Wabanaki Community Foundation – A Campaign of Beauty, Balance, and Belonging

Wabanaki Community Foundation

OUR FUTURE TOGETHER A Campaign of Beauty, Balance, and Belonging

THE MISSION AT THE HEART OF THE WABANAKI COMMUNITY FOUNDATION To honor our ancestors’ dream of health and prosperity for our people by fostering our collective traditions of respectful relationships and giving.

A BOLD NEW CHAPTER IN THE DAWNLAND The Wabanaki Community Foundation (WCF) represents a bold new chapter in Indigenous led philanthropy. As a 501(c)(3) public charity, WCF is designed to grow and steward financial resources that support Wabanaki cultural vitality, build generational wealth, and advance community priorities.

Among the first intratribal Community Foundations, WCF is rooted in Indigenous values of respect and reciprocity. Standing together with our philanthropic partners, WCF will be additive and supportive of existing efforts, while breaking new ground. We are committed to learning from Wabanaki nonprofits and leaders, breaking down artificial silos, and aligning funding to amplify, not replace, the important work already happening across our communities. Our role is to listen deeply, move with humility, and elevate community priorities.

This moment presents an extraordinary opportunity. Maine philanthropists are at the forefront of growing understanding about Wabanaki history and are demonstrating the desire for a different and more equitable future.

With deep support and allyship, WCF will become an influential permanent institution directing significant philanthropic resources that help to restore balance and prosperity across Wabanaki communities.

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WABANAKI RESILIENCE The Wabanaki Confederacy includes the Maliseet, Mi’kmaq, Passamaquoddy, and Penobscot Nations, who have lived in the northeast for over 13,000 years. Wabanaki people have adapted to epic changes in the landscape and climate, and endured the harms of colonization including land dispossession, cultural suppression, economic exclusion, and genocidal actions.

We are resilient. Wabanaki people have preserved our vibrancy through sustenance hunting, fishing, and harvesting, traditional ceremonies, living languages, unique worldviews, and knowledge systems that evolved across generations and time.

Today, our communities stand in a renewed spirit of self-determination. We continue to maintain and revitalize our heritage while navigating opportunities in policy, education, the arts, museums and historic preservation, technology, youth empowerment, healthcare, and economic development.

THE PAUPER MYTH “By 1852, the cascade of events that had bankrupted the tribes began to take on a new narrative. No longer was it the “inferiority” of the “savage” way of life that white Americans blamed for the impoverished state of the Native Americans, but instead it was “native slothfulness” that was to blame. According to a 1852 Governor’s Report on Indian Affairs, the tribes were destined to remain “in a condition bordering on pauperism. . . until their habits have been changed.” Though the State (and its progenitor, Massachusetts)—and not the tribes—had been paupers from their inception, the proliferation of the “pauper myth” of the Native American had begun to spread like wildfire. No one seemed to notice that, in fact, it was the State leeching from tribal resources, and not the tribes leeching from the State.” *

CONSPICUOUS RESTRICTIONS “Maine is conspicuous for the restrictions that the Maine Indian Claims Settlement Act (1980) has placed on the Wabanaki Nations for four decades. We find that the consequence of handcuffing Wabanaki self-government is today visible in the stark economic underperformance of all four of the tribes in Maine—Maliseet, Mi’kmaq, Passamaquoddy, and Penobscot. No inherent or Wabanaki-wide attributes readily explain why all the Wabanaki Nations in Maine trail their peers by so much. The one attribute they all share is the restrictive construct of the Settlement Act.” ** *One Nation, Under Fraud: A Remonstrance; Loring, Mehnert, Gousse, March, 2022 **The Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development; Kalt, Medford & Taylor, December, 2022

WCF was born from a landmark collaboration. Wabanaki leaders helped create Tekαkαpimək Contact Station, which welcomes the global public to Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument. Tekαkαpimək, Penobscot for “as far as one can see”, orients visitors through a Wabanaki lens, honors ancestral Penobscot homelands, and reflects continuous Indigenous presence in the Dawnland.

