Imagine living with no hot water or not being able to get into the bathtub for a soak or a shower. Some low-income senior citizens in the Flathead Valley have lived like that for years in ancient mobile homes.

No one knows more about the hardships faced by seniors than Jim Atkinson, volunteer director of the senior mobile home repair program. He presented these health and safety problems along with several others at his May board meeting.

On the second Tuesday of each month, Atkinson brings his nine-member board new cases involving people who need ramps installed, rotting stairs fixed, leaking roofs patched, single-pane windows replaced, clogged sinks unplugged — the list seems endless. But with just a little over $8,000 in repair dollars, the program budget has severe limits.

“We need to replenish for summer work,” Atkinson said. “I’ve got requests in for grants, but I’m hoping some normal folks will help us out.”

He makes a solid argument for supporting the little boot-strap program he initiated while serving as director of Agency on Aging.  Not a single penny goes into overhead and administration, and his diverse board comes up with all manner of creative solutions to stretch dollars as far as possible.

Atkinson’s actions speak to his passion for helping these forgotten mobile home dwellers. When his contract at the Agency on Aging wasn’t renewed, Atkinson continued working for the senior mobile home repair program for free.

“I was worried that it would go south if I hadn’t volunteered to run it,” he said.

He started raising money to repair mobile homes because most existing programs supported by federal dollars only work on permanent structures. Occasionally, even this program’s board members question the wisdom of putting money into a trailer with little or no value.

When the issue came up regarding a very expensive roof repair, Atkinson had a succinct and heartfelt answer.

“I know it seems like putting money down a rat hole,” he said. “But it’s her rat hole, and she doesn’t have any other.

“She doesn’t have anyone to help her. Her husband died a year or two ago. He was in a nursing home and wasn’t that great of a handyman before that.”

The board finally agreed to spend $685 for a shorter-term roof fix instead of $3,875 for a five-year roof. When a walk-in shower installation threatened to gobble up almost $3,000, they came up with a bench device costing a few hundred dollars that would allow handicapped people to slide into a seat in the tub to take a shower.

When discussing other needs, various board members brought up alternative funding sources and approaches they have used in their programs or knew about in the community. Atkinson said this networking of resources and creative brainstorming happens at every board meeting.

“When you get enough people around a table, they come up with good ideas,” Atkinson said.

 His can-do board members include Leslie Shumate from Rural Development, Dwain Elkins of the city of Kalispell Building Department, Nancy Kair of Loyal Care In-Home Assistance, Mike Radel from Flathead Electric Cooperative, Sue Ann Grogan of Whitefish Housing Authority, Marjie Jones from CAP Weatherization, and Carrol Sorensen and Terry Guidi, both members of the Agency on Aging Advisory Council.

Steve Burgland of Great Bear Builders and Diane Yarus of AirWorks attend meetings and provide professional advice. Both have served as contractors for the program; however, Burgland plans to soon move from contractor to voting board member.

According to Atkinson, Yarus and her husband, Bill, at AirWorks have initiated several of their own senior help programs. One offers free furnace inspections each June, and another provides labor to install and remove air conditioners purchased with Radel’s connections to Flathead Electric’s Roundup for Safety.

Along with the regulars, the May meeting included guest Jane Wheeler of Oro y Plata, a small family foundation that made a sizable grant to the program. Atkinson said he invited Wheeler “to see how we do business,” which started with circulating pictures of completed projects including a new ramp and new set of stairs.

The smiles on those seniors’ faces represent the only pay the board receives, but it was clearly enough. Now they just need more community donations to replenish the dollars that help keep seniors safe and sanitary in the trailers they call home.

“Every penny goes to labor and materials,” Atkinson said.

For more information, contact him at 756-1102, 270-3035 or jcatk@montanaskynet.

Reporter Candace Chase may be reached at 758-4436 or at cchase@dailyinterlake.com.