Jim Daniel, chief of the Cascade Rural Fire Department, puts in 15 hours a week managing 38 volunteer firefighters and emergency medical technicians—not including fire runs. The “job” pays $500 a month.

Jim Daniel with his fire truck. Photo by Ben Salmon, the Star-News.

Daniel is also full-time shop foreman for the Valley County Road Department, and he’s mighty thankful for a boss who’s patient with his frequent absences. “You’re working for a guy and all of a sudden you’re in the middle of three customers and the call goes off. It takes employers who understand that they may need you someday yourselves, so they let you go.”

Indeed, while city folks call 911 when trouble strikes, rural Idahoans call on their neighbors, whose volunteerism makes it possible to put out runaway campfires, treat medical emergencies and find lost hunters and snowmobilers. But because those neighbors are more and more likely to be working several part-time jobs, Valley County Extension educator Steve Hines says they may be less and less able to respond.

That’s why Hines and Neil Meyer, UI Extension economist emeritus, initiated a study of volunteerism in Valley County in spring 2002. Cooperating in the study, the government class of Cascade High School and the McCall Chamber of Commerce took questionnaires to county residents, asking them about their volunteer efforts.

Their findings: 71 percent of the respondents gave an average 5 hours a month to their communities. Thirtytwo percent volunteered for their churches, 15 percent for local government, and 14 percent each for the Chamber of Commerce, Parent-Teacher Association’ and other local services. Thirteen percent led youth groups and 8 percent were Lions, Kiwanis or Rotarians. A little more than a third of Valley County’s volunteers contributed nearly three-quarters of the volunteer time.

“The smaller the community is, the more volunteer energy there is, for sure,” says Hines, who has also lived or worked in Kuna, Filer, and Castleford. “People just realize that if they don’t volunteer, things just won’t get done and these little communities will die. Somebody has to be the local government, somebody has to sit on boards, somebody has to drive the ambulance and somebody has to fight the fires.”

That was easier when jobs in mining, agriculture and timber paid “permanent, livable wages” that came with benefits and supported families, Hines says. “Families could establish themselves in communities and provide lifetimes of services—because they could afford to.” With the Boise Cascade mill in Cascade shutting down in June 2001, the county lost another major employer— and now looks to the planned Westrock development to bring in, at best, significantly lower paying jobs without benefits.

“People who work ski-resort jobs tend to be younger and not as tied to their communities,” Hines says. “They have to work two to three jobs to keep their heads above water and tend not to volunteer.”

Indeed, between 1972 and 1999, average earnings per job in Valley County eroded from just over $25,000 to about $18,000 in 1996 dollars.

Formerly an EMT and Scout leader, Linda Stillwell now gives prodigiously of her time to the Hospital Auxiliary, Western Idaho Community Action Center, Master Gardeners, and Valley County 4-H. But when she looks around, she finds herself more and more often volunteering alone. “With the mill down, a lot of people have had to leave and a lot of others are struggling and just don’t have time to volunteer,” she says. “It takes every minute they have just to make a living.”

Increasing training requirements for both EMTs and firefighters is making it even more difficult to find volunteers with time to serve. EMTs, for example, need 110 hours of classwork training, Daniel says. On the other hand, higher speed limits and burgeoning numbers of recreationists are boosting the frequency of traffic accidents, wildland fires, and other emergencies. Adds Daniel: “I believe the demand will become high enough that there will have to be some paid people to do it.”

The question is, paid with what? Hines sees rural counties—especially those whose economies depend heavily on tourism—eventually approaching the Legislature for assistance.

Dick Vandenburg, a private forestry consultant for Timberland Forestry, is volunteer commander of Valley County Search and Rescue. Vandenburg expects his hale-andhearty band of 68 volunteers to stick with it—and he credits their families for enduring and supporting their many absences. But he’s worried that the increasing flight to distant jobs will leave the Valley County tax base less able to provide his volunteers with the vehicles, equipment, and training they need.

“We’ve never lost anyone we’ve looked for in this county,” says Vandenburg, who also serves on the City Council and holds a dozen other volunteer posts. “We find the guys, we find all the kids, and we could not do this without the county’s support. But as people leave to find other jobs, we’ll see less of that support.”

Not long ago, Daniel responded to a page and saved a 92-year-old heart attack victim. “That’s what keeps the volunteers coming back,” he says—“when they can help the community and help friends and make a difference.”