About Us

Framing Our Community (FOC), a 501 [c] 3 nonprofit, grassroots organization, was founded in
1999 by eleven community leaders that foresaw the economic and demographic changes that
faced Elk City and the surrounding area. These community leaders believed success lay within
the framework of proactive rather than reactive programs and by providing demonstration
projects and economic opportunities that would help our community survive the hard times
ahead.

Our town, Elk City, was founded during the gold rush days of the 1860’s and has been a
commodities-based economy through the timber days until the turn of the 21st century. Since
then mining has ceased, timber sales have dipped to a zero cut, the Bennett Forestry Elk City
Mill has closed and the Forest Service has decreased to 60% of its former presence.

Elk City lies within the boundaries of 2.2 million acres of Nez Perce National Forest and is part
of Idaho County, a county larger than the state of Connecticut and is eighty three percent federal
or state land. The 1990 census shows Elk City and the surrounding township with a population of
1,500. We now number approximately 500 residents. Idaho County has been identified by the
Bureau of Economic Analysis (REIS, May, 2001) as low income and high unemployment. Our
poverty level is sixty-four percent (64%), fifty percent (50%) more young people in Idaho
County live in poverty than those in the rest of the state and ninety-six percent (96%) of the
students in our local K-8 school are enrolled in the school free and reduced lunch program. With
the decline in population that accompanies job loss, other impacts occur, like a decline in the
school’s student population. Our school now has three full time teachers, combined elementary
classes and no high school. Our high school children must attend one of two schools 50 or 63
miles away, board out with relatives or a willing family, leave home on Monday morning and
return Friday afternoon.

In the last century, our surrounding forests – which consist primarily of 80-year-old lodge pole
pine, as well as other softwoods - have fallen on hard times. Those lodgepole pines are dying of
old age as well as by attacks of the mountain pine beetle. Large scale timber harvests on the
national forest lands have been curtailed while our lodgepole pine has reached its maturity now.
There is increasing fire danger from dead timber and the forest has become more unhealthy each
year. The result of all this has been a severe decline in the physical and economic health of the
region.

The leaders who form the nucleus of FOC come from diverse backgrounds and possess the
strength, education and experience to address the economic and social problems we face. They
believe we must be proactive and set a new course to break the cycle of rural poverty. They also
recognized that in hard times lay many opportunities and early efforts have produced projects
that range from construction of an outdoor learning center, testimony to the Senate and House of
Representatives, feasibility studies and business plans for a Small Timber Business Incubator and
a Biomass Cogeneration Power Facility, Regional Rural Community Development Forums, a
Teacher’s Workshop, formation of the “Jobs in the Woods” program and construction of Phase I
of the Elk City Small Business Incubator. To establish a solid economic base we must change
from an extraction based economy to a restoration-based economy capturing the wider margin of
profits from wholesale and retail-based products for urban and internet markets.

To accomplish this goal, FOC designed an integrated plan that begins with restoring and
improving the health of the forest and watersheds that surround our natural resource dependant
community. We then utilize the small diameter, dead and dying trees in the manufacture of
wholesale and retail products for sale to urban and internet markets. This effort required
building human, social and cultural, physical and financial capital, and working collaboratively
with federal agencies, governmental entities, regional and national community-based
organizations and local organizations.

Public meetings helped to build the community’s vision. In the year 2000, community members
determined that they wanted to retain their ties to the natural resources that surrounded them by
developing small to midsized businesses, improving community infrastructure, offering
educational opportunities and connecting entrepreneurs to funding opportunities. This set the
direction for Framing Our Community and the formation of its “Jobs in the Woods” and Small
Business Incubator programs. “Jobs in the Woods” provides jobs in forest restoration, wildlife
habitat improvement and hazardous fuels reduction; while economic development occurs
through the Small Business Incubator. Materials removed from the forest to improve forest
health are utilized in the manufacture of value-added wood products that are sold to urban
markets.

FOC believes that formulating an integrated program which uses every stick removed from the
forest will make the forest healthier and the community safer and more vibrant. Examples of
steps taken by FOC to build capacity and a sustainable future are listed below.