1/31/10 Call for Aid - for our Friends and Family on the Cheyenne River Reservation

Winter, 2010 Editorial
Guest Author: RedEarthDescendants

for Mitakuye Oyasin News is beginning to come about the dire situation in the Dakotas on the reservations. Am fwding this to you all in the hopes you can fwd it on and on so that funds can find their Way to aid our friends and family on the Cheyenne River Res and across this frozen land. Please send this out and if you are able, please send whatever assistance you can with your prayers! i've spoken with Gladys Looking Horse and she confirms all that is written below. In the boxes sent this Christmas we included candles ~ which have all been used now TO WARM THE HOMES in temps that range into the minus degrees!!! If you are able, please help our Relations ~ addresses are included below Blessings of Warmth, Light, Safety and running Waters helen heronheart bellevue, wa hwdusek@comcast.net ----- Forwarded Message ----- From: "RedEarthDescendants" Sent: Friday, January 29, 2010 8:21:35 PM GMT -08:00 US/Canada Pacific Subject: thank you for considering sending some help R.E.D. Community, Thank you for reading through this and even if you can't send funds to help, please send your prayers. I can personally vouch for the validity and integrity of the contacts listed below (they are some of our extended family), so anything you are able to send will be distributed directly to the purposes spelled out. R.E.D. is working toward providing a continuing system of gathering funds and warm clothing/supplies to send back to these places in need on a regular basis. We'll keep you posted on HOW to help. Thank you, Jaimie All My Relations, A severe ice storm on Monday, coated 60 High Voltage towers and over 800 telephone poles with 5 inches of ice and toppled them all to the ground. The reservations of Sisseton, Cheyenne River (where the Calf Pipe is), and Standing Rock, in both North and South Dakota, have been declared by the Obama Administration as disaster areas. This ice storm has caused widespread abandoning of homes without water and electricity for 5 days now, to seek shelter elsewhere. To restore these basic human services may take up to a month. We who participate in the Lakota way of life have an opportunity to give back to the people who have shared their ceremonies and lives with us. I personally spoke with Leon Red Dog (Green Grass, S.D.) today. He told me it takes 35 gallons of gasoline per day to keep his home and his sister's home warm using small generators. The temperature is 10 above! It can drop to -50 below as they get deeper into winter. Because it may take a month to get electricity to the outlying homes around Eagle Butte (as only one example). The people are in desperate need of funds to purchase generators, warm clothes, blankets, food, water, etc.. The elders, children, and pregnant women are particularly vulnerable under these dire circumstances. Barbara Omaha's family are working together to rent a truck to fill with basic essentials that are so desparately needed and drive it to the Cheyenne River reservation for distribution. If you would like to contribute money to help you can send your donation/s to one, or more of these addresses: Barbara Omaha 4808 140th St. Savage, Minnesota 55378 I also spoke with Martin High Bear's sister and husband, Melda & Melvin Garreau, in Eagle Butte, S.D.. They are elders in their 80's, and many relatives have found shelter in their two bedroom home. Electricity and water were just restored to their home on Thursday...but they are stretched to the max providing for those that have sought their help. If you would like to help them during this crisis time, you can send your donation to: Melvin & Melda Garreau P.O. 641 Eagle Butte, South Dakota 57625 and / or to Arvol Looking Horse (Keeper of the Calf Pipe) P.O.Box 687 Eagle Butte, S.D. 57625 You can read below the email that came to me yesterday and prompted me to make several phone calls to the Cheyenne River reservation to check this out. It is all true! Please pass this on to all you know who participate in the Lakota ceremonies...or who would like to help. Nina wopida...very many thanks, my Relatives! Jan Meyer ----- Original Message ----- From: Jaime Rosario To: Jimmy Red Elk ; Jan Meyer ; Lorraine Greybear ; Charlie SittingBull Sent: Thursday, January 28, 2010 11:21 AM Subject: FW: no electricity, no heat, no drinking water -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 28 Jan 2010 10:04:28 -0800 And our country is worried about people that were cheering and burning the american flag after 9-11. You got to love america!!!!!! ........This sounds absolutely awful. I had no idea that this was going on over there. Storm Takes Steep Toll on Destitute Tribe Thousands of Downed Power Poles Leave South Dakota Sioux Reservation Without Heat, Water; Melting Snow to Use in