E.P.A. Region Seven Tribal Plan Awards Grants to Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska for Response Program, Environmental Capacity Building

(Kansas City, Kan., July 9, 2012) - E.P.A. Region 7's Office of Tribal Affairs has awarded 2 grants to the Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska to support a brownfields tribal response plan and increase the capacity of its environmental protection department to protect human health and the environment.

The Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska, headquartered at the Village of Winnebago, occupies approximately 120,000 acres of reservation land in Thurston Co. in northeast Nebraska, About 2,600 members of the tribe reside on the reservation.

A $94,298 grant, expressed through a cooperative agreement, will allow the tribe to continue the process of establishing a brownfields tribal response plan to address contaminated sites on the reservation with the goal of returning them to beneficial reuse.

A $15,000 grant to the tribe's Environmental Protection Department will help the department build its overall capacity to protect human health and the environment. Specific work to be funded by the grant includes expansion of the tribal solid waste program, including tire removal; research for additional backing opportunities; the mapping of abandoned homesteads; and working with the tribe's land management office to plot no-till acreage.

E.P.A. provides financial assistance to states and tribes to help them implement environmental programs. States and tribes may gain these funds in individual environmental plan categorical grants, or choose to combine grants in a performance partnership grant.

The Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska is one of 9 federally acknowledged tribes within E.P.A. Region 7.

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