November 01, 2012
For 33-year-old Peggy Flanagan, health care policy is "super personal." About a decade ago, Flanagan’s mom had to go on social security disability because her pain was so bad. With her fibromyalgia, she could no longer perform the tasks that she needed to do for her job. “That was really hard, because my mom really defined herself through her work,” Flanagan said. “That was her identity – someone who got up at the crack of dawn and worked late into the night. Just to not be able to have that has been really hard on her.”
Care for people. It’s a simple enough concept, but one that sometimes gets lost in all the rhetoric and politics during election season. What would happen if more of our elected officials and people in government thought about the value of caring for people? When it comes to health care reform, 33-year-old Peggy Flanagan wishes politicians would talk about what it means for real people, how Paul Ryan’s plan to turn Medicare into a voucher program people like her mom, a woman who worked her whole life healing others, and now can’t always even get the medication she needs.
Flanagan has worked for the Division of Indian Work, was a School Board Member with Minneapolis Public Schools, and is now the Director of External Affairs for Wellstone Action, where she’s taken a leave to work for Minnesota United for All Families. She’s also expecting a baby in February. And through all of this she’s cared for her mom, a woman who for the past 10 or so years has battled a host of health issues including fibromyalgia, severe osteoporosis and scoliosis, and now has issues with her breathing, because her spine is collapsing and crushing her ribs, making it more and more difficult for her to breathe, and making her essentially bed ridden.
Flanagan decided to vote for Barack Obama in 2008 after he told a story about watching his mom suffer in her last weeks and days of life and having to be on the phone with the insurance company arguing about whether or not they’d pay for her pain medication. “That was the story for me that made me go, “Okay. This guy gets it and will be an advocate for me and my family and specifically for my mom.”

After years of dreaming, planning and collaborating with partners throughout the city and state, Little Earth of United Tribes (Little Earth) has launched its Homeownership Initiative (LEUTHI) this fall.
The initiative, which will support Native American families through the process of home ownership and offer them quality, affordable housing options, marks an unprecedented opportunity for Minneapolis's Native American community. It will also help
provide safety and stability on a block in the Phillips neighborhood that has had a history of drug and gang activity.
"I think it really symbolizes a Renaissance of self-determination and taking ownership and pride in this community," said Jay Thomas Bad Heart Bull (Standing Rock/Oglala Sioux), Vice President of Little Earth.
Bill Ziegler (Lower Brule Sioux), President and CEO of Little Earth, said that the concept behind LEUTHI had been talked about at Little Earth internally since as early as the 1970s and 1980s.

A canoe that was part of a Native community canoe-loaning program was stolen this summer. The canoe was owned by Jon Lurie, an English professor at Macalester College and the University of Minnesota. Lurie manages and maintains five canoes at Lake Calhoun as a resource for individuals and organizations in the Twin Cities Native American community.
"I see my role here as caretaker for a very valuable community resource that I maintain so that the entire community can have access to it," said Lurie.
The canoes were originally purchased by Clyde Bellecourt, a founding member of the American Indian Movement (AIM), through the Elaine M. Stately Peacemaker Center in the 1990s.
The Center used them for a Native youth canoe trip on the Mississippi River from the headwaters to the Twin Cities.
After this trip, they fell into disuse and were stored in a garage for years before Bellecourt loaned them to the now-defunct Healthy Nations program at the Minneapolis American Indian Center.  Lurie worked for Healthy Nations for five years before the state minority community health grant that funded the program was cut in 2010.
While Healthy Nations was an active program, staff took many urban Native American youth on canoeing excursions throughout the state and beyond.     
"It was a unique model of adventure-based restoration," said Lurie. "When I say restoration, I mean restoring individuals' spirits, restoring families, communities, and people's connection with their histories and futures."

Dream of Wild Health Awards First Native Youth Scholarship
The Dream of Wild Health farm awarded the inaugural Sally Auger Rising Star Youth Scholarship at their annual Community Feast on August 25th. Wicahpi Cavanaugh was honored for his exemplary performance and commitment to education.
The scholarship, which provides a $1,000 cash award, was established to help a Garden Warrior, past or present, continue their post-secondary education. In 2011, when founder and Executive Director Sally Auger chose to retire, the scholarship was created to honor her commitment to helping Native youth thrive and succeed.  
Wicahpi was selected because of his maturity, his ability to provide a positive role model for young people in the Garden Warrior program, and his commitment to getting a college education. He participates in Sundance and powwows, belongs to a drum group, and maintains a healthy lifestyle. Wicahpi recently started as a freshman at Minneapolis Community and Technical College.

To the editor,
HR 5544, the Minnesota Education Investment and Employment Act, was introduced by 8th District Representative Chip Cravaack to authorize the exchange of an undetermined number of acres within what is now Superior National Forest for 86,000 acres of State lands within the borders of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW).  
This bill does not account for the mineral rights underlying the surface area of the trust lands and thus leaves the door open for further reduction of Federal forest acreage.
The passage of HR 5544 by the U.S. House of Representatives on September 12 sets the stage for: