Kooskia, ID

QED a private, research and evaluation-consulting practice that is working within the Horizon’s program conducting panel interviews for the past 2 years has selected Linda Martin of Kooskia as one of the winning panelists. The prize, a charitable donation of $500 for participating in the Horizons panel study interviews will be going to an organization called Communities Creating Connections.

Communities Creating Connections is  the non-profit organization that founded the Kooskia Technology Center. Under their guidance the tech center offers an array of services to underserve citizens of the Kooskia region.

Vincent Martinez, site coordinator states, “I am honored to be selected and to give this money to the Kooskia Technology Learning Center for volunteer staff stipend. Communitites Creating Connections (CCC) is the non-profit who sponsors such a great program. Thank you.”

For more information about Communities Creating Connections or the Clearwater Valley Outreach Center call Martinez at the Clearwater Valley Outreach Center (208) 926-7085. 

Kamiah, ID - Upper Clearwater Community Foundation is pleased to announce the Kamiah Pool Scholarship Project. This scholarship program is funded by a grant from the Inland Northwest Community Foundation.

The purpose of the Pool Scholarship Project is to afford families within the Kooskia and Kamiah school service areas the opportunity to enjoy the community pool regardless of their economic status. The recipients of the scholarships, as a season pass holder, will be entitled to daily access to the pool, family swim, lap swim, night swim, teen swim and other pool activities as well as one free swimming lesson class.

The Pool Scholarship Project will provide 162 low/moderate income families with scholarships to attend the Kamiah city pool during the 2008 season. Scholarship applications will be distributed May 22 through the Kooskia and Kamiah schools and will be available at Davis Communications at on Hwy 12. Applications will be accepted on Tuesday, May 27 beginning at 6:30 p.m. on a first come, first served basisat the Kamiah Welcome Center located at 518 Main Street. When completed applications are dropped off proof of income such as 3 months of pay stubs or 2007 tax return or summary statement from the unemployment office; proof of residency such as a utility bill; and social security cards or birth certificates will be required to verify eligibility. This information is required for all household members.

The scholarships will be given on a first come, first served basis and those awarded will be notified by mail. Having access to the pool is important to the community in preventing drownings in the Clearwater River. The family pass will create an avenue for the families to play together throughout the summer. We are expecting families to bond, build community connections, have physical activity for children, participate in alternative activities for youth and adults and have recreational opportunities with access to a safe and supervised environment during the summer months.

The Life Center has stepped forward to contribute to the project as well. They will provide busing from Stites and Kooskia to the Kamiah Pool two days a week during the summer months. More details will be released as information becomes available. Christine McNall, project director states “This an exciting beginning of a new scholarship program for youth activities in the area. This very generous grant from Inland Northwest Community Foundation has allowed us new momentum in giving scholarships to area youth who would like to participate in community activities but do not have the means to do so.” Although KYRA has given scholarships in the past this fund will enable youth access to more youth activities. If you would like to donate to the new youth activity scholarship fund please send your contributions to UCCF noting scholarship fund on your check. You may earmark your donation for KYRA, Pool Passes, or other.

The address is U.C.C.F. - PO Box 73, Kamiah, ID 83536. 

“It is truly wonderful to see our community come together with projects such as this. To afford families in the Clearwater Valley access to the pool is exciting. The scholarships are widely needed and I think we will see more people at the pool enjoying the hot summer days. I, for one, am grateful to the Inland Northwest Community Foundation for such a wonderful gift. I hope we can come together and continue the scholarship project next year with local fundraisers.” – Christine McNall 

 “I think that the pool scholarships will provide a great opportunity for our area youth to be able to swim in the pool daily if they choose. I also feel that the scholarships will help the KAP summer program due to the fact that we require children who are older enough to be in the big pool to have a season pass so that we are able to take the children to the pool and this is an additional financial burden on some families. I just think that our community and the area communities will benefit all the way around. Good job and thank you for your hard work for the community.” -Vickie Jackson, Kamiah After-school Program Coordinator  

“The Save the Pool Committee is extremely pleased with the receipt of this grant.  Not only will it help 150 local families, it will help to ensure the pool stays open another year.  It goes to show what good things can be accomplished when we all work together as a team.  I hope to see the team effort continue.” – Sharlene Johnson, Save the Pool Committee member.

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Good Morning everyone!

My hubby has long been a member of this forum. I visit occasionally. I think it is a wonderful resource on things such as raising livestock ( big or small), country living, country homemaking,  and much more. They even have a shop forum for those who like to tinker. Go to Homesteading Today  and have fun.

Today is the Kooskia/Kamiah/Stites Community Yard Sales and I am about to go find some real deals. Enjoy the sunshine today and have a great day!

