Rural Communities in the Inland Northwest

RURAL COMMUNITIES IN THE INLAND NORTHWEST AN ASSESSMENT OF SMALL COMMUNITIES IN THE INTERIOR AND UPPER COLUMBIA RIVER BASINS University of Idaho n College of Forestry, Wildlife, & Range Sciences RURAL COMMUNITIES IN THE INLAND NORTHWEST CHARACTERISTICS OF SMALL TOWNS IN THE INTERIOR AND UPPER COLUMBIA RIVER BASINS: AN ASSESSMENT OF THE PAST & PRESENT FINAL REPORT: PARTS I Sr 2 Submitted to the Interior Columbia Rivei Basin Ecosystem Management Project U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management Walla Walla, WA Dr. Chuck Harris Co-Principal Investigators: Dr. Greg Brown Dr. Bill McLaughlin College of Forestry, Wildlife and Range Sciences University of Idaho MOSCOW, ID 83843 March 1996 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This research was funded by a cooperative agreement with the USDA Forest Service for the Interior Columbia River Basin Ecosytem Management Project in Walla Walla, W-4. We would like to express our appreciation to Jim Burchfield and Steve McCool for involving us in the project and enabling us to conduct research that would be meaningful and useful. We also would like to express our gratitude and appreciation to the hundreds of citizens who contributed to this research effort by sharing their knowledge and understandings of their communities with us. Chuck Harris and Bill McLaughlin are professors in the Department of Resource Recreation and Tourism, College of Forestry, Wildlife and Range Sciences, University of Idaho, Moscow, ID; Greg Brown currently is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Forestry at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, IL. TABLE OF CONTENTS PART 1: AN ASSESSMENT OF THE SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CHARACTERISTICS OF COMMUNITIES IN THE INTERIOR AND UPPER COLUMBIA RIVER BASINS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2 Research Goal and Premises 2 Research Methods 3 Major Findings 5 Some Preliminary Conclusions 10 INTRODUCTION 13 Research Goal and Premises 13 Why the Community Assessment? 14 A Brief Summary of the “Westside” SIA process in FEMAT 16 Why the Focus on Smaller Communities? 17 Major Findings from the Literature on Social Impact Assessments 20 THE ASSESSMENT OF COMMUNITIES FOR THE ECOSYSTEM MANAGEMENT PROJECT 28 The Community Self-Assessment Study 28 Developing a Strategy for Sampling Communities 28 Development of The Community Self-Assessment Process: What and Why? 31 A Literature Review of Critical Community Characteristics 33 Communitv Character 34 Communitv Cohesiveness 35 Communitv Services 36 Communitv Autonomy 38 Economic Diversitv 39 Resource Dependence 40 Attractiveness For Business 41 Qualitv of Life 42 Communitv Leadership 43 Effectiveness of Communitv Government 44 Communitv Preparedness for the Future 45 Assessment of Community Economies 46 “Significant Change” Communities 48 In-depth Community Case Studies 48 RESEARCH METHODS 50 Data Collection 50 Assessing the Current Characteristics and Recent Conditions of Small Rural Communities 50 Citizen Perceptions of Communitv Characteristics and Current Conditions 51 Sampling Communitv Kev Informants 53 RunninP the Communitv Workshops -- Procedures 57 Collecting Secondarv Data on Communitv Characteristics from Documented/Recorded Communitv Data 59 Estimating Employment Profiles of Communities 60 Surveying Significant-Change Communities 61 Surveying A Representative Sample of All Residents in a Growing County 62 Analysis and Presentation 63 MAJOR FINDINGS 64 An Initial Overview 64 Small Rural Communities Are An Important Scale For Gathering And Analyzing Social Data On Human Populations. 64 The Vast Majority of Rural Communities In the Region Are Small (Less than 1,500 in Population). 67 The Geography of the Communities Can Be Depicted In Terms of Ecological Response Units (ERUs). 68 Results From the Community Self-Assessments 71 What Were the Characteristics of Participants in the Community Assessment Workshops? 71 Perceived Characteristics and Current Conditions of Rural Communities Indicate They Are Variable and Unique. 74 Communitv Attractiveness 75 Communitv Cohesion 76 Communitv Services 78 Communitv Autonomv 79 Oualitv of Life 82 Communitv Leadership 84 Preparedness for the Future 87 Perceptions of Communitv Economics 89 Dominant Industrv Classification and Economic Divers&v 91 Communitv’s Attractiveness For Business 96 ii Results of the Economic Profiles of the Region’s Communities 97 The Economies of Communities Are Complex, And Citizen Perceptions Of Them Vary In Accuracy. 97 Communitv Economic Profiles: Summarv Statistics 97 Economic Diversitv Index 99 Economic Proliles of Communities Based on Size Class 112 A Comparison Of Perceived & Actual Dependence of Communities on Industries 117 Other Research Findings 131 A Community Resilience Index Suggests The Relative Ability Of Small Rural Towns To Manage Change. 