Toilets A tiny tribe of Lakota Sioux has been battling wind, rain and subzero temperatures this week as ice storms lash one of the U.S.'s poorest communities and leave thousands without electricity, heat or drinking water. "There's been winters this bad before, but not with rain so bad it freezes the power lines and snaps the poles," said Joseph Brings Plenty, the 38-year old chairman of the Cheyenne River Sioux tribe, whose reservation lies about 200 miles northeast of Rapid City, S.D. The tribal chairman said 500 power lines were brought down in a blizzard in November, and that between 2,000 and 3,000 more have been lost since Friday from ice storms. The Cheyenne River tribe is made up of four of the seven bands of Lakota Sioux Indians in the Dakotas, whose reservations also include the Pine Ridge, Standing Rock and Rosebud bands. Power-line damage across all reservations may exceed 5,000 downed poles, which tribal authorities said may take weeks or months for utility companies to repair. "These events are showing just how painfully inadequate our emergency response capabilities are. Because of one ice storm, we had over 3,000 downed electrical lines and mass power outages," said Tracey Fischer, chief executive and president of First Nations Oweesta Corporation, a national nonprofit working on economic development in Indian country. "There has been looting of homes and businesses by people desperate for food and water. Schools have been out of session for a week and will likely be unable to open their doors for at least another week," said Ms. Fischer, a member of the Cheyenne River tribe. With just 10,000 residents spread across 2.8 million acres, many Cheyenne River families depend on electricity transmitted across hundreds of empty miles to run pumps for drinking water, or to power the ignition modules on natural-gas and propane heaters. The Cheyenne River tribe set up emergency shelters across the reservation in tiny towns with names like Eagle Butte, Cherry Creek, Swiftbird and Whitehorse. Last year the tribe earned $175,000 leasing land to nontribal ranchers and deposited the money in an emergency fund. That fund is now exhausted, the tribal chairman said. A special Wells Fargo account established to help raise funds to evacuate tribal members with medical needs brought in just $450 in donations on its first day, said Eileen Briggs, a Cheyenne River Tribal executive. Like most U.S. tribes, the Cheyenne River Sioux function as a sovereign nation on their reservation of 10,000 residents. An additional 8,000 Cheyenne River Sioux live off the reservation, mostly in Rapid City. The tribe manages its internal affairs and runs its own police force and court, but receives grants and subsidies from the federal U.S. government, as virtually all American Indian tribes do Just 11 tribal police patrol an area the size of Connecticut. They have been warning residents who remained in their homes to ventilate frequently lest carbon-monoxide fumes build up from gas stoves, a potentially fatal hazard. "We've had 20-degree-below days; some people are burning wood in their homes," said Mr. Brings Plenty. The tribe also evacuated more than 40 elderly members to motels in Rapid City and Aberdeen, mainly so they could have access to thrice-weekly kidney dialysis treatments that had been provided on the reservation. Nearly 20 kidney patients were evacuated to the Oglala Sioux band's Pine Ridge reservation, where another dialysis station was still functioning. Those evacuees were staying at their sister tribe's Prairie Wind Casino. "Normally family members take care of these patients, but with no gas or electricity, and blizzard conditions, we needed a caravan to get them out," said Ms. Briggs. The first van caravan traveled on icy roads, finally reaching Rapid City last Thursday. More patients came on Sunday. Kidney patient Lennie Granados, 59, left his home after its water supply ran out, and is now at the Super 8 motel in Rapid City. "I get reports from my family," he said. "They're out there melting snow and keeping a look out for any water they can use, you know, to flush toilets and stuff." The Cheyenne River tribe has for years asked Congress for funds to restore its ancient water system, which Mr. Brings Plenty said was decades overdue for an upgrade. The total cost would be about $65 million, which may be hard to raise in Washington in the current budget-cutting atmosphere. Some tribal members lamented the chaos, and how hard the current generation of Sioux was finding life on their native ground."A long time ago there were tough Lakota people who knew how to survive. Their teepees were pretty warm, too," said Mr. Brings Plenty. "Times have changed, and the people have changed, too." Write to Joel Millman at joel.millman@wsj.com ................................. 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