Welcome to Engaging Tribal Leaders, Linking Substance Use Disorder Services and Tribal Economic Development. My name is Kiara Mattresino with Kauffman and Associates, and I will manage the logistical support for this Zoom session. At the bottom of your screen, you will find a series of icons. If you have any questions throughout today's session, please use the chat function, and we will address your questions either by chat or during the Q&A section at the end of the presentation. If you would like to speak aloud to ask your questions during the Q&A, please use the raise hand function under Reactions. Finally, please be aware that today's session is being recorded. Closed captioning is available by clicking the CC function. If you need technical assistance during the session, please type the issue into the chat box and one of our techs will address it as soon as possible. Without further ado, I would like to introduce today's facilitator and monitor for their introductions and warm welcome. Tanya, take it away. Hi, everyone. My name is Tanya Tavares. I use she, her pronouns, and I just want to thank you for being with us today. Hope everyone here is here in good spirits. I am a product director for the SAMHSA-funded Opioid Response Network, and I'm based in Rhode Island on Nipmuc ancestral lands. I have two wonderful daughters, and my youngest is about to be three, and my oldest is about to be seven and a half, so we have a couple of exciting weeks coming up. I'm based here at Brown University, and I am really excited to be here today, and I'm excited to introduce to you Kenneth, who is going to be doing our cultural opening. So, if you could go to the next slide. So, Kenneth Hanover Sr., he's from the Round Valley Tribe. He is a father, a grandfather, and a husband, and he has years of lived experience in addiction and growing up and living on the Round Valley Indian Reservation. Kenneth is a certified substance use disorder counselor with 10 years of experience helping his Native community navigate the journey to wellness and sobriety, and he works for Kauffman Associates and as a Northern California Native community advisor, and Kenneth will be leading us today, like I said, in our cultural opener. So, Kenneth, take it away. Thank you, Tanya. Good morning or afternoon, everybody. I hope today finds you in good spirits. I'm going to switch it up today a little bit. I usually open up with a prayer of gratitude, because for us alcoholics and addicts in recovery, you're just grateful to be here. So, prepping for this meeting, real quickly, I'm going to give you a little story on culture here. Prepping for this meeting, I met with my co-teammates, Terrence and Twyla yesterday, and we were prepping for the meeting, and he was asking me about the cultural opener, and Terrence made a statement. He said, hey, I'm like a sponge. I'm just here to soak up everything and learn anything culture, and that gave me a little flashback in 2012 when I entered into sobriety and my own culture, learning and understanding and being a part of that. So, as I was in the lodge, I was having trouble with the prayer and the smudging. You know, I was all brand new to it. You know, I'm 45 years old. I don't know what I'm doing. So, our spiritual leader there, our sweat lodge leader there, kept asking me about two or three weeks every day how I was doing with that, and I said, I'm still struggling. I don't know. You know, I just plain don't know what to do. So, he gave me a printout one day of this very simple but meaningful prayer, and he said, here, do this in the morning for a while until you start feeling comfortable with yourself and your spirituality and your cultural connection. So, I did. For like six months, I said this little prayer. So, when Terrence said that yesterday, it gave me a flashback of my own trials and tribulations I have going on right now, and this is where the culture comes in. You know, I keep smudging and praying every morning, asking the Creator for strength and guidance on this. You know, I mean, we all have our trials and tribulations, even in the recovery. You know, it's not all peaches and cream. So, when Terrence said that, I went and dug out this prayer, and what I needed to hear is sometimes, you know, in this very, very difficult, frustrating work we do in Indian country and serving our people can get very frustrating, and sometimes, you know, just I don't know. You all know what the word I'm looking for. We just get beat down. Sometimes we just need to get back to basics, Native American 101, why we came here, how we started, and what are we doing here today, because we are the ones that made the conscious decision and come into serving our people and with wellness and well-briety in Indian country. So, I had to thank Brother Terrence for bringing me that message. I believe that's what I needed to hear, and about culture. I'm a firm believer in culture is life and spirituality, and I believe that was my message. So, here's me getting back to Native American 101, and this is the very first prayer I started out with to help me along my way. May your hands be cleansed that they create beautiful things. May your feet be cleansed that they might take you where you most need to be. May your heart be cleansed that you might hear its message clearly. May your throat be cleansed that you might speak rightly when words are needed. May your eyes be cleansed that you might see the signs and wonders of this world. May this person in space be washed clean by the smoke of those fragrant plants, and may that same smoke carry our prayers spiraling up into the heavens. Thank you. Oh, mataki ase. Send it back to Tanya. Thank you for that. I really feel like I enjoyed hearing the process of how you got to your opening today, and it really resonated with me, and hopefully the same for others. I'm going to briefly review the agenda