Christine

The most valuable trait that I have gained through the Horizons program is the ability to ask others for input, assistance or opinion. Creating conversations can turn to action in no time. Learning to facilitate meetings and study circles will help me tremendously in my job as well. All the trainings that I have attended have a direct impact in my work too!

Participating in these programs and trainings has allowed me to make connections I may not of had otherwise and has help me accomplish more in a shorter time. Participating has been VERY enlightening too! I have learned how to work with city council, how to approach or how NOT to approach someone about possible change. I have learned through examples provided by others.

I feel Kooskia has gained many new leaders. The city council has two members who actively participate in the program and I feel that their participation will only help the city in its endeavors. Kooskia is really working on bringing more cottage industries to main street. There are many retiring shopkeepers looking to sell out and there is the potential for a thriving community if we can have cottage businesses in our little town. Upcoming entrepreneurial training, the 2 degrees Northwest Program, the economic survey of Kooskia and the partnership with the Kooskia Horizons and the Upper Clearwater Community Foundation are all steps our community have taken as a result of participation in the Horizons Program.

Unfortunately, I was not able to attend the blogging class. I hear it was VERY helpful. However I did glean info from the handouts (which was clear enough to allow me to blog now). For me, blogging is not all that difficult. I realized that writing in “Code” is not for me, so I use the “Visual Editor” option in my profile settings. Blog writing is just a matter of MAKING the time to blog. It is a lot like writing a journal entry each day except instead of penning your thoughts on paper, you are doing so on the keyboard. I think the most painful part of blogging is actually setting up the site or becoming an authorized author. Once past that step, MAKING the time is the biggest challenge for me.

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Silver Valley, an Idaho Horizons community, stated that April was Child Abuse Awareness Month. This site also provides valuable information regarding Youth Suicide Prevention.

The sun is shining and it is a great day today!

Christine

What’s next in Horizons for your community? Are your Action Teams planning activities in the next 2 months? How do those activities relate to the 3 legs of Horizons: Poverty reduction, Leadership Development and Community Mobilization?

Kooskia Horizons plans to become an action team under the 501c3 Upper Clearwater Community Foundation aka UCCF. Website is UCCF.info/

We will continue with our current action teams. Economic Development/Tourism, and Youth, Education, Leadership (YEL) and Communications.

Current project for economic development include the Thursday Peoples Market slated to open in May where locals may set up a table and trade their goods or harvest items.

The YEL action team recently sponsored blog training. Later in May the Kooskia Horizons team will sponsor a three day entrepreneurial training that close to 40 people have enrolled.

We look forward to the exciting business ideas that will generate a new economy in our area! Our steering committee and action teams are VERY active in training our community in various ways. We are seeing new faces at these training which tells us we are generating new leaders. Even the school aged demographic is participating!

Our Economic Development team is working on poverty reduction by providing the platform of the Peoples Market. I am excited to see what the participation will be this spring and summer. The venue is free so we hope that people will think to shop locally before they take their dollars out of our community.

We thank all who are active in Horizons!

South Dakota has really neat info about chicken tractors see below or go to their blog site http://southdakota.communityblogs.us/

Below is the blog written by the South Dakota Team regarding Chicken Tractors.Chicken Tractors??? Who Knew! April 16th, 2008 by Cheryl Jacobs

How to build a chicken tractor

Have a great day! Christine

Framing Our Community (FOC) is a nonprofit dedicated to reducing poverty and improving the quality of life in the communities of North Central Idaho.
To achieve this goal our rural communities need to build Community Capacity by strengthening leadership skills; an important component is the understanding of board responsibilities among our local nonprofit organizations and local governments.

Lynn Hoffman, Executive Director of the Idaho Nonprofit Development Center will conduct training on board roles and responsibilities, legal duties, and good board practices. All participants will come away with a good understanding of how an ethical board operates and what their individual responsibilities are to uphold it. Lynn will review 10 responsibilities of a board, discuss governance (board) roles vs. member roles, staff vs. board roles, board structure and tips and tricks for board effectiveness.

This lively training session will be held May 12, 2008, in the Spirit Center at the Monastery of St. Gertrude’s, 465 Keuterville Road, Cottonwood, Idaho. The morning session will begin at 10:00 am and end at 5:00 pm. We will share a delicious, home-cooked lunch with the sisters in the monastery dining room for a cost of $8.00. All other expenses for the facility and instructor are being funded by FOC’s Northwest Area Foundation “Great Strides Award.”

To reserve seats for your board members please RSVP Ellen at Framing Our Community by April 25th via telephone (208) 842-2939 or 842-2322, mail
(PO Box 321, Elk City Idaho 83525) or e-mail (ellen@framingourcommunity.org).

