CRISIS: Let's build our own center

Two articles in the Cd’A Press highlighted the fallacy, short-sightedness, deafness, and pure mental laziness of certain Republican politicians. In their ideological pursuit of no spending, they have cost Idaho taxpayers millions more by their no-vote for funding for three mental health crisis centers, leading to the loss of one of those for Kootenai County. Knowledgeable professionals in the law enforcement, judicial, and health communities lobbied their legislators - no, their politicians - to no avail. Several legislators, like Rep. Morse and Sen. Goedde, who did put the interests of all Idahoans first, were voted out of office by a minority of ultra-conservative voters, amply and implicitly aided by those voters of all political stripes who chose to not vote. The likes of Rep. Vito Barbieri are now running for office. If that political contingent of the Republican party is elected, we can look backward to find out exactly what they will do: Vote no on any sensible investment in the state’s educational, health, and infrastructure systems, which are, of course, the foundation of a sound and sustainable economy.

We can move forward in two ways. First, elect legislators who will act in the best interest of all their constituents, who will listen to people who know what they are talking about, and who will look at the bigger picture to see what is wise spending, not false economy. As described so clearly in those articles, our jails have become de facto mental health facilities, and our law enforcement officers are pulled off their primary task of apprehending criminals to act, instead, as custodians and transporters of citizens who are mentally ill.

Second, as a community as strong in progressive thinking as ours, embodied in the community treasures of the Kroc Center, the beachfront public park spaces, the libraries, the education corridor, the cooperative tech center near Rathdrum, and the health complex in the heart of Cd’A, let us plan and implement the construction of a mental health crisis center now, not wait for state funding. Kootenai County has many community-minded folk, with broad knowledge and experience, who certainly can figure out a way to build the facility without the immediate assistance of state funding. A community working together to build the facility will not need its politicians to prove that we have wide and deep support for this facility. Given the millions now spent for indigent police holds at the hospital, transportation and overtime pay to out-of-county facilities, the medical costs of completed suicides, etc., those costs once alleviated will pay for the facility with little or no additional burden to taxpayers.

After all, we have come up with the emergency funds to pay for the ill-considered consequences of non-action; we can come up with the emergency funds to alleviate those consequences.

PAULA NEILS

Chair, Kootenai County Democrats

Hauser