with us today, and just kind of go through a few of the ORN housekeeping slides coming up here. We'll go through ORN and the Indigenous Communities Response Team so you get a sense of who we are, and we will be talking through engaging tribal leaders, linking substance use disorder services, and tribal economic development. Dr. Veronica Sanchez is going to walk us through that. We will also then follow that up with caring for our relatives and sharing out, and Tony Hillary from the Lummi Nation Tribe is going to do that. He's their tribal chairperson. We'll get to your questions and answers, and I know we do have the Q&A chat function there, and that will be monitored, and then we'll talk through how ORN can help you should you need training, technical assistance, anything like that. We also have a webinar survey link that we would like you to consider taking for us. It's really important for us in terms of not only knowing how we're doing in serving you but also to help us to continue to get our funding to provide our services free of charge, and then we will leave you with the future webinar topics and our closeout. Next slide. Okay. So, just to lead us off with some acknowledgments, we are funded by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration to do this work for the Opioid Response Network, which is a national network, and so the general disclaimer that, you know, what we say here is not necessarily reflective of or implying any endorsement by the U.S. Government. Next slide. So, a little bit about who we are. We are a network that's providing technical assistance, training, education, and pretty much dissemination of best practices to enhance prevention, treatment, recovery, and harm reduction efforts. As I mentioned before, we do this all at no cost, and we're aiming to have the training and consultation be filling gaps that you've identified or defined, and we assist states, tribes, urban Native organizations, cities and communities, and individuals providing culturally responsive education and training to address opioid crisis, stimulant use crisis, and other disorders, and I did see in the chat that Tony is not here today, so thank you for letting us know. I'm sorry for that. Next slide. Okay. So, through the Opioid Response Network and our Indigenous Communities Response Team, we are working to support you and support Native brilliance and support Native community strengths and expertise and Native sovereignty, and we're working to be building local community leads and providing the training and the education at the local level to really try to build that capacity and sustainability going forward once there are, you know, grant funding might not be there. So, one of the core things you want to do is you want to be building your capacity to carry this work forward since you're all doing such important work. Next slide. And this here is our Indigenous Communities Response Team. Each state and territory has a designated team lead, and that's your Indigenous Community Response Technology Transfer Specialist, and they are the person who will be your first point of contact if you submit a request to us, and they will work with you to assess your needs and help you to basically define what it is that you need and how we can help you to sort of bridge that gap, and we are here to support requests from all the Tribal Opioid Response Grantees and other Native communities. Next slide. Okay, and this is just a really nice map that's showing you the Indigenous Community Response Team regions and how we kind of break apart where we provide our services and just showing you, you can take a look and see where you are in the region, and that will let you know sort of how you correspond to our ORN service provision. Next slide. Okay, and I think that if anyone knows this, it is Indian Country, but together we can make a difference, and the work that we're doing is important, and the ORN would love to support you in any way we can, so if you have a request for us, please feel free to submit that to us at opioidresponsenetwork.org, and like I said, you will get directly connected with your Indigenous Community Response Team Technology Transfer Specialist. Next slide. Okay, so now we're going to get to the reason why you all came today. I'd love to introduce our presenter, Dr. Veronica Sanchez. She is a DSW and LISW and LCSW, so you can see that she is really committed to the work that she's doing. She was born and raised in northern New Mexico, and she brings 19 years of experience to her work with tribal communities in the Southwest, and with her direct service and leadership skills, her deep commitment to community-based programming and cross-disciplinary practices, she's working to address and help people address the opioid epidemic in tribal communities with culturally relevant and effective strategies through the ORN Indigenous Communities Work Group. Dr. Sanchez's extensive background in clinical practice, administrative roles, and higher education equips her to approach challenges with an understanding of the unique needs and strengths of those communities, and she's going to walk us through our presentation today. So, Dr. Sanchez, please take it over. Thank you. Thank you. Good morning, or good afternoon, everybody that's on today. Ken, thank you so much for that beautiful cultural opening, and thank you, Tonya, for that introduction, and I also want to thank all of you that are here today with us that took your time to be here today. I know our schedules are always heavily packed, and so much appreciation for everybody that's joining today. Before we get started, I want to acknowledge and thank everybody that I've worked for and with, and that I work with currently, and those that I have worked with in the past. It's because of these experiences and learning that I've been very blessed to have that I'm