STORY AND PHOTOS BY KAREN BOSSICK

Blaine County’s life expectancy is more than six years above the national average, and rates of adult obesity, sexually transmitted diseases, adult smoking and commuting time are well below the national average.

In fact, Blaine County rated second healthiest among Idaho’s 44 counties, a study by Becker’s Hospital Review has found.

But there are downfalls, observed Mike Higgs, and one of those is that there’s not enough psychiatrists and mental health therapists to meet the demand.

“In a zoom webinar last week sponsored by the Murdock Charitable Trust called ‘Lifting the Fog: Mental Health in the Workplace,’ one of the participants stated: Without mental health it’s hard to have organizational health and success. Good mental health leads to good business health,” said Higgs, who heads up the Chamber of Commerce in Carey.

Higgs spoke at the second of Sun Valley Economic Development’s roundtable discussions examining critical issues for the Wood River Valley. This particular roundtable, held at Zenergy Health Club & Spa, looked at the health and wellness of the community, as well as the labor pool.

Higgs, a SVED board member, told the audience that Sally Gillespie of the Spur Foundation had researched nonprofits in the Blain County and found out that there are hundreds of registered nonprofits—80 of which are active.

• Twenty of those are in the Health and Wellness categories.
• The 80 active nonprofits generated a revenue of $87.5 million in 2022 and had assets of $304 million.
• The health and wellness nonprofits have 144 employees with $23.5 million in revenue and assets of nearly $54 million.

  “So, it’s clear that nonprofits are an integral part of our local economy, and it’s clear that the services they supply are important, even vital,” Higgs said.

  Brooke McKenna, one of the co-directors at The Hunger Coalition, said her organizations considers its emergency food program to be an indicator of middle-class health and stability because it’s a safety net program to catch families in crisis.

  “We provided emergency food response to a record number of families last year, even more than during the COVID shutdown. Alarmed by this, we spent the past several months surveying our participants to find out what was going on in their lives that is creating this incredible need,” she said. 

  The Hunger Coalition determined that 85 percent of its emergency food recipients are employed. Ninety percent of those said they are making $20 or less per hour at their jobs.

  “That tells us loud and clear that, if an employer is paying an individual $20 or less per hour, that individual isn't making enough money to survive in this county,” McKenna said.

  The Hunter Coalition also conducted a cost-of-living analysis for Blaine County and found that a family of four must make $54 an hour just to make ends meet. That doesn’t allow for sending kids to college, taking a summer vacation or even building an emergency savings account, McKenna said.

  “Our data, in conjunction with Mary Fauth's stats about her participants all being cost-burdened by housing--meaning they are spending over 30% of their income on housing--are important bellwethers for the living conditions of thousands of county residents. Blaine County can't be a healthy, thriving county until all families are able to live healthy, thriving lives. Employers need to be aware of more than their own bottom lines and truly take care of their employees in the manner that works best for the employee.... meaning, they gotta be paying people more!” she added.

  Sarah Seppa, who heads up St. Luke ‘s Center for Community Health, said that her organizations assists Wood River Valley residents seeking medical treatment with things like gas cards to help them mitigate the costs of driving for treatment in Twin Falls. It also connects them to other resources.

  Seppa made a pitch for the 5B Suicide Prevention Alliance, which has been working on several fronts to try to cut the suicide rate in the area, one of those being locks for guns and pill safes.

  Sun Valley Economic Development Director Harry Griffith and Seth Harrington of the Department of Labor produced a number of statistics giving a clearer picture of the Blaine County workforce during a session on Labor and Talent.

• The unemployment rate as of April 2023 was 2.3 percent. Unemployment spiked up to 8 percent in 2020 during the pandemic—nearly twice as high as the South Central Idaho and Idaho average. Now Blaine County has a slightly lower unemployment rate than the others.
• Blaine County had 2,085 employers in 2022.
• The county boasted 13,798 workforce employees that year.
• The number of Blaine County remote workers is 1,900.
• The average hourly wage was $28 an hour in 2022.
• The total wages for Blaine County in 2022 totaled $853 million.
• The average weekly wage for construction workers in Blaine County is just under $1,200. That’s less than Ada County but more than Twin Falls County.

Both Griffith and Trish Wilson, who recruits workers via her Success Management, agreed that the valley could stand to recruit more remote workers because they contribute to the fabric of the community.

Laura Rose Lewis, who heads up I Have a Dream Foundation, said that the foundation is being rebranded as “Far and Wise” as it seeks its independence from the national I Have a Dream Foundation in order to better serve community needs.

One of the ways the organization is doing that is through four camps it offered this week and last to expose high school students to such trades as welding, automotive, plumbing, masonry and heating and air condition work. Such camps might better serve some students who aren’t interested in going on to college or university, Rose Lewis said.

In other news, those between 60 to 64 now constitute the largest chunk of the population of Blaine County followed by those between 55 and 59 and those between 65 and 69. That said, the only population that has declined since 2017 is those aged 0-5.

SVED Board Chair Guy Cherp, who oversees Cox Communications in the Wood River Valley, said that SVED started the roundtables to give valley residents a chance to get together to talk about important issues facing the valley more often than the annual Sun Valley Economic Forum allowed.

The occasional gatherings are open to the public, but members get a chance to win door prizes like ski and golf passes donated by Sun Valley Resort. Individual memberships are available, in addition to business memberships.

Griffith said the roundtables will take a hiatus during the busy summer. When they do return, the subject will necessarily be affordable housing, he said.