Ceremonial grounds sold out from under -- but spirits soar
Not long after the state sold off the ceremonial grounds of the North American Indian Center of Boston last summer, lightning struck a tree there.
This was no random act of nature; this was a sign of ''the energy here, from the spirits of our people," said Sterling Hollowhorn, an Oglala Sioux -- the tribe of Crazy Horse -- who manages special projects for the center. ''It was a good omen. It meant we were going to always be here, watching."
For the first time, the Indian Center has a sense of permanence after years of living under the threat of relocation. State and center officials say that by selling the ceremonial grounds to Star Realty for $1.5 million, the state will be able to sign a 99-year lease as early as this week allowing the Native American community to remain at its building on South Huntington Avenue.
The site of powwows and weddings, the land has a sweat lodge, a fire circle, and a playground. It has been invaluable to both newly arrived and local Native Americans for years, said the center's executive director, Joanne Dunn. Nevertheless, with the grounds sitting on prime real estate on the Jamaicaway, she considers being able to keep the Indian Center's building the best outcome that realistically could be expected.
''This is the heart of the native community here," she said recently, looking out over the grassy lot. ''We're sad to lose it, but at least we don't have to move. Our people were ready to link arms around this building to keep it."
For Greater Boston's small but close-knit Native American community -- estimated at about 6,000 people -- the center tries to replicate the support structures of the tribes many have left behind. Tribes often resemble a huge extended family, an informal network providing everything from car rides to baby sitters to career advice. The move off the reservation to the big city is a daunting one, Dunn said.
''This is always the first place Indians come to," she said.
Along with offering a place for members of tribes from around North America to burn sweet grass and celebrate their tribal cultures, the center provides healthcare, day care, job training, counseling, and a Head Start preschool program. An annual budget of about $1 million, supported mostly by federal grants, pays for a staff of 23.
''They provide a service to a population that doesn't have much here that's culturally compatible," said state Representative Jeffrey Sanchez, who filed the legislation allowing the state to lease the property. ''The people there are working hard, and they needed stability in terms of where their home will be."
While traditional singers and dancers in brightly colored dress performed inside during the center's annual craft fair last month, Lisa Michael recounted how she came to Boston alone at age 19, leaving behind her Micmac reservation in Nova Scotia, Canada. Bleak job prospects propelled her to Boston, and she turned to the center.
While working at Filene's, Michael took an electronics course at the center. Her new skills led to a job soldering on a
''It gave me my start, and it was all I knew here in the beginning," Michael said as her small son danced to the tribal music. ''Now I bring my kids here."
When Janise Billiot, a 35-year-old single mother, first came to Boston, she assumed she'd have to prepare her two kids for college without the support of other Native Americans. A member of the Houma tribe of Houma, La., she came to Boston in search of a better job and public schools that would prepare her kids for college. She spent nearly five years as her children's only meaningful link to their native heritage.
Then, while searching the Internet for an after-school program for her son Blake, she discovered the center.
''We had found ourselves in a strange place without people from our tribe," Billiot said. ''They really helped with my son. He was a struggling senior, and they helped him pull through, graduate, and go to college.
''They helped throughout the admissions process, they gave us direction, and they got him to stay focused."
Her son not only flourished in the center's mentoring program for high schoolers, he also met other young Native Americans and discovered a love for native drumming, Billiot said. He's now a freshman at the University of West Alabama.
At first, college was an intimidating idea for her family, Billiot said.
''I didn't know many people back home who had graduated from high school and went on to college," she said. Billiot's daughter Bridget, a Madison Park High School sophomore, attends the mentoring program. And with her kids on the right track, Billiot herself is college-bound. The center advised her throughout the enrollment process, and this month she became a full-time management student at Cambridge College.
''They're like an extended family to me," said Billiott, an administrative assistant at
More services and a bigger, better building are part of the center's vision, said Dunn, its director. With its long-term lease, the center finally will be able to apply for the much-needed large grants available only to institutions with leases of at least 60 years, she said.
Dunn said she expected the center's board of directors to approve the lease this week. The center also has begun raising funds toward the estimated $15 million cost of a new building, Dunn said.
Without a lease, the center couldn't make anything more than superficial repairs to its dilapidated four-story brick building over the last three decades. To ensure that the building is warm when the staff arrives in the morning, a maintenance worker must tend its antiquated furnace throughout the night, Dunn said.
The state donated the run-down building, an old reform school, to the Native American community in 1973. In 2003, looking to sell excess properties during a budget crunch, the state's Division of Capital Asset Management offered a buyout. But the center would have been forced to pay rent at a new location. With the support of neighborhood activists, it rejected the offer.
The plan to sell only the ceremonial grounds was developed as an alternative, and the acre of tree-lined open space, which has a serene view of Olmsted Park, was sold to Star Realty last June for $1.54 million. The firm did not return phone calls for comment on its plans.
Peter Norstrand, the Division of Capital Asset Management's deputy commissioner, said the sale of the grounds and the long lease on the building benefit everyone involved.
''We're looking forward to signing the lease," he said. ''They were in a difficult position because they had no legal right to be on the premises, but we've solved that problem. Now the building for all intents and purposes will be theirs, and they'll be free to tear it down and rebuild it."
A new Native American center makes sense for a city that prides itself on its history and diversity, Dunn said.
''We don't want to be an invisible people anymore," she said. ''We want a home we can feel proud of, something you'd drive by and say, 'Gee, there are Indians here.' "
Ron DePasquale can be reached at ciweek@globe.com
