I’m not a fan of affirmations. I don’t have a poster on my wall that inspires me to succeed, nor do I have a calendar on my desk with daily inspirational quotes. In fact, one could argue that my personality is more in line with “Team Building: Sometimes, the most important lesson you can learn is that you’re not a very good team.“
Nonetheless, I’m completely taken in by the idea of social capital — that there is power in numbers. The definition of social capital, as preferred by the Utah Foundation, is the networks and social connections that advance the interests of both individuals and communities. The networks make us stronger — together.
One great example of social capital of the “community life” variety is from the historic flood of 1983. I’d recently moved to Utah from the Midwest. Given that my family tuned in to the six o’clock evening news every day during dinner, I watched as City Creek began flooding Salt Lake City’s streets. With the help of thousands of volunteers, who filled and placed sandbags, the flood was directed down State Street to the Jordan River, eventually ending up in the Great Salt Lake.
Thinking back, the awe I felt from that grand effort may have led to a life filled with volunteering. But to look around, we can see the Utah community coming together quite regularly. This October, for instance, when we saw flooded homes, communities stepped in to help. This year, when we saw the Deer Creek fire in San Juan, the Salt Lake Main Street fire, the homes lost in Millcreek and, just this month, homes lost in Layton, Utahns were there to help.
In all of these instances, you can see networks and social connections that support people when they are in need. Utahns are volunteering their time to support their community.
In the most recent release of the Utah Foundation’s Social Capital Index project, which focuses on community life, volunteering is front and center. Neighborhood participation is also front and center. More specifically, “Did you get together with other people from your neighborhood to do something positive for your neighborhood or the community?”
Utah is first in the nation on both metrics. And not just first, but far beyond all the other states.
Utahns also do well with charitable donations (first in the nation) and religious participation (second), but volunteering and neighborhood participation are what really set us apart from every other state.
That said, volunteering and neighborhood participation are boosted by religious participation. Before I came to the Beehive State, I hadn’t ever heard of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. But here the Church was, in 1983, at the request of Mayor Ted Wilson, coordinating to bring volunteers from outside of Salt Lake City, outside of Salt Lake County, to “advance the interests” of the larger community in mitigating the flood.
But religious participation is in decline. In 2007, 57% of Utahns polled said they attended at least once a week, 23% said once or twice a month or a few times a year, and 20% said seldom or never. By 2024, 41% (a 16% decrease) said at least once a week, 23% (a 4% decrease) once or twice a month or a few times a year, and 28% said seldom or never (an 8% increase).
Along with religious attendance, two other community life indicators are dragging Utah — and the nation — down. Americans are spending less and less time with friends and neighbors. Relatedly, we are spending more and more time alone.
While Utah is relatively in great standing, ranking — by far — first in the nation in terms of community life, we’ve lost our footing, dropping over 40% of our total community life index score over the past 15 years. This doesn’t bode well for the coming years, let alone this year.
To my mind, in terms of disappointing affirmations, who cares how well we do compared to other states if we aren’t doing well compared to our past selves?
However, I don’t want to lose sight of the fact that, in many ways, you can look around the state to find people helping one another. There are lots of disasters, as well as little trials and tribulations we each face daily, which, without the support of the people in our community, would become unbearable.
Networks make us stronger — together.
This op-ed was originally published in the Deseret News, here.
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