Dear Friends,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This week I joined State Treasurer Julie Ellsworth, families, and students at Eagle Elementary School to mark a milestone. Idahoans completed 250,000 acts of service ahead of America’s 250th birthday on July 4th.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That number started as a goal. At the beginning of 2026, the America250 in Idaho Ambassadors and the State Service Committee launched a statewide challenge to reach 250,000 acts of service between January and Independence Day. Representative Brandon Mitchell and Senator Ben Adams sponsored a legislative resolution declaring 2026 the Year of Volunteerism. The idea was that as the country approaches this milestone anniversary, Idaho would mark it not just with celebrations, but with service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At Eagle Elementary, students, parents, and community members came together to celebrate reaching that goal. The founders didn’t build this country on the assumption that government would solve every problem. They built it on the assumption that free people, left to govern themselves, would take care of each other and build something worth passing down. That’s what 250,000 acts of service looks like in practice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Self-government only works if people are willing to show up for each other. Laws and institutions matter, but they rest on something deeper. Neighbors who actually know each other, someone who shows up when a family is struggling, students who learn early that citizenship involves obligations and not just rights. Idaho has always understood that, and this week was evidence of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We set a goal this year of 250,000 acts of service, and Idahoans have already surpassed it with more than 315,000 acts logged. That doesn\u2019t surprise me, because serving others is part of who we are as Idahoans. If you\u2019d like to help us reach even greater heights before July 4th, visit IdahoKindness.com<\/a> to log your acts of service or find opportunities through JustServe.org<\/a>.<\/a> As we look ahead to celebrating America\u2019s 250th birthday, let\u2019s continue building a culture of service, kindness, and community that makes Idaho strong.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Dear Friends, This week I joined State Treasurer Julie Ellsworth, families, and students at Eagle Elementary School to mark a milestone. Idahoans completed 250,000 acts of service ahead of America’s 250th birthday on July 4th. That number started as a goal. At the beginning of 2026, the America250 in Idaho Ambassadors and the State Service […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":81,"featured_media":19777,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[243],"tags":[712,1595],"class_list":["post-19956","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinions-op-eds","tag-charity","tag-volunteering","cat-243-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19956","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/81"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19956"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19956\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19957,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19956\/revisions\/19957"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19956"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19956"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19956"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}