Our View: Three cheers for Rocky Boy's fight against meth

A major effort is underway at Rocky Boy’s Indian Reservation to eliminate use of methamphetamine.

Rocky Boy residents have seen the devastating effects on the drug on their communities and their children, and we are heartened to see the reservation-wide effort to curb use of the drug.

Certainly, Rocky Boy is not the only community in Hill County to feel the devastation of a meth plague, but the Native community is showing tremendous leadership in taking on the problem head-on. We hope other communities and schools follow suit. The meth trail doesn't end at the reservation line. As long as meth brings its horrors to the reservation, it will do so to areas outside the reservation and vice versa.

People in the tight-knit community have seen the wreckage caused by meth.

These are the immediate effects. People are afraid in their own homes and afraid to walk on the reservation for fear of meth addicts who have taken over. Once-responsible people have resorted  to burglaries, muggings and robberies to feed their addiction to the awful drug.

It is not, old-timers say, the same Rocky Boy.

But the long-term effects of the addictions are more serious.

Whole generations are being wasted while drug pushers, often from off-reservation, are are making millionaires of themselves.

Children are seeing their parents waste away from the drug. Young people are losing their future to meth.

As we see young people suffer from failing physical health and disastrous mental health caused by meth, we can see lots of talent go down the drain.

Many of these young people could have gone on in life to be productive members of their communities, they could have become tribal leaders, teachers, attorneys and social workers. All that talent will be lost because of their decision to involve themselves in meth.

Some may have gone on to careers in science and helped in breakthroughs in health care research.

The group launching the fight has a long way to go before making a dent in the meth epidemic, but we are sure this won’t be another effort that fades into the sunset.

The effort is too important to the people of Rocky Boy.

There are a wide variety of options open to the group undertaking the fight. Some have proposed going as far as banishing drug dealers from the reservation.

The people of Rocky Boy will be able to figure out the best solution.

We just want them to know that whatever they decide, the people outside the reservation boundaries 100 percent behind them.