131 How was the Communitv Resilience Index Developed and Validated? 131 Operationalizing the Concept of Resilience 134 Resilience Classes 140 An Analysis of a Sample of Communities by Perceived Economic Dominance Classification and Degree of Resilience 148 Other Findings on Community Resilience 152 U.S. Forest Service “Timber Dependent Communities 159 The Geography of Communities in the Region Is Significant In Terms of Differences Associated with Ecological Response Units (ERUs). 160 Small Rural Communities -- Is Bigger Better? 165 Quality of Life in Small Communities Is High, But This Community Characteristic Is A Complex One. 169 Small Rural Communities Across The Region Are Changing. 171 Manv Small Rural Communities Are Growing in Population. Although Their Rates Of Growth Vat-v Across The Region. 174 The Results of the Analvsis of “Significant-Change” Communities in the Region Corroborate Other Findings. 177 CONCLUSIONS 181 LITERATURE CITED 184 APPENDIX A: Community Self-Assessment Workbook 190 111 PART 2: CASE-STUDIES OF TYPES OF SMALL RURAL COMMUNITIES UNDERGOING CHANGE IN THE INTERIOR AND UPPER COLUMBIA RIVER BASINS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 213 Introduction 213 Research Methods 214 Results 215 Conclusions 217 INTRODUCTION 221 ABOUT COMMUNITY CHANGE 223 The Community as a Unit of Analysis 223 Theoretical Framework 225 A Model of Community Change 228 Research Questions 229 RESEARCH METHODS 233 Research Design 233 Community Selection 234 Current Retrospective Community Assessments 236 RESULTS 243 Baker City, Oregon 243 Burns, Oregon 246 Driggs, Idaho 248 Joseph, Oregon 252 Kellogg, Idaho 256 Mattawa, Washington 260 Pomeroy, Washington 263 Riggins, Idaho 268 Salmon, Idaho 273 Whitefish, Montana 278 DISCUSSION 283 Psychological Responses of Community Residents 283 Organizational Responses 285 Validating the Assessment Workbook Constructs 286 iv Ranking the Assessment Workbook Constructs 289 Assessing the Validity of the Community Resilience Index and Its Implications 292 The Community Resilience Index (CRI) 292 Results 293 Baker Citv, Oregon 295 Burns. Oregon 295 Driggs. Idaho 296 Joseph. Oregon 297 Kelloge. Idaho 298 Mattawa. Washington 299 Pomerov, Washington 300 Riggins. Idaho 301 Salmon. Idaho 302 Whitefish, Montana 303 Summary 303 CONCLUSIONS 307 LITERATURE CITED 310 APPENDIX A: Initial Contact Instructions and Community Identification Form 313 APPENDIX B: Retrospective Assessment Workbook 316 PART 1 AN ASSESSMENT OF THE SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CHARACTERISTICS OF COMMUNITIES IN THE INTERIOR & UPIWR COLUMBLA RIVER BASINS Dr. CJ:uclc Harris Co-Principl Iuvestigators: Dr. Greg Bwvu Dr. Bill McLtlughliu Research Tea 111: Jean Haley Chris Wall Taylor Pitman Stephany Bales Lance I<IxIII EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Research Goal and Premises The goal of the research described here was to assess the characteristics and conditions of small, rural communities in the Interior Columbia River Basin (henceforth, the ICRB); this area includes the lower basin in eastern Washington and Oregon and the upper basin spanning all of Idaho and western Montana and Wyoming. This research was based on several premises: l The small, rural communitv is an imoortant scale for social assessment. For most residents of rural regions like the study area -- even those people living well outside the borders of incorporated towns and cities -- the community where they socialize, shop, and perhaps work or go to church becomes the focus of their social lives. Social sciences reco,&e the significance of this scale of social organization. They include sociology, which focuses on social groups, organizations, and communities as primary units of analysis, and for which conflict and cohesion are “central forces driving change;” and anthropolo,v, which is centered on social groups, communities, subcultures, and sometimes entire cultures, with a focus on tradition (Machlis and Forester 1994). Rural towns are too small to have neighborhoods, and the only other definable social grouping between individuals and communities is the socio-cultural gr.oups and organizations that often exist within communities; while these groups are often influential in making things happen where they are located, most of the governmental, civic, social, and infrastmcture mechanisms fimction at the community level. The next highest level of social organization is one of polity: county government. Most data collected by federal and state agencies are reported at a county level. Unfortunately, in many places, conditions and changes in them at the broader level of counties only serve to mask the differences across communities in those conditions and changes and thus impacting their residents in different ways; this aggregation problem reflects the reality of the county as a political entity that, for many residents, may

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