Liberation, action, change

COEUR d’ALENE — More than a year after the making of his documentary, “What Are Idaho’s True Values: This Is Who We Are,” Jeff Crowe fought back tears Thursday.

“We learned something from every person that we talked to, something that I didn’t know was an eye-opening adventure,” he said during a luncheon hosted by the Kootenai County Task Force on Human Relations.

The strongest impact came from the Coeur d’Alene Tribe, which funded his documentary, Crowe told about 30 people at the Best Western Plus Coeur d’Alene Inn.

He recalled visiting Chief Allan and Ernie Stensgar and was shocked when they told him they could not walk the streets of Coeur d’Alene.

“And I thought, at that moment, ‘Shame on me,’” Crowe said, his voice breaking with emotion.

He said it was then he realized he never saw Native Americans in downtown Coeur d’Alene.

“They’re just not there,” Crowe said. “So our work is not done: We have a ways to go.”

A panel convened by the task force shared thoughts on human rights victories and challenges in the region.

The program’s topic was “The KCTFHR story as shared in three books, two documentaries, a student’s master’s thesis, a student’s Ph.D. dissertation and several national and international journals.”

It included Marcia Franklin, a producer and host at Idaho Public TV, who talked about her award-winning documentary “The Color of Conscience,” which features the KCTFHR; Gonzaga University professor Dr. Kristine Hoover, who discussed her 2020 book “Countering Hate,” which shares the KCTFHR travels to cities across America promoting human rights as a counter to hate activities; and Dr. Kathy Canfield-Davis, who chatted briefly about her national and international journal articles about the KCTFHR’s successful strategies.

Canfield-Davis said words, not numbers or statistics, say it best.

Her first article, “Social Justice Leadership In Action: The Case of Tony Stewart,” was published in 2009.

The second, “Leveraging Conflict to Achieve Advances In Civil Rights: Community Leadership — An Unfinished Work for Educators,” was published in 2016.

“The purpose of academic research is to add to the body of knowledge, nothing more and nothing less,” she said.

Asked by moderator Tony Stewart, KCTFHR secretary, to define social justice leadership, Canfield-Davis said, “A practice of confronting discrimination in communities and striving for democracy, inclusion, liberation and action for change, rather than inaction, preserving inequality.”

Hoover said she wants her book to make sure others know of the incredible work combatting racism the task force has done over 40 years, without ever resorting to force.

Hoover said direct confrontation is actually more costly and more harmful, and the task force pursued peaceful avenues to succeed.

“We were able to build a new generation of leadership from the work that you’ve done,” she said.

Hoover said standing up for what is right, for those who would face hate and discrimination, is everybody’s responsibility, “every day, everywhere.”

“We must support the people who have been targeted and let them now they are not alone," she said.

Franklin said one of the powerful aspects of “The Color of Conscience" was “the life that it had after it aired.”

While she said she couldn’t measure with certainty the impact of her work, she believes it created a historical record of a trying time in North Idaho.

“My hope is that all those raw interviews can be used in some sort of way,” Franklin said.

Crowe said his documentary could be traced to a local group having trouble attracting medical professionals to the area because of its lingering reputation as a haven for white supremacists.

They wanted to know how to counter that perception.

“We’ve got to do something,” Crowe was told. “This is affecting us.”

Based on that realization, Crowe talked to key players in the community to “find out our side of the story,” that of the real Idaho.

Crowe said he believed his documentary made a difference.

“It offered hope to a whole lot of people who were out there looking,” he said. “That is probably its main goal.”

Another luncheon program set for June 22 will look at “The Rise and Fall of the Aryan Nations: Are Extremist Groups on the Rise Again in the United States?”

It will be from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at the Best Western Plus Coeur d’Alene Inn. Tickets are $25 and can be purchased by sending a check to KCTFHR, P.O. Box 2725, Coeur d’Alene, ID 83816, or calling 208-765-3932.