Bar Owner Finds New Purpose at Frazer Council

For the first time in its history, the Frazer Community Council has opened a community office to provide services, guidance and resources to the residents. That effort has been led and funded in large part from a local businesswoman who found a new calling in life helping her community become "clean and sober" by providing a grass roots system of change.

When Angie Toce's brother finally made the decision to get sober, she was on it. Calling the Spotted Bull Treatment Center in Poplar but finding no availability for her brother, the center referred her to Wayne Martell, who gave her a list of Narcotics and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings in the area. Toce took to her brother's recovery and attended meetings but says she was resistant to admitting she might have a problem herself.

"I attended the meetings but I didn't participate, because, I didn't believe I was an alcoholic," explained Toce. While in those meetings, though, that perception changed for Toce who described her transformation: "I learned things about myself and I wanted to be sober, but how do you do that as a bar owner?"

Toce, who currently owns the bar Baby Lonnie's Beer Mug in Frazer, says she shut down for a brief time and found other sources of revenue. She started to follow the twelve- step program herself. Toce says she was on the step where you make amends and at that point realized she had harmed so many people.

"I hurt a lot of people," she said adding, "So I thought, how do I make that right?" Toce says she began thinking about breaking the cycle and began a youth alliance in Frazer that mainly consisted of fellowship, activities and bible studies.

Then as part of the Youth Alliance, she attended a Frazer Community Council Meeting with her assistant, Ashley Daniels, and one thing lead to another before Toce was asked to join the council as the vice chair. It was after that appointment that she began working towards opening an office. After badgering the Fort Peck Tribes she finally attained a key to the Frazer Tribal Elder building. She proceeded to install a phone and internet and obtained computer resources and books, at which point she was able to open her doors and try to keep as regular of hours as possible.

All of this has been accomplished on a volunteer basis with no official funding. Toce says the community is in the process of finding their past funding revenues but that mainly she has operated on her own dime, even going so far as to buy a van with her own money to take residents to NA/AA meetings in other cities.

So far, the Youth Alliance and community council have held a New Year's Eve lock-in where over 100 youth and family members attended to participate in games, food, and fun. The event was paid for by Toce and a group of her friends, most of whom are in recovery themselves. "We were sober and happy," says Toce describing the drug and alcohol free event for the Frazer community.

Still it has not been an easy road for Toce. "In order for me to sober up, I had to find who I was and why I needed to be sober." She described how she felt after her mother passed away over a decade ago and that she needed to reconcile that with her current life and why she drank. She spent time reflecting spiritually, "This past February I fasted for four days and nights. I made amends with my past and it is easier now with my creator first."

The recovering addict has taken pride in her work so far. "I have helped 13 family and friends become sober and reunite with family," say Toce about where she has come since starting her road to recovery.

Since its inception, the council's office has taken to offering a wide array of services from Transitional Assistance for Needy Families and Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program volunteer programs, because as Toce and Daniels described it there were "too many unreliables" in the community that no one could sign off on the volunteer requirement.

The other point of pride for the office is the fact that community members can now search for jobs and use the internet in Frazer rather than having to travel to Wolf Point or Glasgow. The office also offers activities and programs for youth with donations from the Fort Peck Youth Activities Department, which provided games, activities, projectors and speakers for youth in Frazer to enjoy.

Even with the fast success of the program, there has been some negativity, but Daniels and Toce try not to let the negativity affect their new found purpose.

"You always have your crabs in a bucket," says Toce, "People say negative things or post them to Facebook. I just leave it there and I don't say anything." Toce feels the truth will keep the program going saying: "I try to keep the community on what and where everything is being spent. When I started this I began with the quote, 'You must never be fearful about what you are doing if it is right,' and that was Rosa Parks."

The program is always looking for volunteers but with a caveat. "If you want to help me, then I need a little bit from you too. I need clean and sober," say Toce laughingly adding, "And I will help them. They stay clean and sober and I will move mountains for them."

Currently the office offers Social Security Administration paperwork assistance, they are getting HiSET (formerly GED) classes and Diabetes program outreach. Other exciting developments came from the Valley County administration following a meeting between the FCC and the Valley County Commissioners and Sheriff. In those meetings they offered to help with fixing street signs, having regular Sheriff patrols and with plowing the town roads. The road departments even help plow driveways and roads of people who require dialysis.

In the end, Toce described her vision simply. "It is all about being clean and sober," said Toce adding later that their focus is in, "breaking the cycle and teaching children that there is a healthy lifestyle alternative."

If you are interested in assisting the Frazer Community Council or the Youth Alliance you can contact the Frazer Community Council at 406-695-2260.