“OUR THINKING, OUR CULTURE
TELLS US, THAT IF ONE PERSON IS
POOR, WE’RE ALL POOR.”
that have created jobs and small
measures of growth and opportunity over the last few decades. These
include a telephone authority,
which now has some $10 million in
annual revenues, and Lakota Technologies, an information technology
firm that provides call centers and
other services to government and
commercial customers.
Still, many stumbling blocks remain. There is not nearly enough
housing for the reservation’s population, and overcrowding inside
crumbling housing stock is common. Attempts to attract outside
businesses to the area—an assembly plant, say, or a livestock processing facility—are stymied by
the tribe’s antiquated and overtaxed water system, which has
been unable to support new connections for years.
Kevin Keckler, chairman of the
Cheyenne River Sioux tribe, reckoned a proper upgrade to the water
system would cost about $65 million. He said the tribe has lobbied
the federal government for funding
assistance with limited success,
estimating that about half the necessary amount is still needed. He
guessed it would be another four
or five years, even in the best of
circumstances, before a new water
system might be in place. He also
said hundreds of millions more dollars would be needed to distribute
the water to the remote communities like La Plant and others scattered across the reservation.
Keckler held up his index finger
to indicate the size of the tubing that currently snakes out under the prairie to reach far-flung
homes. When more than a few of
these households turn on a spigot
at the same time, the pressure can
drop to a trickle.
“If we could get that water system built,” Keckler said, “I think we
could see a better quality of life.”
Meanwhile, even tribal members
who sit on substantial and intact
parcels of trust land with clear title
have had difficulty using the holding as collateral to secure loans and
otherwise spur economic activity
that would improve their lot. Commercial banks often avoid lending
against trust land, they say, for fear
of unfamiliar paperwork and complicated jurisdictional issues should