Current Projects

California COVID-19 Recovery and Resiliency Fund

California COVID-19 Recovery and Resiliency Fund

The California Tribal Fund COVID-19 Recovery and Resiliency Fund provides financial support to California Native-led organizations for their response and recovery efforts associated with COVID-19. This exclusive fund for California Tribes is made possible thanks to generous funding by the Stuart Foundation, The California Endowment, Hewlett Foundation, and Regenerative Agriculture Foundation.

The fund is administered through First Nation’s California Tribal Fund, which was created to support California-based, California-Native-led nonprofits and tribal programs in controlling and protecting their food systems, water, languages, traditional ecological knowledge, and land.

The California Native nonprofits below received grants for general operating support and for emergency relief, health care, equipment, and reopening expenses.

Additional granting rounds will be made as funds allow. This relief for California Tribes in the fallout of COVID-19 is provided in coordination with First Nations’ overall COVID-19 Emergency Response Fund.

Winter 2021 Grantees

Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival, Fresno

The Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival will improve their organizational capacity by increasing their online presence, evaluating efficacy of their programs, and utilizing funds to increase staffing. The project will enable AICLS to reach communities statewide, make and retain meaningful partnerships, and stabilize program management.

Bishop Paiute Tribe, Bishop

The Bishop Paiute Tribe will increase the Cultural Center’s organizational capacity by generating a museum website. During the pandemic, an online and virtual presence is needed to advocate, protect, and promote the cultural heritage and lifeways of Indigenous people. This includes Indigenous food systems, water, languages, traditional ecological knowledge, and land.

California Indian Museum & Cultural Center, Santa Rosa

The California Indian Museum and Cultural Center will create a resilience hub. The project will leverage CIMCC’s existing facility, staff and curriculum to provide power, connectivity, cleaner air and programs to Native people to increase their safety and wellness during disasters, knowledge of clean energy alternatives, use of traditional foods, and control over Native food systems.

Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians, San Fernando

The Fernandeno Tataviam Band of Mission Indians will create the Virtual Language Through Song Series for the development and teaching of seasonal songs. The Tribe will leverage an existing virtual model, technological infrastructure, and access to cultural people. The songs will be demonstrated/celebrated at tribal events, thereby increasing value to FTBMI’s scheduled community events.

Gabrieleno / Tongva San Gabriel Band of Mission Indians, San Gabriel

The Gabrieleno/Tongva San Gabriel Band of Mission Indians will retain their ability to offer cultural workshops. This will be done through providing virtual cultural workshops to tribal members.

Indian Cultural Organization, Redding

The Indian Cultural Organization will utilize their traditional medicine-gathering and medicine-making knowledge and practices to continue resilience and distribution efforts to the greater Winnemem Wintu tribal community. This program will increase participation and capacity of tribal members through the support of monetary stipends, reimbursed gas costs, and program supplies.

Ione Band of Miwok Indians, Plymouth

The Ione Band of Miwok Indians will focus on increasing organizational capacity to provide supportive services for tribal elders during the COVID 19 pandemic. The project will increase the tribe’s capacity to connect to their tribal elders through a multitude of platforms.

Mesa Grande Band of Mission Indians, Ramona

The Mesa Grande Business Development Corporation will purchase and install a 20’ x 24’ high tunnel structure as part of a larger garden project to develop and sustain a tribally controlled food supply that will provide tribal members safe access to healthy, affordable organic produce without leaving the reservation.

Miwok Heritage Center, Ione

Funding for the Miwok Heritage Center will empower the organization to create new resources related to traditional Miwok foods and incorporate resources into their existing website. The project will increase their capacity to serve the Miwok people, wherever they reside.

Native American Pathways, Hoopa

Native American Pathways will create a Native youth mentorship program to uplift tribal traditions, food sovereignty and gathering practices. It will also retain and increase access to culturally inclusive COVID-19 messaging developed for the safety of community members and reservation residents.

Northern California Tribal Court Coalition, Eureka

The Northern California Tribal Court Coalition will deliver high-quality, virtual COVID-related programming through the purchase of better-quality computer peripherals for live-streaming. This will enable NCTCC to compensate skilled volunteers for online conference facilitation and planning and leverage existing funding, resources, technology, and skills to host and produce online events.

Pukuu Cultural Community Services, San Fernando

Pukuu Cultural Community Services will increase organizational capacity to provide cultural and traditional knowledge opportunities during COVID-19 in terms of technology, especially website and online apps, supporting dynamic and engaging engagement related to food sovereignty, environmental stewardship, and traditional knowledge transmission.

Robinson Rancheria Band of Pomo Indians, Nice

The Robinson Rancheria of Pomo Indians will create a community garden that will primarily serve elders in their community. The project will increase the tribe’s capacity for food security and promote health and nutrition benefits.

