Pauly Denetclaw
ICT
On Tuesday night, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services cut $2 billion in mental health and addiction services.
“Let me make myself clear when I say that politics should never impact the work that we’re doing with our kids, and that’s what it did,” said Mitchelle Mitchell, director of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes’ education department.
Mental and behavioral health programs that primarily serve Indigenous people, from across the country, received emails stating that their grant funding through the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration had been rescinded.
A handful of tribal nations received federal grant funding from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration for the 2025 fiscal year.
Nearly half a million was awarded to Lac Courte Oreilles Tribal Government in Wisconsin, Two Feathers Native American Family Services in California was awarded $3.6 million, Chinle Unified School District on the Navajo Nation in Arizona was awarded just over $3.5 million, Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe in Michigan was awarded a little over a $1 million, and the Pueblo of San Felipe in New Mexico was awarded $1.5 million.
This sent a shockwave through the Confederation Salish and Kootenai Tribes in western Montana and St. Francis Indian School in South Dakota who rely on these grants to provide mental health services to their nations’ children and teens.
On Thursday morning, they received an email that their grant funding had been restored, but staff remain worried about the future.
Mitchell described the whole experience as “traumatic.” Her department was informed by email that two grants, amounting to $2.75 million, had been rescinded.
“It was one of the hardest days of my career,” Mitchell, Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, said. “To get the termination notice late at night without any warning. It was so unexpected. And then to have to come in (the next day) and tell staff that not only do we not have the funding, they don’t have jobs.”
The tribes’ Project Aware and Partnership for Success programs rely on federal grant funding. Project Aware contracts with tribal knowledge keepers, and has partnerships with three local public school districts. The Partnership for Success collaborates with the Boys and Girls Club of the Flathead Reservation.
Mitchell spent Jan. 14, personally calling all the program partners and contractors to tell them they would no longer be able to work with them or provide services to students.
“It broke a little piece of me doing that,” she said.
Five years ago, Mitchell wrote the grant proposal for Project Aware. It was a way to bring her three-tiered system of support rooted in Salish, Kootenai and Kalispel language and culture to the children in her community. Prior to Project Aware, she had applied for two other federal grants but wasn’t selected.
“This idea is putting culture into the school system,” Mitchell said. “It’s not to add beads and feathers to something. It’s to make sure that our tribal kids are thinking of other content areas (like math and science) through a tribal lens.”
The project is in its fifth year and has met every annual goal since it started, a point of pride for Mitchell.
“Our goal is to help our kids strengthen their sense of who they are, so that they’re healthy, well and resilient,” she said. “Then we just pull the rug out from underneath them, when we take that away. If I sound a little angry, it’s because I am. But, I’m so cognizant of the impact that we’re making, and this work is so important. We can’t let it stop.”
She has spent a lot of time creating strong partnerships with the local school districts and traditional knowledge keepers. The project is in a unique position to bring hands-on cultural learning to three different school districts in rural, western Montana.
Students who were at-risk of not graduating high school participate daily in cultural activities through their immersion school. Some of the students said it was one of the only reasons they came to school. They looked forward to tanning hide, learning how to sew ribbon skirts, beading, going outside to learn about traditional plants, and speaking their language.
Every year, they have Culture Camp on Flathead Lake. Last year over 600 students and their family members participated. Every day, there are up to 30 different cultural activities participants can choose to do. There’s no time limit and the curriculum is self-directed.
“We were right, when we help our kids strengthen that sense of who they are as tribal people, then they’re more likely to choose things that cause less harm for themselves or help encourage their friends to,” Mitchell said. “When they learn how to do something that’s culturally or tribally-related, then they can lean into that in times of trouble.”
The St. Francis Indian School in rural, southern South Dakota also received funding to create a Project Aware. The school’s population is 98 percent American Indian or Alaska Native. The project serves more than 600 students from kindergarten through 12th grade. They receive a little over $1 million a year to provide culturally relevant programming and mental health services.
Nearly six years ago, a student at St. Francis Indian School died by suicide, and since the school has been working diligently on suicide prevention. One of the main aspects of the school’s Project Aware is suicide prevention.
Over the last three years, the project has been able to create a strong mental health response team.
“They are able to connect with students and make sure that each student is able to explain and express the needs that they have, whether it’s in the classroom or at home,” Beckey Eddie-Moosman, director of the school’s mental health department, said.
On Jan. 14, Eddie-Moosman and Maria Valandra, one of the school’s counselors, were trying to figure out what grants could pay for at least the rest of the school year. These services are vital for the health of students.
“Still having kids that need to come to you while you’re trying not to literally panic,” Valandra said. “(On Wednesday) we had school and we had kids who still, we’re like, ‘Hey, I come to school because this is my safe place. This is where I get my routine and structure. These are the people who usually are right here for me,'”
After a stressful day, Valandra was doomscrolling on social media when she came across an article that said mental health grant funding would be restored. This led to another restless night worrying about whether it was true.
On Thursday morning, Eddie-Moosman and Valandra waited for an email stating their grant money had been restored. At 10 a.m., they got the “good news.” It was a relief.
The school administration had affirmed they were committed to keeping the mental health services available to students.
This is not the case for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. If their federal grant funding gets rescinded, those programs will no longer be available. This has caused a lot of stress for staff who are worried about having stable employment.
“We’re on guard now. Could this happen again? Could they figure out how to do it in a way that doesn’t have to be rescinded?” Mitchell said. “That is a scary way to do your work every day, because of it I actually have one of my employees who works on Project Aware that has an interview for a different job on Friday. They can’t live like this and I don’t blame them.”
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