Philomath City Councilor Rich Saalsaa is about to trade council chambers for mountain passes.
Beginning Aug. 24, the retired Philomath Fire and Rescue deputy fire chief will set out from Bozeman, Montana, on foot, aiming to cover 760 miles over a month before finishing at Seattle’s Pier 62 on Sept. 24.
Saalsaa’s walking the final leg of Walk USA for Health Equity, a five-year, 3,450-mile campaign started by naturopathic doctor Dennis Godby to draw attention to disparities in health care access across the country.
Saalsaa, 68, and Godby, who will turn 70 three days before the walk begins, have known each other for more than 50 years going back to when they were classmates at a California seminary school in the early 1970s. The two stayed in touch as their careers diverged — Godby into naturopathic medicine, Saalsaa into a 50-year public safety career that included stints as a firefighter, EMT and deputy fire chief, along with work designing dispatch and nurse advice call center software that earned him several patents.
Godby began his walk across America five years ago, starting in Myrtle Beach and completing it in stages tied to different causes. This final stretch is dedicated to health equity — the idea that a person’s ZIP code, income or ethnicity shouldn’t determine the quality of health care available to them.
“He’s been doing this for a long time … and COVID hit,” Saalsaa said. “He started to realize that essentially people were sort of getting different levels of healthcare just depending on where they live — you know, like what their zip code is, and it’s like, well, ‘hang on, why is this so out of kilter?’”
Saalsaa said the disparities show up in ways both obvious and subtle from where health clinics choose to locate to the biases that can shape care itself. As examples, he mentioned the color of a person’s skin or their ethnic background can factor into biases when it comes to access to health care. Plus, folks in rural America can be impacted more than those in cities simply because of limited access.
Saalsaa’s decades as a first responder gave him a close-up view of the problem — including his own occasional blind spots.
“As a first responder, I got to see it up close and personal, even in our own town. And I’m just as guilty of the bias, you know,” Saalsaa said. “You walk into a patient’s house and it’s like a hoarding house or something like that, for example, and you already form an opinion, and that opinion becomes a barrier. It just does. It’s human nature.”
Saalsaa retired from Philomath Fire and Rescue in December 2024, though he still volunteers with the department as an EMT. Around the same time, he touched base with Godby.
“When I retired, I said I want to do that at the last leg, and so I started walking a lot,” Saalsaa said, adding that the training shed 165 pounds.
The pace won’t be gentle. Saalsaa and Godby expect to average about 26 miles a day — essentially a marathon daily — with more than 35,000 feet of vertical climb along the route, including a stretch between Missoula and Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, that Saalsaa said will involve 8,000- to 9,000-foot climbs.
“Philomath is a great place to actually do walking because we’ve got hills,” Saalsaa said. “But mind you, it’s a little different walking to the top of Neabeack Hill to walking to the top of the Rocky Mountains.”
Wildfire smoke across the region is an added wrinkle. If conditions become hazardous along the planned route, Saalsaa said the pair will relocate to a less-affected area but still complete the full 760 miles.
“It’s pretty antithetical to be in hazardous smoke conditions, talking about health equity,” he said.
The walk will begin in Montana, pass through Idaho and end in Washington with scheduled stops in Helena, Missoula, Coeur d’Alene, Spokane, Moses Lake, Ellensburg and Snoqualmie before reaching Seattle.
Saalsaa and Godby will largely walk the route themselves, though other supporters, including at least one fellow naturopath, plan to join for individual segments.
Godby’s brother will drive a support vehicle — Saalsaa’s Subaru — along the route
“As you can imagine, you’ve got to be heavy on electrolytes and water and things like that,” Saalsaa said. “So yeah, they’ll be providing that level of support.”
Along the way, Saalsaa said he’s looking forward to seeing acquaintances in Montana, but the emotional high point will likely be the finish.
“At the end in Seattle, my daughter and granddaughter and my brother and other family are going to venture up there when we finish the walk,” he said.
The final three miles will retrace a route the pair test-walked previously, starting at Jimi Hendrix Park and passing City Hall Park, the downtown waterfront and Pike Place Market before ending at Pier 62 on Sept. 24.
Organizers aren’t fundraising for a cause directly — donations collected along the way are meant only to cover the cost of the walk with any leftover funds going to regional health equity organizations. Saalsaa said the campaign also includes meetings with mayors and other elected officials in cities along the route.
For Saalsaa, the walk carries a dual meaning — as a private citizen honoring a decades-old friendship, and as a Philomath elected official with a stake in how his own community addresses health care access.
“I kind of have an interesting twist in this because not only am I just an individual but I’m an elected official and I’m a first responder,” he said. “So from our standpoint as an elected official of Philomath, the opportunity is to look for those places where we can improve access to health care and things like that for our own folks.”
Those interested in following the walk can do so through the Walk USA for Health Equity website, Facebook and Instagram pages.