Save California Salmon, Orleans

Save California Salmon Water Protection and Education Project will enable the organization to continue to provide and expand online educational and organizing webinars, provide direct support to webinar participants, and create curriculum around water protection, advocacy, science, and traditional ecological knowledge.

Tübatulabal Tribe

The Tübatulabal Tribe will create and develop a tribal-based, language-centered community effort to increase awareness and build community capacity for members to better manage and make more informed decision on ways to stop the spread of COVID-19 within their tribal community and increase access to vaccines within their most vulnerable populations, including youth and elders.

Yak Tityu Tityu Yak Tilhini, San Luis Obispo

The Yak Tityu Tityu Yak Tilhini Northern Chumash will create multi-faceted strategic planning focused on developing tribal infrastructure utilizing collaboration from multiple tribal committees (strategic planning, membership, and constitution committees). Funding for this project will support capacity-building efforts as they seek federal acknowledgement and increase participation from their tribal community.

Yurok Tribe, Klamath

The Yurok Tribe will continue to support the Yurok Tribe Food Sovereignty Division to create programs and leverage additional funding by allocating staff time for grant research and application preparation, as well as increase community and tribal member participation in determining program priorities through outreach.

Summer 2020 Grantees

Barbareño Band of Chumash Indians, Santa Barbara

The Barbareño Band of Chumash Indians is a 501 (c)(3) non-profit working to unify their people, revitalize their culture, protect their ancestral lands, and share their heritage with the community.

California Indian Basketweavers Association, Woodland

The vision of CIBA, a Native-led non-profit, is to preserve, promote and perpetuate California Indian basketweaving traditions while providing a healthy physical, social, spiritual and economic environment for basketweavers.

Clearlake Pomo Cultural Preservation Foundation, Clearlake Oaks

The Clearlake Pomo Cultural Preservation Foundation is a native led non-profit that advocates for the protection and preservation of Clearlake Pomo tribal cultural resources.

Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians, San Fernando

The Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians (FTBMI) is a state-recognized tribe consisting of a voluntary village community, composed of a coalition of three lineage communities that retains the integrity of each constituent lineage community.

Gabrieleno Tongva San Gabriel Band of Mission Indians, San Gabriel

The Gabrieleno San Gabriel Band of Mission Indians (AKA) “Gabrieleno Tongva” is the “Historical Traditional Tribe” within the County of Los Angeles. The tribe’s vision is to build and inspire traditional values and ethics for future generations while preserving the foundations of American Indian culture.

Juaneño Band of Mission Indians Acjachemen Nation, San Juan Capistrano

The Juaneño Band of Mission Indians Acjachemen Nation is a state-recognized Native American Indian tribe located in San Juan Capistrano.

Maidu Summit Consortium, Chester

The mission of the Maidu Summit Consortium is to preserve, protect, and promote the Mountain Maidu Homeland with a united voice. The Maidu Summit Consortium envisions re-acquired ancestral lands as a vast and unique park system dedicated to the purposes of education, healing, protection, and ecosystem management based upon the Maidu cultural and philosophic perspectives, as expressed through traditional ecology.

Mishewal Wappo Tribe, Santa Rosa

Mishewal Wappo Indians is a non-profit organization composed of the descendants of the people who lived for thousands of years along the riverbanks and in the valleys of Napa and Sonoma Counties.

San Luis Rey Mission Indian Foundation, Oceanside

The San Luis Rey Band of Luiseño Indians operates as a non-profit organization and has kept its identity as a people within the county of San Diego and the city of Oceanside, continuing to exist on ancestral tribal lands. The tribe works to preserve what remains of their great cultural past and to create and share its heritage with future generations.

The American Indian Council of Mariposa, Mariposa

The American Indian Council of Mariposa County is a non-profit organization that works to maintain and provide education to its members and the public concerning the historical, social, and cultural traditions of the Indians of Mariposa County.

Tule River Economic Development Corporation, Porterville

The Tule River Economic Development Corporation (TREDC) is a non-profit organization that is owned by the Tule River Indian Tribe and governed by a Board of Directors comprised of the Tule River Tribal Council.

‘Ačaam Together’: California Tribe Celebrates Language Through Seasonal Songs, March 2022

To help bring its community together during the pandemic, the Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians (FTBMI) created a musical instruction program taught via Zoom, using traditional musical instruments. It aimed to teach participants the Tribe’s language and culture centered around the seasons.

 

The Historic Malki Museum: ‘We’re COVID-Safe!’, March 2022

The Malki Museum is the first museum in California founded by Native Americans in 1964. During the pandemic, the historic Malki Museum, on the Morongo Band of Mission Indians Reservation, adopted robust COVID-safety measures and messaging to get visitors back to the museum―and used this opportunity to teach the Cahuilla language, too.