Tribal leaders bring litany of needs to hearing on federal funding

WASHINGTON – To the Tohono O’odham chairman, it’s schools and health care. To the Hopi chairman, it’s badly needed jail improvements. Those were among the laundry list of needs outlined at a hearing Thursday on federal facilities in Indian Country.

“To say that the Hopi people are frustrated is a major understatement,” Hopi Chairman Timothy Nuvangyaoma said of federal promises to fix the tribe’s only detention center. “Nearly four years later, there is no broken ground, only broken promises.”

No one at the House Natural Resources subcommittee hearing challenged the needs, on everything from roads to broadband, that could cost billions of dollars, a funding shortfall that one lawmaker called “a travesty.”

https://www.indianz.com/News/2021/06/18/cronkite-news-tribes-seek-fixes-for-aging-infrastructure-in-indian-country/