Graduation signs cleared off The Island

BONNERS FERRY — “The Island” is a serene strip of land on the Kootenai River next to the bridge. For many years this has been the site of proud signs boasting a year, put up by the many graduating seniors of Bonners Ferry High School, or returning alumni, celebrating their reunions.

“I put one up when I graduated from high school with a group of kids, and a couple of years since, with our class reunions, but it just got so trashy looking now, here in town on a beautiful river,” said Bonners Ferry Police Chief Brian Zimmerman.

The once proud tradition had deteriorated.

“Classes were going out, individuals were going out, ripping signs off of posts and throwing them on the ground and putting up theirs, and it just kept adding up,” said Zimmerman. “There were at least a dozen signs on the ground, and it looked trashy.”

Zimmerman put the word out, giving people the opportunity to go out and save their sign, especially if they plan on reusing for future reunions, but only one class responded.

A team was then put together to go and rescue The Island’s reputation and restore the natural beauty.

“The county offered a lot of help through this, and we used the County Waterways jet boat, and had help from Detective Caleb Watts, Detective Dave McClelland, Reserve Scott Brown, and Dave Wenk,” said Zimmerman.

The team went to The Island on March 4, gathered all the dilapidated signs, and burned them.

Zimmerman respects the tradition and fully expects more signs to be set up, especially with an All Class Reunion happening this year, but he hopes that people will be respectful of The Island and help keep it tidy.

“It would be really nice for them to take their sign down, especially if they want to save it, because if it turns to trash again, we are going to go out and we are going to burn them again,” said Zimmerman. “If you can put together the means to put one up ... put together the means to go take it down at the end of the celebration.”

If people take down a sign that does not belong to them, in order to put theirs up, Zimmerman requests that the downed sign be removed, and not left as trash on The Island — a small request in order to maintain both the long standing tradition, as well as the beauty of The Island and the river around it.

“None of us have a problem with the current graduating class putting their year up to celebrate graduation and/or those classes that are celebrating their 10th, or 20th, or 30th reunion,” said Zimmerman. “We will have a couple signs — I suspect — show up this summer for class reunions, and if we can just keep it clean, that would be great.”

For now, The Island stands as a blank canvas again, thanks to the dedicated team that took the time to clean it up.