COUNTERING MILITARY RECRUITMENT
Articles: Military Recruiting: Recruiting in Rural Areas
55124 zip code has most recruits for military
Mark Brunswick, Star Tribune
November 3, 2005
Is the 55124 ZIP code more "gung ho" than most?By one way of counting, maybe so. The ZIP code, which encompasses most
of Apple Valley, had the highest number of military recruits among 18-
to 24-year-olds in Minnesota in 2004. Twenty-nine people from 55124
joined the Army, Air Force or Navy last year.The figures come from a
national study by the Massachusetts-based National Priorities Project.
It shows overall, the group says, that military recruitment has a
disproportionate impact on low- and middle-income communities."If we're
going to engage in war, then we ... need to reflect on the fact that
it's middle- and low-income families who are paying the highest price,"
said Anita Dancs, the group's research director.The National Priorities
Project conducted the survey in conjunction with the American Friends
Service Committee. The results were released this week.Nationally, the
data show that all of the top 20 counties in recruitment had median
household incomes below the national median, and 19 of the 20 had
medians below their state's median.In Minnesota, the highest rates of
18- to 24-year-old recruits who enlisted in the Army, Navy, Air Force
or Army Reserves were from rural counties with median household incomes
at least $17,000 below the state's median of $54,931 a year. If you
were an 18-year-old high school graduate in Traverse County in far
western Minnesota, for instance, you were more likely to join the
military than any of those in your peer group across the state.More
populous metro counties had higher total numbers of military recruits
in 2004 (Hennepin, 374; Dakota, 158, and Ramsey, 152). But Traverse
County, which hugs the South Dakota border, had the highest rate of
military recruitment in the state at 10.5 per thousand of the targeted
population.Big impacts, new restrictionsThe impact of military
recruitment can be profound in rural areas. In the town of Mabel in
Fillmore County along the Iowa border, three people joined the Air
Force in 2004. They represented 11 percent of the 18- to 24-year-olds
in the town, the survey showed.To some, the data show a similar pattern
to the military during the Vietnam War, when draft rules favored those
in college. While there is no draft now, the options available to low-
and moderate-income young adults may continue to be limited."The
well-to-do in this country consider it somebody else's problem. It's
the unshared sacrifices," said Winslow Wheeler, director of the Straus
Military Reform Project for the Washington-based Center for Defense
Information, a nonpartisan organization that analyzes military
operations. The picture in Apple Valley But what accounts for the high
numbers in Apple Valley, where the median household income is $70,253,
two-car families are the norm, and 92 percent of the kids who graduate
from Apple Valley High School go on to higher education?Apple Valley
American Legion Post 1776 is often credited with being supportive of
recruiting by acting as fundraising liaison with the high schools. Many
military recruiters actually live in Apple Valley or neighboring
suburbs."It's just a very patriotic city," said Sgt. 1st Class Donald
Piotrowski, commander of the Army's Burnsville recruiting station,
which includes Apple Valley. "We'll just go down there with American
flags and hand them out to people and most people accept them."But
things are changing.Military recruiters are finding themselves
restricted in high schools, their prime territories. Where once they
could set up tables near the lunchroom for hours, establishing personal
contacts, now they are limited to specific times and to whom they can
talk. The changes are what might be seen as an ironic result of federal
No Child Left Behind legislation that is causing districts to set
clearer rules about when and how recruiters can visit schools. At
Eastview High School in Apple Valley, for instance, Army recruiters are
now relegated to a basement counseling room, down the steps from the
principal's office. There are announcements that the recruiters will be
coming the day before and the morning they arrive, but it is up to the
students to make the effort to see them, Piotrowski said.Parents are
objecting to recruitment efforts with more frequency, too."It could be
because they don't want their children to go to war. That they don't
want their children to die. Just because you join the military doesn't
mean you are going to war. Yeah, the chance is likely, but it doesn't
mean you are going to die, either,"Piotrowski said.With access
restricted at the high schools, the recruiter's main focus these days
is the malls and cold phone calls to homes. Fifty percent of the time,
parents are putting a block on the call. "It's not an easy job,"
Piotrowski said.
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