SKC Community Service Day is good for the spirit of community

By B.L. Azure

Royelle Bundy and Ellie McLeod help spruce up the Jocko Cemetery during SKC’s Community Service Day Friday. (B.L. Azure photo)

ARLEE — For more than 25 years Salish Kootenai College has extended its hand out to Flathead Indian Reservation communities in appreciation for the many things the communities have done for the college. Every May SKC staff, students and other volunteers fan out across the reservation to help with spring cleanup and spruce-up in and around the communities.

“Joe (McDonald) instituted SKC Community Service Day a long time ago, about 25 years or so,” said Bill Swaney, SKC professor. “It started on campus but SKC decided it was really important to give something back to the communities on the reservation so it has expanded to off campus locations.”

Swaney and several SKC staff members, as well as students and other volunteers were basking under the first toasty sun of the year as they spruced up the Jocko Valley Catholic Cemetery Friday. With shovels, rakes, lawnmowers and weed eaters in hand they attacked Mother Nature’s overgrown handiwork made even thicker by this year’s abundant rainfall.

By the end of Friday the Jocko Cemetery was well spruced up and ready for this Memorial Day. (B.L. Azure photo)

“SKC requires students to participate in community service projects. We want to teach them the importance of community service and to lead by example with their participation in such projects,” Swaney said. “The emphasis is on locations where there is work that needs to be done but there is no designated group to do it.”

The snow covered Mission Mountains with Grey Wolf Peak dominant on the blue skyline was a perfect backdrop for the soulful duty of cleaning the final resting places of those who have gone on.

Portions of the cemetery contain the graves of the old Indians who passed on in the late-1800s and early 1900s. Some of the graves are marked, there are remnants of grave markers on many others and many aren’t marked other than sunken earth. Reverence fills the air.

SKC staffers applied a new coat of paint on the Nkwusm Salish Language Immersion School in Arlee Friday. (B.L. Azure photo)

Swaney said he felt spiritually and physically uplifted by the work he was doing at the cemetery. “Some of the most important people of the Salish tribe are buried here,” he said. They include among others Chief Charlo, Antoine Moiese, Chief Martin Charlo and Chief Paul Charlo. “This is a good day. We are making a lot of progress here. It is always good to work hard. It is especially good here.”

This year the selected sites included: the Jocko Cemetery in Arlee; Flathead River cleanup at Buffalo and Sloan bridges; Humane Society including participation in the spayed and neuter clinic in Ronan; Elmo Community Garden; Boys and Girls Club in Ronan; Arlee Tribal Senior Center; Nkwusm School in Arlee; Old Catholic Cemetery in Polson; Old Hwy 93 cleanup in Pablo; and Tribal Elder Assistance.

“We want to thank the Tribal Council who for many years have allowed Sam Barber and his Tribal Maintenance staff to assist us with our work at all the sites,” said Roger McClure, director of SKC’s Career Services. “SKC is always pleased with the willingness of our employees to provide these services to the greater reservation community.”