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CJ · Site Admin Joined: 22 Sep 2009 Posts: 6932

South Dakota Indians Suffering

I hope someone sees this who can help them!

South Dakota’s impoverished Cheyenne River Indian Reservation

February 1, 2010

Sioux reservation struggling after winter storms

EAGLE BUTTE, S.D.
Parts of a sprawling South Dakota reservation still were without water and electricity Monday, nearly two weeks after winter storms toppled thousands of power lines, caused water pipes to freeze and burst, and forced more than a dozen residents on kidney dialysis to seek treatment at another reservation.

Parts of a sprawling South Dakota reservation still were without water and electricity Monday, nearly two weeks after winter storms toppled thousands of power lines, caused water pipes to freeze and burst, and forced more than a dozen residents on kidney dialysis to seek treatment at another reservation.

A fierce ice storm hit the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation overnight Jan. 20, coating roads and electrical lines and forcing shops and schools to close. Before residents could recover from the ice, a blizzard tore through the Dakotas, bringing a few inches of snow and wind gusts between 25 and 50 mph.

Several shelters and distribution centers were set up around the reservation, and an 8 p.m. curfew was imposed after some looting took place last week. At the height of the outages, about 14,000 people in the region were without water — most of them on the impoverished reservation that covers an area larger than Rhode Island and Delaware combined.

About 8,000 people live on the reservation, among the rolling, grass-covered prairies of north central South Dakota that includes Dewey and Ziebach counties. The tribe says unemployment on the reservation is at 80 percent.

More than half of Ziebach County and 38 percent of Dewey County lived in poverty in 2005, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Tribal Chairman Joseph Brings Plenty said Monday that no deaths had been reported, though a few people reported becoming ill because of fumes from gas-powered heaters.

``I thank the Creator for that, because we could have had quite a few people perish in this,' he said.

Seventeen kidney dialysis patients from the reservation were moved to a hotel at the Prairie Winds Casino in southwest South Dakota, said Rick Shangreaux, the casino's acting general manager. Indian Health Services nurses are monitoring the patients, who will get treatment at a facility on the Pine Ridge Reservation in southwest South Dakota.

Curtis Chasing Hawk, 56, was getting his thrice-weekly dialysis treatments at Pine Ridge after leaving the Cheyenne River reservation last week.

``The roads were all icy and the power was out,' Chasing Hawk said. ``We formed a five-car caravan and got out.'

Mona Longbrake said she and her husband, Dilbert, have not had electricity or running water at their ranch about 12 miles southeast of Eagle Butte since Jan. 22. They have been drinking bottled water, cracking ice on a pond to get water to flush their toilet, using an oven range for heat, and using candles and flashlights for light.

``It's getting tired,' Mona Longbrake said. ``You get by as best you can.'

Sonny Brave Eagle said he, his wife and their two young daughters have split time between an emergency shelter and a relative's house in Eagle Butte where four other families have crowded in.

He said he and his family were stranded about six days in the dark at their home 12 miles north of Eagle Butte until law officers came out to check on them.

``We didn't have a vehicle ... We had no phone, no batteries for the radio,' he said. ``We didn't know what was going on.'

Water and power outages struck all of the reservation's residents, tribal spokeswoman Natalie Stites said. Water outages for many lasted about four days, and power outages for some are into their second week. Residents couldn't even get gas for their vehicles because service station pumps weren't working without electricity.

By Monday, outages were no longer considered a crisis, but the tribe was still in an ``immediate response' mode, Stites said. The tribe has spent ``enormous amounts' of money on such needs as fuel and water and an emergency fund that had $175,000 a few months ago has been drained.

The South Dakota National Guard helped bring in generators supplied by the state during the crisis. The tribe distributed fuels such as propane, delivered donated bottled water and send bulk water tanks around the reservation. Stites said the water deliveries were enough to meet everyone's needs.

Electricity had been restored to most of the reservation's population centers, including Eagle Butte, where the tribal offices are located, but hundreds of people in rural areas remained without power, said South Dakota Rural Electric Association spokeswoman Brenda Kleinjan.

Brings Plenty said some of the estimated 1,700 homes that remained without electricity might not have power restored for another three weeks. He said crews need to use jackhammers to break through the frozen ground so they can drill holes for power poles, and snow drifts as high as 30 feet also are hampering the work.

The number of water outages had declined Monday, with about 100 people still affected in the town of La Plant and some scattered rural areas, said Tri County Mni Waste Water System general manager Leo Fischer. Power failures led to equipment malfunctions in the water system's treatment plant, causing flooding a week ago, that took more than a day to clean and repair. Many pipes on the reservation also froze and burst, adding to the outage problems.

Our days have run together out here since the 21st, Fisher said.

