DWIs take heavy toll on 2 state counties

By Larry Oakes

Star Tribune Staff Writer

DULUTH -- Alcohol-related traffic accidents kill people in two sparsely populated counties in northern Minnesota at a rate about 20 times that of the busiest metro-area county, state figures show.

Both rural counties, Mahnomen and Cass, contain parts of the state's two largest reservations for American Indians, a population afflicted disproportionately by substance abuse.

From 2001 through 2003, Mahnomen County, which lies within the White Earth Ojibwe Reservation, had both the highest alcohol-related fatality rate and the highest rate of DWI arrests, with one arrest for every six people in the county and one death for every 865 people, the state numbers show.

Sheriff Brad Athmann said the numbers don't surprise him.

"We have a high rate of poverty and a high rate of unemployment," he said. "There's too much drinking going on, a lot of drinking and driving."

Cass County, targeted along with 13 other counties for special DWI enforcement next year, had 26 deaths in the three years, more than metro-area Anoka, Dakota and Washington counties each had, despite their vastly greater numbers of people and cars.

"There's no denying that alcoholism and drug use is a huge problem for our people," said Lila George, coordinator of the Addiction and Dependency program on the Leech Lake Ojibwe reservation, which lies partly in Cass County. "We're trying to take care of what some people think is an epidemic."

The death and arrest disparities show up in figures compiled by the Minnesota Department of Public Safety as part of a program to reduce drunken driving.

Earlier this month the department's Office of Traffic Safety announced that it would use a federal grant in 2005 for extra enforcement in 14 counties with the most alcohol-related traffic fatalities.

Officials picked counties based on numbers of deaths alone, not deaths per capita. Hennepin County, with its population of more than a million people and 58 deaths, topped the list, which included the six other metro-area counties.

Even though Cass County's population of 27,150 is a fraction of all the other counties on the list, it had the fifth-highest number of deaths, with 26.

That's one death for every 1,044 people in the county, compared with one for every 19,244 people in Hennepin from 2001-2003, according to state statistics. By that measure, Cass was the second deadliest of the state's 87 counties; Hennepin was 80th.

"You have poverty, you have despair, you have a cycle of desperation that continues," said Cass County District Judge John Smith. "It's not like we're soft on DWIs. We have some of the highest fines in the state. It's a societal problem."

With six deaths, tiny Mahnomen didn't make the state's list for extra enforcement. But when its population of only 5,190 is considered, it becomes clear that alcohol killed a greater share of the people there than anywhere else in Minnesota.

Costly carnage

"The fact that Cass could have more deaths than Anoka or Dakota surprises people," said Kathy Swanson, director of the Office of Traffic Safety.

Because Cass is on the list, it will get some of the $700,000 federal grant in 2005 for Operation NightCAP, which stands for Nighttime Concentrated Alcohol Patrol.

The program helps sheriff's offices and other agencies pay overtime to have extra officers on the road at peak times for drunken drivers.

"NightCAP gives a tremendous boost," said Tom Burch, Cass County's chief deputy. "Part of the problem we've had is lack of enforcement due to restrictive budgets. We're hurting, the State Patrol is hurting and our traffic enforcement had not grown with the growth of traffic in the county."

Swanson said the 350 deaths and nearly 1,000 severe injuries over three years in the 14 targeted counties have cost the state and local communities an estimated $400 million.

The program didn't target Mahnomen County, though its death rate was highest, because its actual numbers of deaths are lower, Swanson said.

"We could eradicate traffic deaths in Mahnomen County and save five lives a year," she said. "But if we're able to reduce traffic fatalities even five percent in the metro-area counties, it might result in 20 fewer deaths.

"We've decided to go where potential lives saved would be highest, but you wish you could apply those same resources to every area of the state where lives are lost."

Another state program, the Safe and Sober Campaign, does target areas based on deaths as a percentage of population and miles driven, and Mahnomen always comes out near the top of that list, she said.

Swanson said the death rate from alcohol-related crashes in rural counties may be influenced by more that just alcohol. "Seat-belt use is six to 10 percentage points lower outside the metro area," she said. In addition, she said, roads aren't always as good, and areas are isolated.

Fighting a scourge

A lot of data suggest that substance abuse takes a heavier toll on Indians. They die from alcoholism at a rate 670 percent greater than for the U.S. population as a whole, according to the national Indian Health Service.

A Minnesota Department of Human Services study found in 2000 that twice as many of the state's Indian students evaluated needed substance abuse treatment when compared with non-Indians. In the 45-64 age range, eight times as many Indians needed treatment, the study said.

Rachel Mueller, the longtime director of Pine Manors chemical dependency treatment center in Nevis, Minn., said alcohol and drugs have caused "devastation" in Cass, Mahnomen, Clearwater and other rural counties the center serves.

She said dwindling resources are aggravating the problem.

"These counties have areas of severe poverty," she said. "There is a lack of funding for social service programs, a lack of insurance benefits and declining monetary support for our school systems -- all leading to a decline in living standards and an increase in alcohol and chemical use."

George, the addictions program coordinator on the Leech Lake reservation, said she'll be happy for the extra enforcement if it leads to more court orders for treatment.

"Just picking them up and putting them in jail isn't enough," she said.

In addition, she said, more dollars need to be focused on prevention, through anti-drug and alcohol programs. "We need to reach kids in elementary school," she said.

Sheriff Athmann of Mahnomen County said that good jobs and a better work ethic would go a long way toward getting his county down from the top of the list.

"Native people don't seem to want to leave the reservation, but there aren't a lot of jobs for those who stay," he said. "We need opportunity and a way to bring people out of their hopelessness."

Coming Monday at the Star Tribune: A look at an unusual and chilling form of alcohol-related death unique to the Cass County area.

Staff writer Ron Nixon contributed to this story