My words of wisdom and warnings go hand-in-hand. Make sure people understand, that when Horizons first starts and needs a steering committee, that it is at least an 18 month committment. It needs community members that will dedicate their time on a regular basis, and not just occasionally, otherwise you will have the same few people doing the work that many should be doing.
People should expect some changes in their community. Poverty awareness, and community needs due to poverty are some. As people progress through the stages of Horizons and its Leadership Plenty classes, they learn some leadership skills and some have even become active in local government and The Chamber of Commerce. As for changes in themselves, I find that I not only more willing to help with community projects, but more capable to lead them.
Question 2: That would be our home town of

KOOSKIA!!!

It’s great to have the youth involved!! After all, they are our future!!!

A meeting has been set for Wednesday, February 27, 2008 at the Discovery Center at Clearwater Valley Elementary School for 6:15 p.m. for the Kooskia Horizons Leadership/Education & Youth Committee. We are encouraging everyone to attend!

The Kooskia Horizons Leadership Program will be hosting a Media Communication Workshop, February 19, 2008, at the Kooskia Community Building (City Hall) from 7:00-8:30 PM. Are you involved with a church, service organization, 4 wheeling club, fire district, girl or boy scouts,
4-H, youth athletics or any other group? Need to get the word out about an event or an invitation to participate? Does the thought of writing an informational article for the newspaper or a quick announcement for the radio give you chills? This workshop is a MUST for you. Topics will include: Guidelines to Writing a Press Release, What is a Public Service Announcement (PSA) and How to Write One, Print vs. Broadcast, and Designing a Flyer or Poster. The workshop is open to anyone active within local communities 14 years old or older. Please bring pencil and paper, laptops are welcome. There is no charge for this event and snacks will be provided. For more information, contact Debbie @ 935-0764 or Leigh @ 926-4439.

The Old Opera House is for sale. We are in danger of losing this community icon built in 1912. Couple this with 9 other businesses for sale or just sold in downtown Kooskia and you have a community on the brink of economic disaster. The Kooskia Horizons Economic Action Team identified this need early on and partnered with the Upper Clearwater Community Foundation to get a grant from the Idaho Commission on the Arts to do a feasibility study to determine if it would be viable to have this building be purchased by a local 501 c 3 and retained as a community building. The answer was a resounding YES! However, the current owners have an offer in the works so we are on hold. The good news is that the anchor tenant, a local arts cooperative, is moving forward in hopes that this building will be available for rent or that they will look for another location. And thanks to local media coverage, the other businesses for sale have had increased interest.

Kooskia and Stites are partnering together on a Horizons Project. A resource guide for Kooskia/Stites and the surrounding area is definitely needed. Many people don’t know what products and services are available right here in our area. With gas around $3.00 a gallon, why waste our money and especially our time going out of town, when we could buy gifts, arts and crafts, and many services here and support our Local Family. Because of this, Kooskia & Stites have solicited infomation from all citizens to identify all services and businesses in our area. This all-inclusive resource guide will be available to all community members and new arrivals to inform them of everything available in our community.

In response to the rising demand for entrepreneural training in rural Idaho, Lewis Clark State College (LCSC) developed an on-line class. Identified as one of the top needs in Kooskia and upon inquiry with the LCSC Small Business Development about their NxLevel program, the offer was made for interested budding entrepreneurs to test this class. Normally the NxLevel 12 session class is conducted on the LCSC campus in Lewiston, 45 miles away and at a $300 fee; both huge barriers. In two days, 21 participants stepped forward to begin the class. This immediate response reaffirmed with LCSC the need for this class.

In late April, early May Kooskia Horizons will join together will Phase I Horizons community, Kamiah to host a 9 hour entrepreneur workshop locally to provide additional assistance to those taking the on-line course and to other people within the region.

Writing a blog (short for Web Log) is the way people of all ages are communicating on the internet. The Kooskia Horizions Program identified a need in our community to train people how to blog to enable everyone to have a voice in our area.

The Blog training will be presented to our community by local youth because during the training given by the Horizions to the community, our youth ran circles around the rest of us.

Keep an eye our for the training schedule!

Finding information in Kooskia is as easy as walking down the street!
Kooskia Main Street is the place to go to find the information you need. With the revamping of the Community Bulletin Boards, information is available for those looking for housing assistance, food bank contacts, utility assistance, job placement, odd jobs and community events.
Check out the new bulletin boards on Main Street in Kooskia, across from City Hall, next to NAPA Auto Parts.

To get the answer to this question, the Economic Development Action Teams of the Kooskia and Stites Horizons groups contacted the Universtity of Idaho to request assistance for a survey of our area to determine what businesses would be successful and how to market our area to attract those businesses. We are looking forward to the start of this survey in Spring/Summer 2008.