Stites said schools remained closed throughout the reservation Monday and the tribe was continuing to distribute water until it could be determined that the tap water was safe.

http://www.jamestownsun.com/event/article/id/104033/group/home

http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/149774/group/home

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CJ · Site Admin Joined: 22 Sep 2009 Posts: 6932

Cheyenne River Indian Reservation SD is hurting

Feb 2

EAGLE BUTTE, S.D. — Sonny Brave Eagle and his family spent six days in the dark without a phone or working radio before law officers found them in their home after a fierce winter storm cut power across South Dakota’s impoverished Cheyenne River Indian Reservation.

“We didn’t know what was going on,” said Brave Eagle, among hundreds of people on the sprawling reservation amid a second week without electricity as utility workers struggle to make repairs. The storm brought down power lines, iced roads and led to water outages.

Tribal Chairman Joseph Brings Plenty estimated that 1,500 to 1,700 homes were still without power Monday, and said it would take “better than three weeks” to get the reservation up and running again.

The tribe has spent “enormous amounts” of money on such needs as fuel and water, and an emergency fund that had $175,000 a few months ago has been drained, said tribal spokeswoman Natalie Stites.

For now, Brave Eagle, his wife and their two young daughters stay at an emergency shelter or a relative’s house with four other families. They didn’t have a vehicle or even batteries to power a radio when the lights went out at their house, about 12 miles north of Eagle Butte in north-central South Dakota, after a powerful ice storm hit Jan. 20.

Ice coated roads and electrical lines, and forced shops and schools to close. Then before residents could recover, a blizzard tore through the Dakotas with wind gusts between 25 and 50 mph.

The frozen ground complicated efforts to replace power poles, and snow had to be cleared away to allow utility crews to get close enough to rebuild transmission lines, said Brings Plenty.

The power outage led to equipment malfunctions at a pumping plant in a pipeline system that provides drinking water to the reservation. Water service and pressure must be restored gradually in an old system with weak pipes, the tribal chairman added.

About 8,000 people live on the reservation, which is larger than Rhode Island and Delaware combined, and the outages affected everyone, Stites said.

But the reservation faced difficulties well before the storms. The unemployment rate is 80 percent, tribal leaders say. More than half of Ziebach County and 38 percent of Dewey County lived in poverty in 2005, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The reservation spans both counties.

Several shelters and distribution centers were set up around the reservation. At the height of the outages, about 14,000 people in the region were without water — most of them at Cheyenne River.

The number of water outages had declined Monday, with about 100 people still affected, said Tri County Mni Waste Water System general manager Leo Fischer.

The South Dakota National Guard helped bring in generators from the state. The tribe distributed fuels such as propane, delivered donated bottled water and sent bulk water tanks around the reservation.

Brings Plenty said no deaths had been reported, but a few people became sick from carbon monoxide fumes given off by makeshift heating sources.

“We could have had quite a few people perish in this,” he said.

Seventeen dialysis patients were moved to a hotel at the Prairie Winds Casino in southwest South Dakota, said Rick Shangreaux, the casino’s acting general manager. The patients are being treated at a facility on the Pine Ridge Reservation, where the casino is located.

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CJ · Site Admin Joined: 22 Sep 2009 Posts: 6932

Help for storm-battered Sioux Tribe

February 24, 2010

EAGLE BUTTE, South Dakota
Joe Brings Plenty is amazed that no one died.

Still, the chairman of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe and his fellow members faced a dire situation after an ice storm struck their South Dakota reservation on Jan. 21, knocking down thousands of utility poles and cutting off power for several weeks.

With few shelters, most of the roughly 11,000 residents stayed in their homes as the wind chill reached 20 degrees below zero. Water was also cut off due to a malfunction at the local treatment facility. And an earlier Christmas blizzard had drained much of the tribe's emergency fund.

Shortly after the ice storm, a state emergency team and the National Guard arrived to help distribute relief supplies. But the crisis initially got little attention outside this rural state, and I could see why as I toured the snow-covered reservation last week. Tiny communities dot an area stretching across two of the poorest counties in the nation, with an unemployment rate hovering near 80 percent.

Tribal officials had sought financial assistance via a Web site and Facebook page. But their efforts got a real boost after being featured for several nights on MSNBC's "Countdown with Keith Olbermann." To date, the tribe has raised about $400,000.

Now, the tribe is hoping to shift attention to a long-term goal: federal funding for an upgrade of what it calls an "outdated" and "maxed out" water system, one that contributed to the recent crisis. The price tag is a hefty one and the project currently lacks political support, but Joe Brings Plenty sees the overwhelming humanitarian response to the ice storm as a sign that his tribe has not been forgotten.

http://fieldnotes.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2010/02/24/2211602.aspx

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