Beltrami County and the Red Lake Nation have been honored by the National Association of Counties for working together for the Red Lake Initiative, a multi-jurisdictional solution to addressing tribal child welfare and social service needs.

For decades, public officials from state, tribal, federal, and local governments disagreed about who was responsible for the welfare services in the Red Lake Nation, which is a sovereign tribal government. In 2015, several leaders from all those governments looked towards a new way of thinking that tailored and improved services to the Red Lake Nation.

Innovations focused on:

• Establishing a comprehensive understanding of what tribal needs were
• Evaluating how cultural services could be expanded
• Addressing how to honor and respect tribal sovereignty
• Elevating access to services to tribal members

By — Lakeland News