able to share with you all today. I want to preface the presentation by saying that some of the things that we're going to be discussing today may feel very familiar to you, and chances are that you're applying a lot of what we're going to discuss to your work already. However, I find that in my experience, it's very helpful to revisit information often, and as we do that, we can discover new ideas and new ways of integrating and applying new things into our work. So I hope that you guys find this information that I'm going to share helpful, and most of all, that you enjoy the time that we have together to learn with and from one another. So for me, it's always meaningful to be in a space with other people who are doing similar work. So thank you guys once again just for sharing this time with me today. I appreciate it. With that, let's go ahead and get started, and so I want to take a moment for us to revisit the title of our webinar today before we get into the overview. So the title was read as we began, and our title of the webinar today is Engaging Tribal Leaders Linking Substance Use Disorder Services and Tribal Economic Development. For the majority of us that are in attendance today, I'm guessing that we're in the profession of helping people in some capacity in one way or another. We're all working in some sort of various social service capacities, whether that's in behavioral health, case management, prevention, maybe administration and nonprofits, or something within the arena of helping people. And because we are so focused, as we should be, on helping other people, we often don't make the connections of the work that we do to economic development. However, there's really strong linkage that does exist between what we do and the economy of our communities, and many of us are probably very familiar with the term or the concept of social determinants of health, but for those of us that might not be as familiar, I'd like to provide a quick overview and kind of talk about what studies have shown throughout time in terms of social determinants of health, and how studies really link to community wellness when we look at social determinants of health. And so what studies have found is that when certain factors exist in communities, the probability of wellness increases. So as these things exist somewhere, then you have kind of a balance bar of that other things increase as well. So for example, when communities have access, when people have access to things like education, health care, behavioral health, treatment services, exercise, good nutrition, healthy social relationships, culture, when those things are present, then we tend to see that the overall wellness in communities increase. You may be asking, how does all that relate to economic development? Well, it really, really does. And because when our communities are well, when they have access to needed services that you all are part of, they become empowered and mobilized and are able to contribute to economy and be part of the economic development process in our communities. Another key point that I just want to talk about briefly is that when we talk about economic development, it also includes human capital. And so what does that mean? That's really inclusive of how we as people contribute into our communities. We are part of the economy within the communities we live. So all that just to say that your work is very, very important as we look at economic development in our communities. Your work is pivotal in contributing to overall wellness. One more quick example, those who are challenged by substance misuse, when they have access to services, when providers and communities surround them with help and they get better, then they often in turn do the same for others, creating a trickle effect of wellness. And so what you do makes a difference and it matters and it does connect to economic development. So I'm really glad that that's in our title and I just want to take a quick minute and revisit that. And so for our discussion today, we will be focusing on the importance of understanding and getting to know communities, the communities that we're part of or that we're working in, evaluating existing services in those communities, how to utilize best practices when working with tribal leaders, administrators, tribal governance, and then really look at building collaborative relationships and sharing information with leaders about substance use disorders. Next slide. So let's go on ahead and look at what our main goals are for today. So I really believe and I know that every single person that's on this call today and that's here today and has taken the time out, that each and every single person has a very unique skill set. You have knowledge, you have abilities that are very unique and very special. And I really believe that when we share among one another and teach one another, we have the opportunity to strengthen our work throughout the communities across the country. There's people here from all over different areas and I can't wait to learn from you all. I've been really looking forward to this experience. And so our main goal is to interact with each other, share with one another, connect and have fun. So we are going to be having some breakouts. So you don't have to spend all the time listening to me because I feel like we're going to just be able to cross share so much information that can benefit us all. Next slide, please. So let's talk about approaching our work with the communities that we're working with or that we're going to work with. I find, and maybe you, Sharon, in this experience, but we live in an extremely busy, busy world. Things are constantly moving very fast. We're bombarded with emails and phones and meetings and personal and professional tasks that have to be accomplished. And sometimes because of those things, it creates a very