Combined sobriety and MMIP walk a success despite COVID-19

Last Friday saw the return of Rocky Boy's annual Sobriety Walk, which was combined with an awareness walk for missing and murdered Indigenous people after being canceled last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The event's primary organizer, Terrie Stump of the Chippewa Cree Wellness Coalition, also Rocky Boy Health Center's diabetes prevention coordinator, said attendance at the event was slightly lower than a normal year, but given the fact that the COVID-19 pandemic is still going on she's impressed so many showed up.

Theron Small of the White Sky Hope Center said he was also thankful to see so many people out supporting their fellow community members dealing with addiction, especially young people who need help.

In her address to the crowd before setting out on the 3.2 mile journey from the Old Stone Child College parking lot to the Rocky Boy Powwow Grounds Stump said she wanted to thank the attendees for participating, and the many organizations supporting the event including Plain Green, My Paisley Pals, Diabetes Prevention, the Diabetes Program, Rocky Boy Health Center's Transportation, Housekeeping, and Alternate Resources departments, the White Sky Prevention Program, the Chippewa Cree TANF Program, Housing Authority, Construction Corp., Natural Resources Department and Business Committee, as well as the Rocky Boy Police Department, Rocky Boy Schools, the Tobacco Prevention Program, Gary & Leo's Fresh Foods, and everyone willing to give testimony about their experiences with addiction.

The testimonials were written on signs placed along the road to the powwow grounds, many talking about how addiction had affected their lives for the worse, or had taken friends and family members lives.

"I want you to think about the people in our communities who are struggling right now as you read those signs," she said.

One attendee at the event, Rose Puga, said she's never had addiction issues, but many people in her family have struggled with alcohol and tobacco addictions, and while some have recovered there are a lot of people in the community that are still struggling and she wanted to show them that they are supported in their difficult journey.

"It's always easier when you have support," she said.

In her address, Stump pointed out a source of generational trauma she believes has exacerbated the problem of addiction in the community, one that has become a source of worldwide attention in the past few months; the residential school system.

In the past few months mass unmarked graves of hundreds of Indigenous children have been found at the sites of former residential schools in Canada, some of which were run by the Roman Catholic Church.

Stump said abuse like this has echoed down through generations and driven many into addiction, but there is hope.

"From these schools has evolved generations of trauma which has impacted many of our tribal members, especially with addiction," she said. " ... But as Native Americans, we are resilient. I believe the culture and traditions we share will pull us through these traumas and out current struggles with the addictions in our communities, as long as we listen to the words of Chief Rocky Boy, 'to love one another, and take care of one another.'"

MMIP awareness

Rocky Boy Health Center Diabetes Program Director Lisa Scheresky O'Neil said the sobriety walk, though it may have started out that way, isn't just about addiction, but about wellness in general, preventing diabetes and encouraging people to eat well and take care of themselves.

She said merging this year's walk with an awareness walk for missing and murdered Indigenous people, run by Duane Garvais Lawrence, is a great opportunity, and if the event ever comes back to Rocky Boy she'd certainly support combining the two events again.

"I think anything we can do to bring awareness is phenomenal," she said.

Lawrence has been traveling the U.S. raising awareness and money to address the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous people and said he's been happy to be able to put Rocky Boy on the list of places he's been able to visit.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Native Americans account for more than 25 percent of the missing person cases in the state of Montana despite being less than 7 percent of the population.

Native Americans, especially Native American women, go missing at extremely high rates compared to people of any other races or ethnicities in the U.S. and Canada and face staggeringly high rates of homicide, abuse and sexual violence, several times that of white women.

This disproportionate rate of violence has been attributed to a number of issues, including the historical legal inability of tribes to prosecute on their own reservations when the perpetrator is non-Native, confusion regarding jurisdiction between tribal, state and federal law enforcement, and a lack of resources on the part of tribal police departments, as well as the general economic and social marginalization of Native Americans.

Accurate statistics on missing person cases can be difficult to obtain due to the before-mentioned lack of resources of tribal police departments, as well as frequent errors by non-native police departments, misclassifying Native Americans as another race.

In his travels across the U.S., Lawrence said, he's been able to visit many different reservations and communities, bringing awareness to the issue, raising money for MMIP advocates like Earth Feather Sovereign in Washington state, and providing hope for the families affected by the issue, which he said is his biggest motivator.

"The most critical thing is the families, just that someone is acknowledging their loved and lost one," he said.

Lawrence said tribal police departments need to be vigilant and identify people they see in the community that they don't recognize as community members, and make sure they are not there to cause trouble under the belief that the reservation's law enforcement has no authority to police their actions.

He said the departments need more resources, both to prevent kidnappings and murders and in solving them, or it will just keep happening.

He also said non-Native people need to help in getting the word out about the issue and just how bad it is, and think about what it would be like for their own communities to have to deal with something like this.

Rocky Boy Wellness Coalition Chair Elinor Nault, who helped combine the two events, said the issue has a tendency to be minimized in media reports, and because of record keeping problems the already-staggering numbers of missing, abused and murdered people, especially women and girls, is likely an undercount.

While some at the event didn't know it had been combined with Lawrence's efforts, all were supportive of his cause including Shania and Jenea Parker, who have been regular attendees of the sobriety walk which was canceled last year due to the pandemic.

Shania Parker said she and her sister 100 percent support the cause as well as efforts to address the tragic effects of the residential school system.

Stump said she hopes the inclusion of Lawrence and his cause brought in some more attendees and said it is an issue of great consequence at Rocky Boy, which still has people missing, and she thinks she saw some of their family member there.

"It's important to a lot of people here," she said.

Lawrence addressed the crowd of participants after their arrival at the finish line and thanked them for their time.

He presented gifts to community representatives for their help making the event happen and to those who have lost loved ones to the crisis as well as the Chippewa Cree Business Community for their support.

Lawrence's fundraiser for the event as well as a map of its progress can be found online at https://www.gofundme.com/f/248lzbkoxc .