Feds, tribe both responsible for public safety
By Hope MacDonald Lone Tree
Special to the Times
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The citizens of the Navajo Nation do not have to look farther than the daily pages of the Navajo Times or other regional newspapers to read about crime in the Navajo Nation and its impact on our families and communities.
The citizens of the Navajo Nation can also read about the need for more police officers and the need for public safety facilities across the Navajo Nation.
We read about the innocence of Navajo children destroyed by violent crime. We read about families destroyed by substance abuse and alcohol. We read about individuals falling into the dark realm of crime. We read about violent crime occurring more often and becoming more heinous.
More recently we read about the scourge of meth across Navajo land.
Today we have parents who neglect and abuse their children because of substance abuse. Sadly, we read about fatalities where our young ones are victims of violence in their own home and at the hands of a family member.
A crime-free and safe environment where our children can grow up healthy is essential. A crime-free and safe environment is also critical for the development of our economy.
Safe and stable communities attract business development. Employers and employees feel safe and secure knowing their businesses and homes are safe from crime.
Without adequate protection from crime, without jails for criminals, and without more Navajo police officers, Navajo families are not enjoying - nor will they enjoy - the freedom from the terror of crime in our homeland.
Currently in the Navajo Nation, we have less than 300 officers serving the entire 16.2 million acres, or 25,000 square miles, of the Navajo Nation.
On a daily basis Navajo police officers operate without adequate equipment, with run-down police vehicles, without overtime compensation, and without adequate tribal jails to detain criminals.
Let's face it, our brave Navajo police officers work hundreds of hours of overtime, confronting life-threatening situations, and spend time away from their loved ones to keep our communities safe, to provide comfort, to protect, and to serve.
Over the last few decades the lack of jails has slowly but surely created a precarious public safety environment. Community members who are victims of crime or witnesses to a crime are fearful for their lives and the welfare of their family because, simply put, we don't have jail space to detain criminals for never more than a few hours at a time.
Police officers are frustrated because they often cannot assure victims that criminals will be detained for longer periods of time.
We face great challenges that principally arise out of the poor economic conditions on the Navajo Nation. Some of these conditions can be directly traced to inactions of the federal government in violation of its treaty responsibility to the Navajo Nation.
Many of the problems can be addressed if the federal government fully lived up to its trust responsibility, which includes adequately funding Navajo public safety. Other problems can be traced to the Navajo government that has not treated public safety as a priority.
While there are some ongoing efforts to fund new jails, we must decide, as a nation, the most appropriate and efficient way to construct new jail facilities. Some Navajo leaders maintain that it's the federal government's responsibility to provide the funding. Other Navajo leaders believe that it is the Navajo Nation's responsibility to address the jail situation.
The answer is that both governments have a responsibility to ensure the safety of our law-abiding Navajo people, the safety of their communities, and the safety of their families.
Even as jails are an important element in fighting crime, detention facilities are not the only answer to crime within the Navajo Nation. A successful criminal justice system must include rehabilitative counseling services and reconciliation efforts, and alternatives to incarceration.
The Navajo Nation does not need to travel the same path as mainstream America by building massive corporate prisons.
Over the last five years, the Public Safety Committee has aggressively advocated for increased federal and tribal funding for public safety, including developing a federal funding strategy, providing testimony to Congress, using media reports on public safety challenges, and advancing public safety legislative and funding requests on behalf of the Navajo Nation.
For instance, the Navajo Department of Law Enforcement receives an insufficient $20 million from the BIA for providing public safety services for the entire Navajo Nation. This $20 million is less than 11 percent of the available funding from the BIA - despite the fact that the Navajo Nation has more than 34 percent of on-reservation population nationally and our land base is 21 percent of Indian Country.
Within the Navajo Nation, the Division of Public Safety receives less than 7 percent of General Fund allocations for executive branch programs.
In addition to the need for jail facilities, other public safety issues have come to the forefront: school violence and safety, child sexual abuse, funding for autopsies, overtime pay, funding for patrol vehicles, and funding for an automated fingerprinting information system. Each of these are outstanding issues that require additional efforts by the Navajo Nation government.
In light of the many challenges facing Navajo public safety, it is also important to note that these challenges are not the sole matter of concern for law enforcement and detention personnel. Other key parts of public safety such as emergency medical and management services and fire and rescue staff are also in dire need of additional personnel and funding.
The lack of manpower and equipment for emergency medical services leaves nearly half of the Navajo Nation without these services. The lack of emergency management infrastructure leaves our first responders with insufficient communication technology and safeguards to assure timely response.
The lack of manpower for our fire and rescue department leaves our communities at the mercy of fire danger, especially in our growth centers and in rural communities.
There is a great amount of work to be done to address public safety needs within the Navajo Nation. We need to continue to pressure the federal government to comply with their treaty obligations.
We have a lot of work to do internally to take control of our own governmental affairs and to protect our communities with well- developed and established priorities for public safety. We need to be even more creative in using available resources to address critical public safety needs.
In conclusion, crime is the end result of what is not working in our society and culture. Greater discussion on public safety must occur in each community, within in our families, and with our tribal government and elected leaders. The very life and well-being of our future is at stake.
I have served five years as a council delegate and a member of the 20th and 21st Navajo Nation Councils' Public Safety committees. It has been an honor to serve my people and the selfless women and men who staff our public safety programs.
I look forward to tirelessly working for my Navajo people to advocate for public safety needs in our communities and across Indian Country. I look forward to strengthening Navajo public safety's network of resources.
I look forward to assuring internal accountability and helping to make funding available for one of the greatest challenges facing the Navajo people and nation.
Lone Tree, chairwoman of the Public Safety Committee, is delegate for
Coalmine Canyon and Toh Nanees Dizi.