busy, like we must do now mindset. So we're always in action mode. It feels like things move very quickly. And sometimes we can have expectations placed on us or we place them on ourselves that we have to always be doing things. And if we don't see action based work, then we're not doing things. But I find that, you know, sometimes when we look at our work and we look at our projects, that when we rush into projects and we don't take time to sit back and reflect and think about how are we going to really approach our work, it can be detrimental and maybe we could be more effective or enjoy what we do more. So I would like for us to just take a step back and really look at the foundations of how we approach our work. I kind of have a little analogy and it's from builders, actually, people that build houses or do construction. One of the things that they'll tell you is that when they're building a house, the foundation's like the most critical piece. Because if that foundation, if something's wrong with it, if it's not level, the house is always going to be uneven. You're going to have problems in the walls, the windows. Over time, that house is going to not stand or function as it should. So, you know, right now we're going to transition to some slides that I believe are foundational for how we can approach our work, just sharing different ideas about that. So next slide. So oftentimes, I'm sure you guys are all very familiar with the term strength-based approach. And our world of social services or behavioral health, we talk about that a lot, that we're going to utilize a strength-based approach as we come into what we do. So I would like to take a little bit of time for us to review the key principles and attributes of what is strength-based approach. And so when we look at this, we see that there are five aspects to utilizing a strength-based approach. So this really helps us with our positionality, like before we even go and start doing anything, like how do we approach the things that we do? So let's step back a quick minute and go to the definition. And so when we're utilizing a strength-based approach, we're really focusing on acknowledging and using the inherent strengths, the strengths that exist, the resources, acknowledging the capabilities of individuals and communities, rather than looking at problems and deficits. You know, it sounds so simple and it's so beautiful, but it's really hard to do because we live in a problem-based society and this might be different for everybody, but I know that a lot of the work I've done throughout my career, you know, unfortunately, we talk about problems a lot and we have to, in order to address them. We can't pretend that they're not there, they are there, but at the same time, that can lead us to highlighting or seeing those problems and they can overshadow sometimes the way that we think about the good things that are happening. So if we're utilizing a strength-based approach, it's kind of shifting our mind frame and really trying to overshadow the problems with the things that are going really well. So that's the definition and let's look at the principles and attributes of how then would we utilize a strength-based approach. So we have empowerment here. So when we work with communities and in communities, we really want to encourage self-determination and that community growth by building on existing strengths that already exist. So self-determination, meaning that people have, and they should, have autonomy and ideas and ways of things that they want to see, how they want things done, and that we're respectful of that and we help to build that up. Secondly, the positive focus. We really want to focus on what's strong rather than what's wrong. What is strong in those communities with the people, the individuals that you're working with, the leadership, the governance, rather than looking at things that might not be so well or working so well. Collaboration, really looking at how do we build partnerships? How do we create shared decision making? And then respect, really, that we value the knowledge, skills, and contributions of everybody that's involved. And oftentimes we have people that we're working with. They may be family members. They may be parents, people with lived experience, providers, both tribal and non-tribal. And it's very important for us to keep in mind that everybody has something to contribute and that everybody has something very important to share. And last but not least, of course, resilience. And so really looking at how people are resilient and really work and cope with challenges and how we utilize our strengths to increase resilience. Next slide. So that's the overall strength-based approach. Now, again, we're building our foundation here and we're thinking about how we approach everything that we do. So when we're working specifically in tribal communities, we want to make sure that we're respecting and incorporating traditional knowledge, practices, and values. And so also building on the community's history, their identity, and cultural strengths, and that we're promoting self-reliance and sustainability. One thing, a lot of my work focuses on workforce issues. And one of the things that we often see is a fluctuation in people that come and go to provide services in all communities. We're seeing that across the country. So when we go out and work and we're utilizing a strength-based approach, how do we really promote the sustainability of what we're doing? It's great that we bring our knowledge and our gifts and the things that we've, the things we know, but how do we make sure that we're creating and promoting self-reliance and sustainability from a community context so that if we leave or move or do something different, that all of the programming doesn't go with us, but that that community is sustainable with whatever the projects or