AN AMBITIOUS CAPITAL CAMPAIGN

WCF is governed by Wabanaki leadership - elders, organizers, artists, educators, and knowledge holders from our four Nations. Our Board of Directors brings deep collective wisdom, grounded in lived experience and longstanding trust within our communities. These are not external actors; we are of the Nations, accountable to our people, and trusted by those we serve.

Our elders and ancestors teach us to walk a path that honors the seven generations - past, present, and future. The Wabanaki Community Foundation responds to that call by honoring what was, and building what can be for our people.

WCF builds on the spirit of vision, unity, and leadership that emerged in the Tekαkαpimək project. The Foundation’s early success includes $1 million in seed funding raised through the Monumental Welcome Campaign. This forms the basis of an endowment and donor advised funds, invested for growth under a values based policy by WCF’s investment manager, Goldman Sachs. Start-up operating support is being provided by Elliotsville Foundation, Morton-Kelly Charitable Trust, Maine Community Foundation, and shoppers at the Belfast Community Co-op.

Board of Directors Representing the Wabanaki Nations in what is now known as Maine – Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians, Mi’kmaq Nation, Passamaquoddy Tribe (Sipayik & Motahkomikuk), Penobscot Nation.

Richard Silliboy, President (Mi’kmaq) Newell Lewey, Secretary (Passamaquoddy – Sipayik) Theresa Cochran, Treasurer (Mi’kmaq) Suzanne Greenlaw (Maliseet)

Isaac St. John (Maliseet)

Nolan Altvater (Passamaquoddy – Sipayik) Donald Soctomah (Passamaquoddy – Motahkomikuk) Jennifer Neptune (Penobscot) Shantel DeMerchant (Penobscot) Gary Stern (Non-Native) Nick Francis, Executive Director (Penobscot)

OUR INVITATION: HELP TRANSFORM MONEY INTO MEDICINE WCF is guided by a simple but powerful truth: Wabanaki people know best what our communities need. Well-meaning philanthropy has flowed through non-Indigenous intermediaries or been shaped by outside assumptions that do not reflect our values of interconnectedness between art, health, education, lands and waters, and all of our relations throughout the natural world.

“To Indigenous people, philanthropic money is medicine, a restorative force in a system that has long withheld resources from our communities. Money is like water; it’s a precious, life-giving resource. Money should be a tool of love that facilitates relationships and helps us thrive rather than something that hurts and divides us. If we use it for sacred, life-giving, restorative purposes, it can be medicine.”

Edgar Villanueva, Decolonizing Wealth Partners in this work are setting in motion ripples of change across families, communities, and generations. We can transform philanthropy in Maine and beyond. With your participation, we are seeding a future where Wabanaki communities flourish. The cocreation of WCF embodies shifts from:

Non-Indigenous frameworks to community-led priorities.

Cultural survival to cultural resurgence.

The inhibition of Wabanaki wealth-building to future abundance.

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This is more than an appeal to stand with us.

We are inviting donors into a movement that puts philanthropic power into Indigenous hands as part of a larger vision for healing and prosperity. We aim to join forever in kinship, as together we restore balance, reclaim abundance, and grow a legacy rooted in trust, reciprocity, and Indigenous strength.

Our goal of a $20 - $50 million capital campaign will create a living endowment, drawing 5% annually to nourish what matters most. Programmatic commitments and donor-advised funds are most welcome. We are also testing a bold idea: that those in a position to do so consider an outright transfer of assets to the Foundation above and beyond usual cycles of giving.

Strengthen Cultural Vitality $7.0 million endowment - Annual Draw: $350,000 Language Learning & Cultural Apprenticeships $2M principal → $100,000/year Fund language revitalization efforts and cultural knowledge apprenticeships, such as ceremony leadership.

Rematriation & Indigenous led Research $2M principal → $100,000/year Fund rematriation and restoration efforts of sacred items and stories, archeological research, documentation, and preservation of archeological sites.

