PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE: This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus use an image from my favorite sport, golf. Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all of my professional positions, including as a Congressional press secretary in Washington, D.C., an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and a private sector lobbyist. This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.

There is a great story in Salem and it is not well known.

So be it. Because the effort to provide free health services to low- income residents is based on doing the work and not setting out to get credit for it.

The story: More than 70 churches have banded together to provide free medical, dental and counseling services in a way that verifies it is possible “to put feet to faith.”

Salem Free Clinics (SFC) was started in January 2005 as an outreach by West Salem Foursquare Church. With the need for medical help in mind, Dr. Marion Reynolds and Todd Gould, the Outreach Pastor, made their first house call. Walker Middle School, located in West Salem, offered the use of its gym for the first five years of SFC’s existence, meeting every 1st and 3rd Saturday afternoon.

At about the same time, Salem Alliance Church (SAC) – where my wife have attended for some 30 years — began thinking about plans for a new building located on Broadway just west of the church in Northeast Salem.

In a survey of the Grant/Highland neighborhoods, SAC found that health care needs rose to the top.

So, all of interest merged in a decision by the church to house the free clinic in the new building, which came to be called Broadway Commons.

In 2011, SFC also established a partnership with Corban University to provide counseling services in addition to the basic the medical and dental services that marked the clinics’ start. In the same year, services expanded into Polk County with a free clinic located in Dallas.

The clinic – both the major site and the satellites — is operated by volunteers who greet those who show up for help, plus provide all of the medical, dental and counseling services.

At one point in the last years, it would have been possible to think that there would be no need for a free clinic, given passage of the national Affordable Care Act, which came to be called ObamaCare after the then-president.

But, people still fell through the cracks, plus ObamaCare was not run with precision, so it was often difficult to determine who qualified for government health care and who did not.

That’s where the clinic came in.

Beyond the health care services, staff members at the clinic also are available to provide spiritual guidance to those who come in to the clinic and ask for such help.

That’s a critical part of clinic services because, overall health is not just a physical issue; it also has spiritual dimensions. If an individual receives health care, then commits his or her life to Christ, what better result can there be!