CREATING KINSHIP

Sense of community the lifeblood of the Cherokee Nation

By Bryan Dugan

It’s a Thursday night and the room is buzzing. Dishes of homemade food are being passed around, and everyone is catching up with one another.

Welcome to the monthly community dinner at the Native American Fellowship Inc. in South Coffeyville, Okla.

“It’s always a great time, and our tables are always full,” said Bill Davis, president of the community organization in a town that is so far north on the Cherokee Nation Reservation that it borders the state of Kansas. “We just share with each other: stories, food, news. It’s a time for Cherokees to gather together.”

Whether someone has always lived in a tight-knit community on the reservation or grown up and moved away, or if they have always lived elsewhere, creating a sense of community — ᏍᎦᏚᎩ (s-ga-du-gi), in Cherokee — is just an innate part of being Cherokee.

Cherokee Nation’s Community and Cultural Outreach department works with nearly 70 Cherokee community organizations, most of them across the tribe’s 7,000-squaremile reservation, as well as more than two dozen others that are “at-large” organizations scattered across the U.S. The organizations focus on a variety of efforts including cultural preservation, nutrition and other forms of community service.

Community and Cultural Outreach administers a number of grant and outreach programs, including the Community Impact Grant program that Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr. and Deputy Chief Bryan Warner announced in 2022. That program set aside $1.6 million for a one-time grant of up to $25,000 for each of the nearly 70 community groups.

“This funding from CCO allows our Cherokee citizen-led organizations to grow their organizations,” said Kevin Stretch, the director of the Community and Cultural Outreach department. “In all corners of our reservation to Cherokee hubs across the country, these groups are creating a sense of community. For Cherokees, that means gathering together. But it also touches on having enough money to help mitigate food insecurities or just keeping the lights on at community buildings.”

Davis said his community organization is using its grant to offset utility costs and to keep its food pantry stocked for Cherokees in the community.

“I guarantee you, Cherokee Nation’s help has made a huge difference,” Davis said. “This funding helps us take care of some of the basics of operating our community organization and allows us to focus on other things, like cultural events and our work within the community.”

The South Coffeyville-area’s Native American Fellowship Inc. was founded in 1999 and started out with about 20 members. Davis said it’s grown to more than 800 over the last 20 years.

“We would not have been able to have growth like that,” he said, “without the support we get from the Cherokee Nation.”

Ken Harper, chair of the Cherokee Society of the Greater Bay Area in California, said Cherokee Nation’s support has been critical for the group, both in the past and now.

“The Cherokee Nation has supported our efforts to grow,”

Harper said. “Sending speakers and culture keepers out here for cultural programming and bringing in the tribal registration department has helped increase engagement and interest.”

Cultural programming has also helped foster a sense of community, he said.

“It helps us educate our own citizens about ourselves and our culture,” Harper said. “Being able to see speakers like Crosslin Smith, we were able to realize what it means to be Cherokee and how our culture is distinct and unique and beautiful.”

Harper said the tribe’s funding programs have also helped jumpstart his organization’s meetings, helping to pay for meeting spaces until its membership and donor base had grown enough to make it selfsufficient. The group plans to utilize the Community Impact Grant to continue supporting community meetings and to increase cultural programming by bringing in more Cherokee speakers, scholars and artists, Harper said.

On the other side of the country, the Capital City Cherokee Community helps Cherokees in the Washington, D.C., area find community with one another.

“We’ve always been in the habit of meeting monthly,” said April Day, secretary of the Capital City group. “It’s a time for all of us here to gather and connect.”

To foster their connection with Cherokees living on the reservation, the group donates to the annual Cherokee Nation Angel Project and meets up with Cherokee Nation delegates who travel to D.C. for Cherokee Days and to greet veterans traveling to D.C. as part of Cherokee Nation’s Warrior Flight program.

Like all Cherokee communities, both on and off the reservation, the COVID-19 pandemic kept most citizens at a distance, affecting community ties.

“COVID-19 put us through hoops,” said Barbara Warren, president of the Capital City group. “We mastered Zoom, because nothing keeps Cherokees from connecting, but now it’s time to return to in-person meetings. It’s time for us to gather.”