S moke S ignals
june 1, 2014
11
In search of food self-sufficiency
Meeting discusses
new food bank
under construction
By Ron Karten
Smoke Signals staff writer
With $500,000 from a federal
Housing and Urban Development
Indian Community Development
block grant and a $167,000 Tribal
Housing Authority match, the
Grand Ronde Tribe has designed
and now is building a new, larger
and more comprehensive food col-
lection and distribution center for
the community.
The building has been designed
to handle food from Salem-based
Marion-Polk Food Share and the
U.S. Department of Agriculture’s
Food Distribution Program on
Indian reservations. Regulations
require food from each program be
kept separate and be available on
different days.
The Grand Ronde Community
Resource Center, a local non-profit,
has been receiving food from Food
Share for years, but now a new
Tribal partnership with Food Share
may be emerging. If approved by
Tribal Council, plans are afoot that
will enable Food Share personnel
to take a larger role in programs
to lead the community toward food
self-sufficiency.
Under the plan being considered,
Food Share will bring its leadership
skills and experience with food self-
sufficiency to Grand Ronde to help
create new possibilities for the local
food bank.
The partnership would be unique
to both the Tribe and Food Share.
And the local food bank and com-
munity gardens will participate.
Marion-Polk Food Share supplies
food to the Community Resource
Center and 97 other partners in its
service area.
One goal for Food Share, said
President and CEO Rick Gaupo, is
“to foster and help a community to
the point that they no longer need
Food Share, or emergency food as-
sistance.”
“Without the food box (from Food
Share),” said community member
Greg Van Houten, “a lot of people
would be going hungry, or starv-
ing.”
At a May 14 lunch meeting held
in the Tribal Community Center
to discuss the new 3,300-square-
foot facility that broke ground in
May, Tribal Planning Director Rick
George solicited questions and com-
ments from a group of about 30 in
attendance.
With lasagna, salad, rolls and
dessert under their belts, commu-
nity members turned their atten-
tion to food for the future.
The new facility will replace the
current operation located in an old
house at the entrance to Uyxat
Powwow Grounds off Hebo Road.
The new building will be centrally
located on the Curl property, next
to the current recycling center and
across from the Tribal Housing
Authority building on Grand Ronde
Road.
Sitting on half an acre, the facil-
ity will have 1,500 square feet for a
warehouse distribution center with
100 square feet each for walk-in
cooler and freezer units. Storage
racks and plenty of space inside will
accommodate people waiting for or
selecting groceries, and there will
be a play area for children.
The local Clothes Closet will be
housed there and laundry facili-
ties for the Clothes Closet will be
available. Office space, a private
interview room and restrooms are
also part of the plan.
A kitchen training room will
be a “hybrid, with the feel of a
residential kitchen, but also the
commercial advantage of being
state-approved for packaging,” said
Tribal Engineer and Public Works
Manager Jesse White, who is over-
seeing design and construction of
the project.
Plans also call for raised planter
beds around the facility and discus-
sions are underway to reserve more
land for community gardening proj-
ects. The new food bank will have
18 parking spaces.
Although this facility is “as big as
we can go with the dollars allotted
and still be able to meet the needs of
the community,” White said, “there
is plenty of room to expand.”
“The Community Garden is in
Mending Broken
Hearts training set
The White Bison Mending Broken Hearts training returns to
the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde on Wednesday through
Friday, June 18-20, at the Tribal Education Center, 9615 Grand
Ronde Road.
The purpose of the training is to offer a culturally based way of
healing from grief, loss and intergenerational trauma, especially for
Native American people in the United States and Canada.
The training is free, but people must register to attend. Partici-
pants are asked for a three-day commitment and must attend from
8 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day.
To register or to obtain more information, contact Alcohol and
Drug Counselor Karan Scharf at 503-879-2029.
The training is sponsored by the Tribe’s Behavioral Health Pro-
gram and funded through a Meth and Suicide Prevention Initiative
grant. n
support of the food bank,” said
Community Garden representative
Patty LeClair, who went on to de-
scribe “all kinds of healthy things”
growing and all kinds of jobs for
volunteers to fill. “It’s all for the
community,” she said.
The Community Garden, located
on Grand Ronde Road at Second
Street, has a new greenhouse, 32
rebuilt and raised planting beds
and two planting beds designed to
allow handicapped volunteers to
participate.
“Strawberries, raspberries, cran-
berries and grapes already are
growing there,” LeClair said, and
jobs needing volunteers include
planting, hoeing and watering.
“It is people-run and people-
driven,” said George.
Different regulations for the Food
Share program and the USDA
dictate who is eligible for each
program’s food.
A contained area and active in-
volvement by both the community
and Tribal Council are require-
ments Food Share needs to take the
Tribal food bank one step further,
said Gaupo.
The effort intends “to control the
Tribal community’s food destiny,”
he said. The extra involvement
by Food Share will include help
setting up the infrastructure for
a smooth-running, well-planned
operation that makes the most of
many possibilities. Those might
include examples of what a good
garden looks like, or packaging and
distribution help with some of the
gardens’ harvests.
Facilities will allow the commu-
nity to teach canning processes and
do actual canning as the garden
reaches harvest time.
“Without community involve-
ment,” he said, “it will all go no-
where.”
This is more than Food Share
can currently do with any of the
other 97 partner agencies, said
Gaupo, because those agencies lack
the government involvement that
Tribal Council provides in Grand
Ronde, and a contained area for
distribution.
Plans from the Tribe’s point of
view, said George, also should ad-
dress “community planning and
development around food.”
He asked the group to come back
in two months with new ideas about
community needs, including maybe
a local store for Tribal foods and
crafts, parks and recreation op-
portunities.
Young adults, college graduates
in their early 20s, also will be part
of this Tribal effort, said Gaupo.
The young adults have volunteered
for the AmeriCorps Resource As-
sistance for Rural Environments
program based at the University
of Oregon. It was created to help
Oregon’s rural communities and to
improve their economic, social and
environmental conditions.
“The folks at the food bank have
done a great job through the years
and will continue to do a great job
in the future,” said Mark Johnston,
outgoing general manager for the
Tribe, who introduced the meet-
ing. n