works that have been started. And then encouraging leadership and active participation from community members. And so when we're working in a strength-based approach, that means that we are inclusive and that we encourage other participation from leadership, administrators, governance, and such. Next slide, please. So now we're going to switch gears a little bit to communication. I like to talk about this because I feel like we know these things, but sometimes the things that we know are harder to do than just talk about them. And so it's good to revisit because we know that with communication, the more effective our communication is or the healthier our communication is, the more we're able to accomplish and the more that we're able to work with others. So I just want to take a quick minute to look at some of the attributes and things that just friendly little reminders of before we even communicate, how we can just take a moment, a step back and think like, am I doing these things or how can I do these or can I teach my team these things? That sort of thing. So active listening, meaning that when we're in a space with anybody that it's really important to pay full attention to the speaker. Again, these are so simple, but I find that simple things tend to be pretty profound. We're busy at any given moment. We're probably receiving numerous texts. We're probably receiving emails. And so that happens sometimes when people are talking with us or when we're in meetings. And that really distracts us from full, active, effective communication. So active listening, paying attention to that speaker, being able to acknowledge their message, which does mean we'd have to listen and respond thoughtfully. Not being quick with the response, but maybe sometimes taking a minute to think through what's the best way for us to respond thoughtfully to what you just heard. Open ended questions. Instead of asking things that'll just. You'll get a yes or no to it's very helpful in relationship building to ask open ended questions instead of maybe, for example, asking was the educational event that we hosted, did you like it? That's going to probably give you a reply of a yes or no versus. How did you like the educational program that we put on? That's going to leave the door open for somebody to really share their experience and really think about what were those aspects of that programming that they actually did benefit from or enjoy. Thirdly, we look at cultural sensitivity. And so really being aware and respectful of cultural norms. And we know that every community is different. So this looks different in all communities and practices within our communications. And so being aware of that is very important. And then having clarity, being able to communicate clearly and avoid jargon or technical language. I think in our sometimes as professionals, we forget this one. Even in written materials or those sort of things is that we can use acronyms and we get so good at what we do that sometimes we can have our own language and other people we don't realize that they might not understand it. They might not understand what we mean. And so if we can avoid jargon and just be simple and clear, that helps for other people, because sometimes people will not tell you that they don't know what you're talking about or what you mean. And just being simple and clear is always pretty helpful and effective communication. And then silence for respect. I love that silence is actually a part of communication because sometimes I believe that silence can be misconstrued. So some people believe that if somebody is silent, that maybe they're not paying attention or they could be disinterested or not engaged. But actually, silence can be very active and it is part of communication. And so to respect somebody's silence is very, very important because chances are that they are thinking quite a bit and processing information. And we all have different ways of communicating. Next slide, please. All right, so these ones are pretty cool, because I think when we think of communication, we probably think of the things that we were looking at in the prior slide. But part of communication is how do we do our work in communities? How do we do our work with our tribal leaders, our administrators, tribal governance? And so these three things are pretty cool. You know, it's very important to keep communities updated, regular updates, being consistent and transparent with communication because we get busy too. Sometimes it's easy to start an initiative or work on one project and then we kind of get busy with something else and maybe drop off the map a little bit. And, you know, sometimes that can be very difficult for a community because then they don't stay informed or they don't stay up to date on what's going on. And then all of a sudden we pop back up and, you know, to keep people engaged keeps people. It helps with the relationship not only that you can develop with community, but it also helps for them to stay engaged with the conversation, especially when we're talking about things like substance use disorders or substance misuse. We're in communication. I know that many of you guys probably utilize these things because I work with a lot of programs that do incredible work in terms of newsletters and emails, utilizing different types of documentations to share information. But, you know, that is a way of communication, those newsletters, keeping people just informed of what you're doing and then community meetings. I think this is important, whether you have coalitions, task force or just informal, but thinking about ways before you approach the work to maybe different ideas of how you'll share updates or get other input. But this is really including community and stakeholders into the work that we do. Next slide, please. All right. So, like I said, when we started is I really