but because we were among the hardest to reach and so last on the list for delivery of modern services considered essential and often taken for granted elsewhere … have you noticed your cell phone fades and drops more frequently in Boundary County? That’s because it’s not profitable for companies to build cell towers here.

Boundary County didn’t have a radio station until four local families recognized how important it was to be able to reach people quickly in the event of disaster and built and maintained the 100 watt AM station KBFI in the 1970s … a time when there were no repeaters to bring the signals from stations outside the community.

During the bad winters of ’96 to ’98, the station, with a signal that barely reached the county lines, saved lives, alerting neighbors to where help was needed while local emergency service providers, most of them volunteers, were stretched thin. When the North Hill slid in 1998, cutting the only north/south route through the county, local property owners allowed use of their land and locals cleared a road to allow school buses and ambulances through, allowing time for state and federal agencies to quibble. When the Kootenai Tribe saw the decline of the Kootenai River white sturgeon, they defied authority and built a hatchery, now a key component of the recovery effort.

Locals don’t yet think along the lines you spell out, Kate — when calamity strikes, and it always does sooner or later, they still rally as a community. Old enemies will work in amity side-by-side when necessary, putting aside their differences until the crisis is resolved, and going right back at it when the dust clears. When a family suffers death, illness or injury, folks still line up at the door to drop off dinner and offer condolences almost always ending with “if there’s anything I can do.” And they mean it.

It likely won’t be much longer, though, before that changes and we become more as you describe, blaming others, waiting for someone to do something, thinking about who we should sue … it’s already trending that way. And it’s a terribly sad thing to see.

~ Mike Weland