Our View: Some goals for 2016

This very special part of the planet that we inhabit faces some serious decisions in coming years.

There are problems in our government, our social structure and in our infrastructure.

All of the problems are fixable, and we hope the people of north-central Montana muster their intelligence and common sense to sit down and deal with the difficulties we face.

For 2016, we’d like to see our area make these resolutions and tackle these problems:

Meth

Methamphetamine is one of the most dangerous drugs out there. It rips apart bodies and souls of its victims. It caused serious problems to our society a few years back, but there were hopes that its use was on the decline. Sadly, that was not so.

It has come back with a vengeance. There are horror stories about people unable to raise their children, youngsters unable to function at school, people’s lives in tatters because of the wicked effects of this drug. Police say it is a major cause of crime.

It’s reached epidemic proportions. Rocky Boy’s Indian Reservation may banish meth dealers from the reservation. Fort Belknap Indian Reservation may declare a state of emergency. The Havre school district has brought in a drug counsellor for the high school.

The effects have been terrible on the reservations, but anyone who believes the enormity of the problem is solely on the reservation is delusional.

A massive communitywide effort to free the Hi-Line from the clutches  of this awful drug is needed.

Law enforcement should be supported in its efforts to crack down on the small-time pushers from our area that are making millions at the expense of others. And there needs even more to be a crackdown on out-of-towners who are getting making money at the expense of the Hi-Line’s youth and the Hi-Line’s future.

And there needs to be more an emphasis on reminding people.

Suicide

Suicide has snuffed out the lives of way too many Hi-Line residents in recent years. Montana is always near the top of states with suicide problems, and the Hi-Line is always at the top of the state when it comes to people tragically taking their own lives.

Too many families have had to endure the loss of loved ones, too many communities have suffered from seeing its residents taken away.

The waste of talent, life and hope is tragic.

There are many reasons given for the high number of suicides, ranging from cold weather to the remoteness of area, to the availability of guns and so forth.

But the solution is to convince people — very often young people — that there is a real value to life. There is always hope.

We have Montana‘s best social workers, educators and  psychologists. If they put their heads together along with us common folks, we can figure out a way to curb the fearfully high suicide rate. Let’s begin in 2016.

Infrastructure

Parts of the Hi-Line are falling apart. Modern deveopment in the area is about 100 years old, just the amount of time it takes streets, water lines and other items of infrastructure to wear out.

The worst example is in Havre where streets are a mess. After a long debate, voters decided against a 20-year, $30 million plan to reconstruct some of the worst streets. What’s next?

That’s what city officials will have to decide in 2016.

Nearly everyone agrees something will have to be done.

The choices: Resubmit the plan, scale back the proposal and resubmit it to voters, be more creative and come up with a combination plan involving increased taxes and creation of special improvement districts.

There is a wise group of people on city council. We hope they can figure out a way that will win voter approval and bring the city’s infrastructure up to 21st century standards.

Economic development

People trying to lure business and industry to the Hi-Line have an uphill battle.

First, there are not a lot of industrial jobs available these days.

And second, we are off the beaten track, far away from most transportation routes and major airports.

There were hopes we could get some industry from being close to the Bakken oilfields before that business explosion began to sputter at least temporarily.

Chances are that gain in employment will come in small groups of jobs.

There are encouraging signs that small business development is happening at Rocky Boy. Bear Paw Development has specialists who work on helping projects blossom throughout the Hi-Line.

Let’s put an emphasis on business development in 2016.