appreciate and thank you all for sharing this space today. And I want to learn from you guys. I know that everybody else wants to learn from you as well. We each come with so much knowledge and so many things that we all can benefit from. And most of all, the work and the communities that we serve. So one of the things I like to do in our breakout is just kind of see what you're thinking is on approaching communities, using a strength based approach, having that as our foundation. Have you used that in your own work or could you use it? Have you seen it be effective or helpful in communities? Just whatever your thoughts are. When we talk about that, when we talk about communication, what methods have you seen to be helpful with the things that you do? Because I know my list was pretty short and it's pretty common, you know, the basics, but I bet there's things that others can benefit that you've done. So let's go on ahead and take time to. All right, well, I think we're all back. That felt fast. I don't know. I'm like, how does five minutes go so quickly? Anyhow, so let's go on ahead and if each person that was assigned to kind of be the lead in the room can just unmute and share what was discussed, that would be super helpful. I can go first for our group. One of the things that we talked about was the communication methods that have been helpful in our work and how that has changed in a post-COVID, post-pandemic era. We talked about the use of telecommunications increasing has been effective, especially for people who are working remotely, who are now able to have sort of increased access to other folks on their team or other people in organizations that they're meeting with to make their meetings more effective in terms of like the number of people you can reach and how often you can have meetings, where in person if you had to drive or you had to leave space in between, you can be a little bit more effective in your day being able to hop on meetings virtually. And we talked about how to be making sure these virtual meetings are still, you know, interactive and still have that sort of feeling of connection the way an in-person meeting would. We also talked about strength-based approaches, really being kind of foundational in providing culturally responsive services and understanding the people that we're serving and working with, understanding what their needs are and sort of how they got to be where they are by using strength-based approaches within our communities. Thank you. Thank you. That is very helpful. And I see Jonna on the picture here. Yes. So we had great discussion. It was mentioned that like how great it is to have the strength-based approach framed this way, because a lot of things, including especially funding, can be focused on a deficit model. And so the strength-based approach kind of resets that from the problem-based and deficit-based conversation. And so from there, it went on to discuss conversation. So how we use strength-based approach to communicate with our communities, to speak to them. It's important to have this so that our communities can see things better instead of just always seeing the problems that are out there and also to help envision for their communities, you know, something better. And then also there was some comments on optimistic view that the strength-based approach brings to the table. So it was a great conversation. And then I see Twyla. I believe that you were in a group. I was. We had a good conversation. The time went by really fast as well. I feel like we were trying to, you know, cram for more time, but we had good discussion and we had folks also share. I like the way it was framed. It was persistent, gentle communication. Also considering how to communicate effectively when programs are not physically operating under one roof. So there was an example of their program staff being under the umbrella or in the same location as the government program, but the program itself and the services were in another location. So thinking about the nuances of programmings, you know, across tribal communities where they might not be housed in the same location as services and how do you communicate effectively when, you know, there's space in between. So that was some of the takeaway, but I wish we had more time, but good discussion. Thank you. That's great. I see Emily on. I'm not sure. Were there others that had a group, a breakout? Yeah, I went to it and we barely got to graze through the topics, but we mainly talked about the first question or point. And we basically just all agreed of the power of the strength-based approach and that it instills hope and a whole different perspective rather than focusing on like what's wrong or not working. Several people shared about like clinical work and how it's really helpful with individual levels work, but we didn't really get to the beyond that, but it was still, you know, agreement that it is very powerful. Awesome. Thank you. Was there another group that I'm missing? We had a group. Our group, everything went by so quickly, so we didn't have a lot of time to go over the topics. But we all kind of agreed that starting with a resilience or a strength-based approach is really vital in all the work that we do, even though we're all kind of working in different roles or in different sectors. It's something we all bring into our work. Great. Well, thank you. That's really awesome. And time is the thing, right? But one of the neat pieces here is that you all, with your individual programs, can take this back. And, like, sometimes that's just so helpful to reflect because of time, and we don't get a lot of it. And so just kind of thinking with your team, like, how do we do this? How do we shift? It can be healthy, and we don't have time today to go over some of it. But, you know, it's self-care for us, too, because for us as providers