The Wrap: Possible government shutdown won’t affect IHS

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RAPID CITY, SD — Indian Health Service operations will continue in the event of a government shutdown, as announced Tuesday at the annual Secretary’s Tribal Advisory Committee conference in Rapid City.

The weeklong conference brings together tribal leaders and federal health officials, including U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra and IHS Director Roselyn Tso.

“Because of the fact that now we have advanced appropriations for Indian Health Services, on Oct. 1, whether or not there’s a federal budget in place, will continue providing services,” Becerra said.

Previously, IHS employees would have to work without pay or on furlough, limiting service to the roughly 2.6 million citizens who rely on Indian Healthcare. READ MORE — Amelia Schafer, ICT + Rapid City Journal

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In a literary endeavor that intertwines gritty reality with imagination, Stacie Denetsosie, a compelling voice from the Navajo Nation, unveiled her debut book, “The Missing Morningstar.”

Through a series of poignant and thought-provoking narratives, Denetsosie dives into the impacts of settler-colonialism on Indigenous lives, exposing both the scars of complex history and the enduring legacy of beauty, tradition, and storytelling.

As a proud citizen of the Navajo Nation from the Bitterwater Clan (Todích’íí’nii) and born for the Mexican Clan (Naakaii), Denetsosie has etched her journey from the terrains of Kayenta, Arizona, to the pages of modern Indigenous literature.

Born and raised in the heart of Kayenta, Denetsosie’s connection to her roots serves as the compass of her storytelling. READ MORE — Grace Benally, Special to ICT

A workshop on September 20, 2023, will help tribal leaders navigate the complexity of federal funding.

The Bloomberg Philanthropies e311 Federal Assistance Program’s workshop will help break down and identify funding opportunities. There will also be examples citing successful tribal project case studies.

The e311 Federal Assistance program has provided guidance to 1,400+ cities since 2020, regarding claiming and retaining federal funds. This workshop will is open to tribal governments, intertribal organizations, non-profits, grant writers, and federal agencies, who work with tribal communities. There will be information about grants, loans, and tax credits available to Tribal governments for infrastructure, broadband, and energy, among other types of projects.

Featured speakers include Larry Wright, National Congress of American Indians; Susan Masten, Native American Finance Officers Association; Will Micklin, Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska; Onawa Haynes, Hozhonigo Consulting; Chris James, National Center for American Indian Enterprise Development, Fatima Abbas, U.S. Dept of Treasury; Telly Meier, Hobbs, Straus, Dean & Walker, Of Counsel (Former director, Office of Tribal Governments, Internal Revenue Service); and, Denise Litz, chief, Division of Economic Development, Bureau of Indian Affairs.

To participate, register here.

On a cloudy September morning, dozens piled into kayaks, stand-up paddle boards and a canoe near the base of Willamette Falls. As they took to the water, Gerard Rodriguez, Yaqui and Nahua, spoke about the river and the importance of the falls to local tribes.

“This is a very important place that connects all of Indigenous country here in Oregon,” said Rodriguez, associate director and director of tribal affairs at the Willamette Falls Trust, a megaphone projecting his voice across the water. “This is an intertribal area that connects many different tribes — the Yakama Nation, the Warm Springs people, Umatilla, Siletz, Grand Ronde and Nez Perce. So welcome here, to Indigenous land.”

The trip was part of the four-day Land Trust Alliance Rally, an annual conference where hundreds of representatives from land trusts from across the country gathered. It came the day after an unofficial part of the rally: a summit where nearly 100 Indigenous leaders discussed the historic problems with land trusts, most notably the lack of Indigenous values and leadership, and how organizations should be doing it better.

At the Indigenous Land Conservation Summit, participants envisioned a future where Indigenous voices and values are central to conversations about land protection, and how they overlap with Land Back efforts. READ MORE — Nika Bartoo-Smith, ICT + Underscore News

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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued recommendations on the new COVID-19 vaccine. The agency advises that all Americans six months and older receive the new shot from Pfizer and Moderna ahead of the fall season. Dr. Loretta Christensen says it’s important to get the updated shots when it becomes available to them.

The Indian Health Service is investing $3.5 billion for water and sewer projects. ICT’s Mark Trahant and Joaqlin Estus have this report.

Hundreds of Indigenous people across Turtle Island drove to a small First Nation in the Lake of the Woods in northwestern Ontario this summer. APTN’s Karli Zschogner takes a closer look at the beginnings of the jingle dress.

WATCH:

A new study found trace amounts of nuclear waste in sea turtles in the Marshall Islands and five locations in the continental United States, underscoring the enduring legacy of nuclear testing and weapons development.

The analysis, published in the journal PNAS Nexus, looked at turtle and tortoise shells at locations tied to nuclear testing including Southwestern Utah, the Oak Ridge Reservation in Tennessee, the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, and the Barry M. Goldwater Air Force Range in Arizona.

Cyler Conrad, an archaeologist at the University of New Mexico who led the study along with 22 other researchers, said the team found evidence of uranium radionuclides in the shells of turtles and tortoises at all five sites. He added that contamination amounts were so small that it’s doubtful the animals experienced health impacts.

“If you take a paperclip and divide it a million times, if you take a millionth piece of that and divide it another million times, that’s about the same quantity that we’re measuring in some of these shells,” Conrad said. READ MORE — Grist

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