Next meeting April 15; Park Point “Alley of Allies” in support of MMIWR- information is here; April Breeze is posted
By Dawn Buck on Mar 19, 2025 in Uncategorized | Comments Off on Next meeting April 15; Park Point “Alley of Allies” in support of MMIWR- information is here; April Breeze is posted
Park Point Red Dress Display in Solidarity with No More MMIWR by Lisa McKhann, presentation of project idea to PPCC, 3/18/25)
Read and learn more here from neighbors and advocates working together:
Though I have no personal connection with Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Relatives (MMIWR), I have felt the visceral impact of encountering just one red dress, day after day, where it hung from a gatepost. It’s haunting. So, when I considered our unique geography here on Park Point, and our kind care for everyone in our greater community, this came to mind: The image of a river of red dresses, blowing in a spring breeze or taking on a May shower. Vehicles slowing to take them in, asking questions, and learning the troubling answers.
Background about MMIWR:The red dress or shirt is used in Canada and the U.S.as a symbol for Native American and First Nation lives lost to violence, often sexual violence. These garments represent the indigenous women, girls, and other relatives, who are missing or murdered at a vastly disproportionate rate to any other demographic. Minnesota, Wisconsin and Canada share this issue, geographically and culturally.
In 2022, a broad coalition created a local Award Fund to help move cases forward in the justice system. Alicia Kozlowski, now a Minnesota State Representative for Duluth’s District 8B, then spoke for the City of Duluth.:
“In Minnesota and Wisconsin, historical and contemporary forces intersect to make native women especially vulnerable to sexual violence. While native women are 1% of Minnesota’s female population, they are 8% of all missing and murdered women in the state. On any given month in Minnesota, there are between 27 and 54 native people who are missing.”
Historically there have been issues of jurisdiction for prosecutions on and off tribal lands, for charging native and non-native assailants; prejudice against the victims in police work and media reporting; prevalence of domestic violence and sex trafficking.
Kozlowski went on to say,
“This is a human issue, a community issue.
When one is dehumanized, we all are dehumanized.”
Long-time advocate Rene Ann Goodrich works with Native Lives Matter Coalition and No More MMIWR, among others, bringing justice and healing to families.
“There’s a history of trafficking in Twin Ports, connected to the land base. We are bringing awareness, education and action to address the epidemic of missing women, girls, and two spirits.”
Rene Ann says Visibility is key.
So come on Park Point. Let’s make good use of our unique geography and our caring concern. Help make our Five-Day Display.
Learn more and get connected! Email Lisa, lulu@cpinternet.com
Learnings from the Minnesota Indian Women’s Sexual Assault Coalition Conference
In light of the upcoming MMIWR awareness day and the initiative on Park Point, I want to take a minute to reflect on a conference that I attended where I was first exposed to MMIWR. The conference was hosted in 2022 by the Minnesota Indian Women’s Sexual Assault Coalition (MIWSAC), a statewide tribal coalition dedicated to ending sexual violence. Things hit home when all the conference-goers were gathered in a room and informed that the body of a young woman, Alexis Whitehawk Ruiz, who had disappeared from North Minneapolis late in 2022 had just been found in the Mississippi River. In the following days, I learned about the disappearance of Neveah Kingbird who was last seen in Bemidji (where the conference was being held) in the fall of 2021. I met Neveah’s cousins at the skatepark in Red Lake, talked to her relatives in the audience at the conference, and I heard her mother, Teddi, speak at length about her longing for her daughter and her tireless organizing to bring Neveah home. I heard the mother of Jeremy Jourdain, who went missing from Bemidji as a teenager in 2016, express her rage that six years had passed and she still had no answers as to the whereabouts of her son. Something switched in my thinking: this isn’t just a trend that becomes apparent if you pay attention to data; it’s something current, ongoing, and incredibly real in people’s lives. The roots of this epidemic aren’t easy to contend with: sexual and domestic violence, hamstrung tribal prosecutorial authority, a long history of Native people being devalued and disbelieved, to name a few. There are glaring similarities between the way that the wider culture responds to the loss of Native lives and the way it handles the loss of Black and brown lives. The reflex is to somehow blame the individual, their character, and the culture that they’ve emerged from for their own death or disappearance. A former colleague of mine, in fact, the person who brought me to the MIWSAC conference, said that Black people die, in part, because of hypervisibility while Native people die from invisibility. This upcoming day of awareness is a way to, however briefly, push back against that invisibility. I urge everyone as neighbors to join together in doing that.
-Pentti Hanlon
The names of three indigenous people murdered or missing in this area:
Peter Martin, age 31, last seen on the Fond du Lac reservation one year ago this month.
Chantel Moose, murdered one year ago in Duluth, an open case with the City of Duluth.
Sheila St. Clair, missing since 2015.
Donations:
Duluth’s ‘They Are Remembered Forever’ Reward Fund, offering rewards for information leading to the resolution of unsolved cases of local missing or murdered indigenous people in our area.
https://updateandnews.wixsite.com/gaagige-mikwendaag-1
contact Rene Ann Richardson at Native Lives Matter Coalition, nlmcoalition@gmail.com
Extra garments will be donated to the local organization No More MMIWR advocating for families of MMIWR and raising awareness through displays. www.nomoremmiwr.com
Dollars for dresses for acquiring thrift-store garments, please email Lisa McKhann: lulu@cpinternet.com Thanks!
Participating Organizations, Community Partners, Groups– Supporting the Local Annual MMIW Events and Twin Ports Red Dress Campaign and Reward Fund (an ever-growing list)
City of Duluth, Duluth City Hall
Duluth Indigenous Commission
Native Lives Matter Coalition
Twin Ports No More MMIWg2S Great Lakes
Native Lives Matter Great Lakes
Gaagige-Mikwendaagoziwag
Justice For Chantel Moose
Justice for Native People
Safe Haven Shelter & Resources
Building for Women
Justice for Native Lives
YMCA Duluth
CASDA
PAVSA
Life House
Rural Aids Action Network
Duluth YWCA
Rainbow House
American Indian Community Housing
Mending the Sacred Hoop
Duluth Candy Shop
We Health Duluth
Building Unity Org
Women Against Military Madness
WRAC – Women’s Resource Action Center
UWS- Indigenous Student
UMD- Indigenous Student Organization
Harm Reduction Sisters
Duluth, Denfeld High School
Duluth – Harbor City International School
Media coverage of Feb. 14, 2025 MMIWR march in Twin Ports
Read and learn more here from neighbors and advocates working together, pdf.
Additional PPCC initiatives:
Summer Camp for Kids Ages 7-12: Contact Carolyn Kerns at camplafayetteparkpoint@gmail.com with questions about camp. Slots will fill quickly, don’t delay!
Walking Audit with City Transportation Planner, James Gittemeier, Saturday, April 26, noon, meet at Franklin Park.