to always be thinking about the things that maybe don't go so well or the problems that exist, you know, we internalize all of that. And so sometimes being able to shift that and, like, really focus on those things that are working really well can also be a form of self-care to us and help us to enjoy our work and our day and really be a little bit creative and innovative in the things that we do. So, okay, let's go on ahead and shift to the next slide. So our starting place. Man, you guys can see I take a lot of time before I actually do something. So we're still not at the place of actually jumping into our work. There's our foundation. So now, you know, we're ready to kind of delve a little bit more. But I really want to just take that time to think about what are some of the things that we need to consider before we go into community? Can it help with the work that we will be doing? And really taking time to learn about the communities that we're serving. So, again, this is still things that we do before we jump into the initiatives or maybe the goals that you may have set forth or the activities that you're going to do. So next slide, please. All right. So the importance of learning about communities. Like, this is critical. We all want to be effective and successful in what we do. We want to provide the best services that we can. So I'm going to go over just a few things that I have found helpful. And, again, so many thanks to people that have been so willing to teach me and that I've been so fortunate to learn from and how these things actually can work and make a difference. And so before we even step into our work, it's really good and helpful to understand and learn about the community that we're going to be serving in. And that's even if we're from that community. Or maybe we've worked in different communities before, different leaderships. We might know about governance. But every community is so different and unique. I know that all of you guys know that. But just as a reminder that not all communities are the same. So things to look at are things like population size, like really getting to know who makes up the community. What are the languages spoken? What is the government structure? Many are very different. All of them are different. Cultural traditions, such as, like, arts and food. But I want to jump real quick back to that population size and kind of give examples of why I believe that it's helpful in what we do. Looking at things like maybe you want to find out what are the number of youth in that community? What are the number of adults? What are the number of older adults? That can really be helpful before you start your work. Because if you find that there's a large population of youth, maybe that'll change the way you do programming. Maybe you gear a lot of your information, a lot of your research on that population size. One of the things that I find, I do a lot of local evaluation. And what we have seen over the years is that the age group between 18 and 24 tend to be hard to engage. So, you know, we talk a lot about why. What are the reasons? What are the factors? And then how can we engage? You know, probably because they're in college. They're busy. There's all kinds of numerous reasons. But knowing population, it's good for us to know because we should if we're serving a community. We should know the community. It helps us to build trust. It helps us to build relationships. And it really shows respect. But on top of that, it really does help us to be more impactful and to be more effective in what we do. Because we can actually have, like, targeted initiatives and understand it from those different perspectives. Next slide, please. So, here we look at how we evaluate or look at different services that exist in a community. And one of my favorite things to do is mapping. I absolutely love, I call it mapping, just for lack of a better word. But really it's helpful to really find out what services exist. And when we say this in community, we're talking tribal and non-tribal. Because a lot of the communities that we work with or serve, there are other entities that folks are receiving services from that are outside of the community. And it's very important that we have a good understanding of who those folks are, what services do they provide, how do people feel about those services. Just a basic understanding of what does that look like. So, here, just some examples is what schools exist, what health clinics, what hospitals, how do people receive emergency services, things like support groups. I think, like, the schools, health clinics, like, we kind of get that. Those are big things. But sometimes we forget, like, support groups that are both formal and non-formal. Different behavioral health services, coalitions, task force. Like, really trying to see what's happening here. Who's doing what? How are they doing it? Are people receptive? Like, what's going on? And so, I put in the mapping part, just because for me, I tend to like visual. I'm like a visual learner. So, I like to just kind of put it out there. And then, again, not only is it helpful for us, but in my opinion, it's also helpful as we develop our programming. Like, when we finally step into that work, then we know what's there and how to better serve and connect. And, you know, it also helps us to collaborate and coordinate and support each other, because now we know what actually exists. Next slide, please. So, understanding governance and leadership in communities, and this includes our administrators of different programs. I find that it's very helpful to understand what that structure is, what makes up the governance. And then also, like, what I think is really important is chain of command. Like, really understanding who do we go to if we want to start maybe a new initiative. You saw in our prior slides, it talked about