The Native American Community Clinic Moves into a New Building, and Native Running Clubs Are Growing Fast

Transcript

[Music: Minnesota Native News Theme]

Marie Rock: For Minnesota Native News, I'm Marie Rock. This week, a Native clinic gets ready to move into its new building, and running clubs are promoting health and healing.

First, reporter Laurie Stern gets a behind-the-scenes tour of the new Native American Community Clinic, NACC, in South Minneapolis.

Laurie Stern: The old NACC was a former strip mall that started with a handful of staff twenty three years ago. The new clinic is a dream come true, two stories every inch planned to welcome and heal.

Erik Kelly: We are on floor two and NACC has the first and second floor for clinic and the top four floors are for housing that we spoke of.

Laurie Stern: Erik Kelly, the Project Manager, says the new clinic is big enough to house departments that used to be off-site. Each one is marked with tiled artwork.

Erik Kelly: So, these are being called medicine thresholds and what these do is frame essentially your patient's entrance into different departments within the clinic.

Laurie Stern: Departments like behavioral health, dental, medicine assisted treatment for addiction, and traditional healing. Spirituality has been a feature since before the foundation was poured.

Dr. Antony Stately: We buried a buffalo heart in the center of the property with that bundle of prayers.

Laurie Stern: This is NACC President and Executive Officer, Dr. Antony Stately.

Dr. Antony Stately: It was our opportunity to say Thank you to the earth for allowing us to sort of break her open and cause some wound to her, but also because it was a sacrifice we were asking her to make for the people.

Laurie Stern: People like the ones he met at the Wall of Forgotten Natives back in 2018 when he was still relatively new at the clinic.

Dr. Antony Stately: People were living in that little one block strip of land in like two hundred tents, no running water, no bathrooms. It was like heartbreaking to see the community where I was born and raised, having this experience that I had never seen anything of that nature ever in my lifetime.

Laurie Stern: Dr. Stately says his heartbreak turned into anger and then determination. He prayed for help and his prayers were answered by allies at many levels of government, philanthropy, and community. Not only was the clinic funded, but four floors of affordable housing too.

Dr. Antony Stately: Because that's what our people that are living under the bridge and living in tents and living unsheltered deserve. They deserve a community that puts their arms around and holds them and helps them stand their lives back up.

Laurie Stern: For Minnesota Native News, I'm Laurie Stern.

Marie Rock: Next, Deanna StandingCloud learns more about running clubs in the urban Native community.

Deanna StandingCloud: Like clockwork, every Wednesday evening, the Four Winds Running Club laces up their running shoes and meets outside the Waterworks building at Mill Ruins Park in downtown Minneapolis.

Joseph Regguinti: I think it's super important to just build community out to do healthy activities together and we got like about forty people in our group chat for our run club. We probably have like, I don't know, between seven to fifteen people show up every Wednesday to come run.

Deanna StandingCloud: Joseph Regguinti is the Twin Cities in Motion Program Manager for their IndigieFit Initiative. He's been running for three years. It's a passion that grew from his sobriety journey.

Joseph Regguinti: That's one of the things that helped me stay sober. You kind of end up with like this community of people. You might not be best friends, but at least for like an hour out of the day, you kind of like get someone to say hi to. You get someone to chit chat with. They'll ask you about your day.

Deanna StandingCloud: There is a growing number of native running groups popping up all around Minnesota.

Joseph Regguinti: I think we got 9 coaches, including myself. We're all certified run coaches now. There probably weren't 10 certified run coaches put together in the state. I wouldn't think so, like Native run coaches.

Deanna StandingCloud: According to the Minnesota Department of Health, native people die from heart disease at two and a half times that of the rest of the state. Physical activity can offset chronic illnesses in native communities.

Joseph Regguinti: You know, it really has changed my life around a lot, and I just try to kind of spread that because I think getting our bodies moving is part of being human.

Deanna StandingCloud: Learn more or join the running club by checking out their Instagram at Four Winds Native Running Club. Everyone is welcome.

For Minnesota Native News, I'm Deanna StandingCloud.

Marie Rock: That's all for this week's episode. Join us next time for more voices and stories that inform, uplift, and shape our communities.

[Music: Minnesota Native News Theme]

Marie Rock: Minnesota Native News is produced by AMPERS. radio stations made possible by funding from the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.