A collection of regional nonprofit organizations is working to center Indigenous perspectives in fundraising. The Good Relatives Collaborative hosted one of the sessions at a recent Rapid City tribal relations meeting.
The Good Relatives Collaborative seeks to connect grantmaking with an explicitly indigenous-oriented lens.
Lakota Vogel is the executive director of the Four Bands Community Fund, based on the Cheyenne River Reservation. She says the collection of organizations seek to create new opportunities.
“We are a group of Native nonprofits through the regions of South Dakota, North Dakota, and Minnesota who have received Bush Foundation funding to uplift Native nonprofits within those three states," Vogel said. "We like to think that people who are approximate to the opportunities have the solutions for their communities, and oftentimes that is Native-led. Oftentimes, as Natives we’re entering spaces where our viewpoints are not centric, so this is an opportunity to put them first, lift up their values, and use that as a starting point.”
Alongside Four Bands are the North Dakota-based Sacred Pipe Resource Center and Minnesota-based Native American Community Development Institute. Alissa Benoist is the director of programming with Four Bands. She says any group seeking assistance can find it with these groups.
“The work that they do is phenomenal," Benoist said. "It’s not outside entities coming in and telling them what to do, they’re finding their solution that best suits their needs at the time. We’re here to support them along their journey and finance the solutions they may need.”
Associated grantee groups attended the luncheon with Vogel and Benoist, along with their Sacred Pipe and Native CDI counterparts.