Tribal Museums $3M principal → $150,000/year Support tribal museum development, operations, and capital needs.

YOUR VOICE, YOUR INSIGHT, AND YOUR SUPPORT WILL HELP SHAPE THE NEXT CHAPTER OF WABANAKI SOVEREIGNTY AND OUR SHARED PROSPERITY. WE WELCOME YOU INTO THIS JOURNEY AS A COMPANION IN BUILDING A FUTURE OF BEAUTY, BALANCE, AND BELONGING.

Expand Economic Opportunity $4.5 million endowment - Annual Draw: $225,000 Fast-track Mini Grants of $15,000 or less $3M principal → $150,000/year Meet career and business development needs of individual artisans, guides, food producers, and other cultural practitioners through microgrants, mentorships, and other supports.

Artist and Cultural Practitioner Cooperatives & Market Access $1.5M principal → $75,000/year Support development and sustainability of cooperative market platforms and collective NGO models for cultural goods and services.

Invest in Youth & Education $4.5 million endowment - Annual Draw: $225,000 Flexible Scholarships and Learner Support $2M principal → $100,000/year Meet needs for traditional mentorships and internships as well as stipends that allow full participation of rising Wabanaki learners in higher education settings.

Youth Development & Leadership $1M principal → $50,000/year Support youth gatherings, in-state and national travel, leadership and culturally grounded experiences.

Youth Athletics $1.5M principal → $75,000/year Sponsor cross-community activities and events, including “Team Wabanaki” participation in the North American Indigenous Games.

WABANAKI COMMUNITY FOUNDATION INAUGURAL CAMPAIGN

Focus Area

Endowment Principal

Annual 5% Draw

Cultural Vitality

$7 million

$350,000

Economic Opportunity

$4.5 million

$225,000

Youth & Education

$4.5 million

$225,000

Community Connections

$3.0 million

$200,000

Generational Wealth

$3.82 million

$50,000

Philanthropic Prowess

$8.0 million

$400,000

TOTAL

$30.82 million

$1,450,000

Foster Community Connections $3.0 million endowment - Annual Draw: $150,000 Intertribal Gatherings & Events $1.5M principal → $75,000/year Support gatherings, events, and travel to reconnect elders and kin, preserve shared traditions, and nurture cross-community ties.

BEAUTY, BALANCE AND BELONGING

Traditional Food & Medicine $1.5M principal → $75,000/year Invest in Wabanaki food and medicine sovereignty projects.

Increase Wabanaki Philanthropic Prowess $8 million endowment - Annual Draw: $400,000

Foundation of Generational Wealth $3.82 million endowment Future Wabanaki Newborn Retirement Accounts $1M principal → $50,000/year $1000 each prospectively for the approx 50 new babies born per year Today’s Wabanaki Children & Youth Retirement Accounts $2.82M principal - One-time awards $1000 each retroactively for the 2,820 children and youth under the age of 18 (approx 29% of Wabanaki population in 2025)

Endow WCF Core Operations $6.5M principal → $325,000/year Assure capacity to perform all functions of a Community Foundation in perpetuity, including community governance, outreach and organizing, philanthropic relationships, funds management, grantmaking, program administration, and legal and fiduciary duties.

Serve as a Trusted Intermediary $1.5M principal → $75,000/year Facilitate and administer donor-advised funds aligned with Wabanaki values. Serve as a fiscal sponsor for other Wabanaki NGOs and as an intermediary with other grant makers.

KCI WOLIWON (A BIG THANK YOU) FOR STANDING WITH WABANAKI PEOPLE AT THIS RARE AND SACRED MOMENT.

WABANAKIFOUNDATION.ORG Wabanaki Community Foundation Nick Francis, Executive Director P.O. Box 543, Old Town, ME 04468 nick@wabanakifoundation.org (207) 659-0031 wabanakifoundation.org

Photography: Jennifer Sapiel Neptune and James Eric Francis Sr.