Local issues discussed during roundtable

KELLOGG — Shoshone County Fire District No. 2 played host to a special meeting on Thursday afternoon as Idaho officials Bobbi-Jo Meuleman and Alex Adams, along with State Senator Carl Crabtree stopped by for a roundtable discussion on a few pressing issues.

Among the topics discussed were items like education, including K-12, post-secondary and career technical education, also discussed was rural health care, as well as the CARES Act and some Idaho financials.

The first two topics were really where the discussion was exceptionally local.

While the COVID-19 situation wasn’t exactly the intended focus of the roundtable, there was really no way to avoid it with the topics discussed.

Kellogg School District Superintendent Dr. Nancy Larsen expressed several concerns tied to education and the way COVID is affecting the way her district is operated this coming school year.

Those concerns: Masks and internet.

Two of the more polarizing topics in the area, each plays an integral role in the coming school year.

Dr. Larsen alluded to the possibility of her district having masks be part of their potential reopening plan, but that she has reservations due to potential backlash.

“I fear the potential repercussions from my community if decisions are made that they don’t agree with,” Larsen said.

Senator Crabtree was sympathetic to Larsen’s concerns and highlighted the methodology behind allowing the schools to have local control.

“We sat down with administrators from around the state, talking about what reopening could look like this fall,” Crabtree said. “The whole idea was to come up with some broad guidelines, understanding that the best decisions are going to be made locally.”

Crabtree also recognized that in certain cases, it may be easier for some school districts to have the state simply tell them what to do, but that really doesn’t follow how Idaho has dealt with any of this situation.

“We try to stay more in the guideline area than in the you-will-do-the-following area,” Crabtree said.

As far as the internet was concerned, Larsen and Crabtree spoke about the shortcomings that seem to really affect the entirety of Idaho’s 7th District before Adams spoke up to mention a state initiative that allotted $30 million for schools to purchase new technology devices and $50 million for rural broadband.

Internet has gone from a luxury to a necessity over the years and that will likely never be more apparent this coming year as schools will continue to lean on the ability to have remote learning options at their disposal throughout the school year.

Meuleman, the Idaho Director of Intergovernmental affairs followed that up by reiterating the governor’s wishes regarding the upcoming school year.

“The Governor (Brad Little) does want to see schools open this fall,” Meuleman said. “It’s really an important goal for him.”

As far as rural health care was concerned, one of the highlights of that discussion centered around telehealth, which has been an incredible asset for rural hospitals and medical facilities like Shoshone Medical Center throughout the entire COVID ordeal and is going to be a focus of Gov. Little moving forward.

Telehealth is the distribution of health-related services and information via electronic information and telecommunication technologies.

Which allows long-distance patient and clinician contact, care, advice, reminders, education, intervention, monitoring and remote admissions.