When Horizons guest speaker David Buerle came to Kooskia for our visioning rally I was very excited to see that over 100 members of our community participated. I was also astonished that when Mr. Buerle asked if Kooskia had a newspaper, NOT ONE PERSON had responded with the answer yes. Wow! Did anyone realize that THE CLEARWATER PROGRESS was their community newspaper?

With Kooskia feeling they had no connection to the community newspaper, THE CLEARWATER PROGRESS, even though this newspaper covers sports, events, obituaries, organizations, city and other news that directly relates to Kooskia, I wondered what can be done to make the connection.

I took the information from the rally back to the editor of THE CLEARWATER PROGRESS. After a few months of brainstorming as to how we can better serve Kooskia and the rest of our Clearwater Valley residents, the decision was made.

Beginning the first week in February 2008, THE CLEARWATER PROGRESS NEWSPAPER, will become a FREE community newspaper. It will be delivered to EVERY mailbox in the zip codes that belong to Kooskia, Kamiah and Stites. How exciting is that?!

The folks at the paper are excited too. They feel that they are offering a quality product that is relevant to the whole Clearwater Valley. They will be keeping the community informed and they recognize that their contribution will help reduce poverty in our region.

The newspaper is taking a huge risk by going against the grain. But they are also a forward thinking bunch. How better to reach their consumer than by distributing the news for free? How cool is that?

Once you receive your free paper, recognize that it is a direct result of the Horizons program. Do your part and read the news, participate in community discussion and patronize local businesses.

Everyone is invited and encouraged to attend the Kooskia Horizons Community Potluck on Saturday, January 19, 2007, from 12:00-1:30, at the Kooskia Community Center at City Hall.
This event is to update the community on where each Action Group is now and what the plans are for the future. Come & visit with your friends and neighbors, bring a dish, and discuss the future of Kooskia!

Not long ago I attended what was billed as a “Kooskia Visioning Rally” to which all Kooskia residents and nearby neighbors were invited. The stated purpose of this rally was to arrive at a shared vision of the future of Kooskia and everyone was encouraged to participate. Almost 100 people attended and a “vision” was arrived at. It’s understood that such a vision is a flexible concept, open to adjustment and amendment as conditions and awareness change, and what’s now called the Kooskia Horizons project has taken up work on effecting that vision.

Immediately following the rally I made an effort to bring the idea of that visioning and the subsequent Horizons project up in conversations with local business owners and friends who hadn’t attended the rally. Along with some refreshingly positive feedback, I was surprised to hear some quite negative comments from several folks.

In particular, some claimed they’d examined the literature passed out at the rally and listened to the presentation and recognized certain “catch phrases” common to organizations intent on community, national and/or world domination. Additionally, they declared that the foundations supplying the seed money for the rally were themselves probably(!) funded by the above organizations. No proofs of these ideas were offered.

I was totally unprepared for these views at the time and didn’t have a ready response. I quickly realized several things, however. I’m sure there are individuals and groups who fantasize, if not plan, for dominating others. On the other hand, if there really were sinister machinations in this case, the perpetrators violated a strategy basic to domination: divide and conquer.

It’s true that our world faces many challenges, many threats. It’s also true that we each need to maintain a healthy skepticism and apply a bit of discernment in making judgments. Another good tool, to me, is examining “what is” right along with “what might be.” Yes, an Australian fellow served as master of ceremonies at the original Visioning Rally. In subsequent meetings, though, only local people have been involved. In short, rather than divide our community, neighbors are talking and working with neighbors to help bring into being a viable positive future for our community. Furthermore, all are volunteers.

With all of the above in mind, check out the previous blog entries below. Then I hope you’ll come join us at our next Community Potluck and Get-together on Saturday, January 19th, from noon till 2 pm, in the Kooskia Community Center. This will be a gathering of all the smaller groups — people focused on specific aspects of “the vision” — at which we’ll be explaining our particular projects. It’s open to all those in our neighborhood so they can become, or stay informed about the Horizons program too.

Again, please consider joining us. At the very least, you’ll see who has been involved and hear what we’ve been thinking and doing. Perhaps you’ll have ideas we overlooked!

David Bearman
Tahoe Ridge

This 8 member Action Team will be involved with the following issues: Lack of Living Wage jobs; Business and Service Directory and the Community Bulletin Board. By June of 2008, we hope to establish an active partnership between the Chamber of Commerce and IdaLew foundation to increase the presence of small businesses in Kooskia, as well as increase the active membership in the Kooskia Chamber of Commerce. We also want to have a Business Market Analysis completed, to identify new businesses that Kooskia needs and determine their sustainability. We will also work with the other Kooskia Horizons Action Teams to complete the Community Bulletin Board and Resource Guide. Long Term, we would like to bring businesses to the Kooskia area that will create an additional 50 jobs.
Kooskia Horizons is slowly overcoming apathy and the defeatist attitude that has undermined similiar endeavors.