We’ve come a long way in the past 18 years

I attended our monthly staff meeting on Oct. 5 where our Housing Director gave an overview of the 13 low-rent, housing units. My mind went back to when we first started rebuilding our Tribal Government in this new way. Our ancestors always governed themselves; they just didn’t know the English word for it.

There were only a handful of us some 18 years ago who knew we had to do something to improve the way things were going for our family/tribe/village. We chose to be a traditional government, not a corporation, which is legal fiction.

We asked as many family members as we could what should be our priorities. Our Ya Ne Dah Ah Tribal School has always been tops. We also wished we had housing for our family members who needed help. There were issues needing to be addressed as well, such as our ancestors’ graves in Sutton being desecrated and bought and sold into private ownership by the state of Alaska. We couldn’t even stop and take care of the Spirit Houses.

There was a lot of work to do and not many resources. I had to work temp jobs to support my Chickaloon Village habit. We practically had to beg people to be on our Traditional Council. (I even got on there for a while with all my impatience!) When I read over the Chickaloon Village Traditional Council minutes these days, I am totally amazed at how much important ground is covered.

It’s so different today. We have a wonderful health clinic, which hosts an Elder’s lunch every Thursday. These services are open to everyone in the community. The location is next to our Spirit Houses, which we were finally able to reclaim.

We have an Indian Child Welfare person who works with our children and families to assist in keeping them safe.

Our dynamic environmental department is accomplishing wonderful things such as restoring the creeks in our area and keeping the campgrounds clean.

How I love to see the most beautiful bus on the road go by with our Chickaloon logo on it, thanks to our active Transportation Department.

Our Accounting Department does such a meticulous job; they have clean audits every year.

But back to our staff meeting Oct. 5. My heart swelled with emotion when Daniel Harrison helped us understand some phrases in our beautiful Ahtna Athabascan language. It brought back memories of 60 years ago when our relatives would stop by on their way from Copper Center to Anchorage to visit with my mother.

To hear our young ones speaking our eloquent language is the frosting on the cake. Tsin’aen (thank you) to our staff, friends and family who give so much of themselves to make this all happen.

We are not supposed to be filled with pride, or brag. Those things are “engii” or taboo. So I’ll try not to swell up when I think of all these wonderful accomplishments our Tribal Government has achieved. But I’m sure it is quite all right to feel immense appreciation, and that I do.

Patricia Wade is Editor of the Chickaloon News.