Federal Government Update
1/31/2025 2:36:00 PM
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Public Relations
Boozhu SCIT Members and Employees,
Thank you for your patience and understanding as we have worked internally to gather information related to the recent announcements by the federal government. The chaos and uncertainty around this announcement has been felt throughout Indian Country and our nation. The Office of Management and Budget initially released Memo, M-25-13, on Monday, January 27th temporarily freezing federal funds, which affect funding at all levels. This memo was released with minimal direction, very limited guidance and/or clarity. Our teams immediately began the work to protect and prepare for potential impacts to all programs and services throughout our organization that were affected by this memo.
Tribal Council, Tribal Administration, Accounting, The Office of Grants and Contracts, Human Resources, Legal, and many others continued to gather and provide data to offer solutions in hopes of lessening the direct impacts within our community. In light of quick litigation, this memo was rescinded on Wednesday, January 29th and although we are temporarily relieved, we are mindful of potential future disruptions of this nature.
At this time we anticipate no interruptions of programming or services provided by the Tribe. We are closely monitoring any updates around this issue. We want our community to know that our Tribal Council, alongside our dedicated administrative teams, will continue to advocate for funding services obligated to the SCIT which have significant impacts to our tribal members, employees and community.
We are working with our tribal, state, and federal partners to keep each other informed and updated about the challenges we are all facing. We encourage you to express your voice alongside us by calling or writing your elected officials at https://www.usa.gov/elected-officials. We are committed to working with other tribes and our governmental teams to reaffirm the message to the federal legislature in honoring the government’s obligations to the Tribal Nations of this country. We will provide data to assist in communicating the importance of the SCIT’s legislative priorities and urge the legislature to make informed decisions.
Most importantly we are committed to providing updates to you all. We understand these announcements weigh heavily on many within our community and we will continue to provide updates as we navigate through these issues.
Chi Miigwetch
Saginaw Chippewa Tribal Council