By DAVID JOHNSON
of the Tribune

MOSCOW -- When she moved here four years ago to possibly attend the University of Idaho, Barbara Richardson Crouch says she found Moscow to be "the friendliest place I'd ever been."

But the 40-year-old Crouch, former executive director of the Latah Economic Development Council and wife of former Sheriff Jeff Crouch, says she's leaving a town where racism has been given tacit approval.

"The entire town seems to say, 'why are you so upset?' " says Crouch, who is black.

She acknowledges many people were upset with her after she told an audience of more than 400 that she was leaving because Moscow is not a good place to raise a multi-racial family. She made the comments during a panel discussion following a local documentary movie titled "My Town." The movie by a Washington State University professor chronicled what some people are calling a cultural divide in Moscow

"I don't feel anyone has endangered my children or threatened to hurt them,"

says Crouch, "but it's stuff like little kids don't want to be brown, and I'm getting out before my little girl doesn't want to be brown."

Mayor Marshall Comstock says Crouch has a right to her opinion, that he respects her as a person and a professional, but he doesn't agree with her assessment of Moscow. "It's frustrating when we have accusations that this is a racist town. I've had many friends, who are minorities, who say this is not a racist town."

While her disappointment is directed mostly at local leaders and residents who won't acknowledge the problem, Crouch says her ire is directed at Christ Church Pastor Doug Wilson. If racism were compared to pregnancy, says Crouch, "Doug Wilson might be four months along."

Wilson counters that Crouch has taken a cheap parting shot at him and a community that's anything but racist. "The obvious thing is that her husband lost the race for sheriff," Wilson says. "I doubt they'd be moving away if he'd won."

Jeff Crouch lost his reelection bid last November.

Barbara Crouch also asserts local racism was quickly exposed in the pending murder trial here of three black men charged with killing another black man.

Grand jurors investigating the shooting death of 19-year-old University of Idaho football player Eric McMillan have made statements, according to court records, that defense attorneys claim are racist in nature.

Latah County Prosecutor William Thompson Jr. acknowledges that allegations of racial bias have been raised in the murder case, but insists that race never played a factor in any of the charges filed. In addition to three principals, six family members also were charged with perjury in connection with the case.

"The whole damn family went to jail for lying," Crouch says. And that's never happened before in Latah County.

Crouch and Jeff Crouch, who is white, have a 20-month-old adopted daughter, MinaBella, who is black, and a biological 1-year-old son, Donald Howard (D.H.).