Food sovereignty is a hopeful practice for tribal communities here in South Dakota, and so I'm sad to read this news.
From the South Dakota Searchlight.
Grant that ‘would have fed thousands’ on SD Native American reservation lost to Trump cuts
by John HultThe Trump administration’s efforts to claw back federal grant money, led by the world’s richest person, will affect access to fresh fruit for some of the nation’s poorest people.
Late last month, a nonprofit organization that serves and is headquartered on the Rosebud Sioux Reservation got notice that it would lose access to a $547,000 federal grant funneled to it through the Nebraska-based Arbor Day Foundation.
Sicangu Co. was set to use the funding to plant 70 fruit trees and 600 berry bushes in backyards across the western South Dakota reservation and at the Keya Wakpala garden on the grounds of a Lakota immersion elementary school.
Some of the community garden’s produce is used to feed kids in that program. Some is used for boxes delivered to tribal members.
A new employee would’ve facilitated the program, according to Sicangu spokesman Aaron Epps, and the organization had just finished writing the job description when news of the grant cancellation landed via email.
Over time, Epps said, the bushes and trees paid for through the grant funding “would have fed thousands of people.”
News of the grant loss came amid a weekslong effort by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to find savings by canceling government contracts and firing federal employees. The DOGE team is headed by Tesla founder Elon Musk, empowered to slash spending by President Donald Trump.
The Sicangu grant is diminutive by comparison to higher-profile Trump administration actions, but Epps said the impact locally is significant. The reservation’s Todd County is a persistent poverty area, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, which defines the term as a place having a poverty rate of 20% or higher for three decades.
Some parts of the organization’s food sovereignty program will remain, Epps said. The organization had previous funding to plant gardens in 60 backyards a year. That work will continue, but the low-maintenance, perennial promise of food from fruit trees in those garden installations for the next three years is gone for now, as is the immediate placement of an orchard for the larger community garden.
The Sicangu loss was tied to the cancellation of a larger, $8 million grant to the Arbor Day Foundation from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service to promote healthy eating in tribal areas.
The Nebraska foundation awarded subgrants to groups with plans to address food insecurity in those areas, which are often “food deserts” where the nearest fresh fruits and vegetables are far away. The USDA estimates that 2.3 million people in the U.S. live more than a mile from the nearest grocery store and don’t have a car. Food deserts are associated with worse health and educational outcomes for residents.
Other projects funded through the $8 million USDA grant included funding for similar projects in Wisconsin for the Bad River and Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, in South Carolina for the Catawba Nation and in Alaska for the Native Village of Tyonek.
Sicangu Co. posted a redacted version of the termination notice email to its LinkedIn page. The last line says the Forest Service had determined the grant award “no longer effectuates agency priorities regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and activities.”
“My hunch for the reason it was cancelled was that this award was aimed at tribal communities,” Epps said. “Obviously, I don’t have proof for that.”
Elise Peterson of the Arbor Day Foundation said in a statement that the organization couldn’t speculate on the reason for the grant’s cancellation.
“Right now, we’re focused on helping our sub-awardees find other opportunities to fund their impactful work expected to be supported by the federal grant,” Peterson wrote. “We are already in dialogue with our network of supporters, both individuals and corporate partners, to hopefully help some of these projects still come to fruition.”
A USDA spokesperson didn’t mention diversity, equity and inclusion in a response to South Dakota Searchlight on the reasons for canceling the grants. Instead, its statement said the Trump administration “rightfully has asked for a comprehensive review of all contracts, work, and personnel across all federal agencies.”
“Anything that violates the President’s Executive Orders will be subject for review,” the statement read. “The Department of Agriculture will be happy to provide a response to interested parties once Secretary Brooke Rollins has the opportunity to analyze these reviews.”
Epps hopes the grant cancellation isn’t a sign of more cuts to come for the families of Rosebud. The Lakota immersion program is funded in part by federal grants. So far, he said, no funding cancellation notes have appeared that could affect that program.
Even so, he said, “our feeling is that every single federal dollar we’ve had awarded to us is in jeopardy.”
Photo: A child helps plant vegetables in a community garden on the Rosebud reservation. (Courtesy Sigangu Co. to South Dakota Searchlight).
This South Dakota Searchlight article is republished online under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
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