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WOOD RIVER WEEKLY
YOUR VOICE IN THE WOOD RIVER VALLEY
Free | Nov 2 - 15, 2022 | Vol. 3 - No. 22 | woodriverweekly.com
“May your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears.” – Nelson Mandela
PERUSING VALLEY NEEDS
The Hunger Coalition, based in Bellevue, has seen its weekly numbers of households served jump 240% since early 2020. Photo credits: Jay Graham
Can community services support its residents’ goodwill?
N
By Eric Valentine
ews that one of the Valley’s most cherished and utilized nonprofits‚ The Hunger Coalition, was requesting people cut back on its food pantry usage to twice monthly brought post-pandemic life into focus a little more harshly this week. Among other things, it triggered questions about whether an alleged influx of refugees or asylum seekers to the Valley was having unsustainable impacts to an area already battling a housing shortage. What follows is The Hunger Coalition’s response to questions asked by Wood River Weekly.
Q: A couple of calls came into Wood River Weekly that indicated at least some people feel if the influx of Peruvian immigrants didn’t happen, there’d be no change in service happening. Can you shed any light on this? A: We’ve adapted our emergency food distribution to provide the best possible experience for participants and make the increase in need more manageable for our staff. While there have been no cuts to our programming, we have shifted our model; essentially sharing more food less frequently. While we still have three weekly distributions, we are temporarily staggering traffic flow by asking our
participants to shop every other week and giving them more grocery points with which to shop. We hope this change will allow us to do what we’ve always done— provide emergency food to everyone who needs it efficiently and compassionately. No Blaine County resident who needs food is being turned away. The recent changes to our distribution are in response to a record demand for food. This is a result of Continued Community Services Page 4
Correction to Wood River Weekly Article, published 9/21/22 The publisher of the Wood River Weekly (WRW) hereby issues a retraction to an article titled “Grand Theft Water”, published on 9/21/22. WRW acknowledges the writer failed to contact the defendant’s representatives for comment and clarification. WRW acknowledges that all information for the story was obtained directly from a court filing in a case that is still pending. We did not verify the statements the plaintiff asserted in the lawsuit. WRW acknowledges the use of legal and/or inflammatory language (‘theft’, ‘steal’, ‘cheat’, ‘kill’) was not warranted or supported by the facts of the case as they are known. The writer relied, and embellished on, the filings of the plaintiffs and did not do his due diligence in reporting both sides. We acknowledge that this language can be interpreted as prejudicial, and it is not in our purview as a publication to use such language. WRW acknowledges that, in not being interviewed for their side of the story, the defendants felt the reporting unfair and detrimental.
It was not our intention to defame the defendants in any way and the story was not researched or published to offer a biased, sensational version of events. This was in no way intentional and we extend an apology to the Defendants. The facts of this lawsuit are yet to be considered or adjudicated in a court of law and only the documentation filed by the plaintiffs was used by Mr. Valentine in writing the article. It is clear now that both parties should have been interviewed and able to provide their views regarding the pending case. We acknowledge this now and would like to clarify that all points reported in the story were taken directly from public records and public court filings made on behalf of the plaintiffs, much like a criminal case, which do not include the opposing view or explanation. This case remains active in the in the Fifth District Court for the State of Idaho, Blaine County and WRW anticipates publishing another story to include the cases of both the plaintiffs and the defendants. Land use, water rights, and HOA agreements are complex and nuanced topics of concern for all residents in the Wood River Valley and ones that can inflame tempers. Fair, impartial reporting will be the watchword for the WRW in covering these types of stories in the future.