the importance. Like, when we're using a strength-based approach, that means that we're engaging leadership. That means that we're engaging our stakeholders. But we also have to be mindful that when we do that, there's probably a process in place of how we communicate, who we communicate with, where do we start. And, again, all of this is kind of funny and cool, because it's all interrelated. So, when we do these things, we're actually, like, enforcing that strength-based approach, using effective communication. So, it all kind of works hand in hand. But, yeah, the chain of command is really important. And then also, who are the tribal program administrators? And when we think of this, again, there can be consortiums that are providing services. And, again, people may be different entities that are non-tribal, like corporations that may be providing service. Who are those administrators? Who are your leaders that are going to really be overseeing the processes and that you want to bring into the work that you're doing, so that then it can triple down to the folks that you're working with or serving? And so, if willing and appropriate, if you do build that relationship with tribal leadership or administrators, if they're willing and if it's appropriate to share, because sometimes it just might not be and that's okay. But what are their ideas for program development? And this really also goes back to economic development. What do they see? What do they envision in terms of the work that you're doing? Oftentimes, when you do build a healthy relationship with leadership, there's ideas and thoughts. Would they like to see in the future recovery center? Would they like to see maybe infrastructure? What are the things that are important to them? And that really does matter for sustainability and the work that we do, because I am sure that so many people on this call today have experience and expertise, maybe in grant writing and program development. And so, you can really be a vital resource to help to build those things and help with the economy within the communities that you're serving. Next slide. All right. So, this one, here we go. We come back to each other. So, now let's go on ahead and break out again. And here, please share about how you feel, like, what are your thoughts about learning about communities and programs? Like, should we take all the time to do the things we just went over, like to pause and learn before we jump into our work? And is it helpful? I really, the second piece to me is really important, because I think, you know, sometimes it's like we don't build the connections, because we're so busy. But really, does this stuff, like, if we take the time to do all this, does it change outcomes? Is there like a correlation between those things and what we see happen? And is there a connection to sustainability? Like, when we take the time to do that, is there some connection there to sustainable programming? And then these two, like, one thing that you've done to work with leadership that has worked very well, and maybe something that you have, like, don't do this. I'm interested in that, because I always like to know, like, what I should not do and be aware of. So let's go ahead and break out, and then we'll come back. Okay, great. Well, we're all back. If we can do the same thing that we did the last time, a share out of what we talked about. And let's see, I see Jillian on the top of my screen. I'm not sure if you were a lead in a room. I was not a lead in the room. I was in the main room. Oh, sorry. Okay, let's see, Jonna. Yeah, again, it was great conversation. There was a discussion on the emphasis of connection and mapping highlighted that because what we end up with is duplication rather than connecting and strengthening what's already there. So I thought that was a really great point. Also, the importance of knowing the demographics and the targeted messages, like who are we serving, even within the same tribal communities, you may have your individual communities out there and they're differing from one another. We also had a tribal leader in the room. So one of the do nots when working with leadership to share was do not tell us what to do, but to walk through that process with us. And so I thought that was very poignant. Thank you. Yes, very helpful. And I see Twyla. I was in the room with Terrence and maybe I'll lean to Terrence. Oh, because you did our discussion and may come back. Oh, I was just going to lean on you. No, I think it was a really amazing conversation. And then we learned from our last little breakout, you know, really speed into it, get into it. But the conversation was kind of really recognizing how in tribal communities, we have small tight knit communities, and we have large communities, depending on which reservation or where you're located, urban center and how you're working in those. But it was also having relationships, building relationships with leadership and how that takes time while also those that are coming back into community are coming back into their culture or identity. How are they building those relationships? And a lot of that was, you know, really getting down to just outreach, going into these community functions, being a part of what is happening. So just allowing yourself to build those bridges with community, while also engaging with leadership at the same time. So you're building this kind of circle. And I believe we all kind of touched up on those talking parts. Thank you. Thank you so much for that. And I see Chelsea, did you have a breakout? I did, yes. So we talked about learning about communities, making sure that you're really aware and you know, current and previous traumas that have happened and that your communities might be dealing with. It's also really important to be mindful and aware and respectful of different political structures. So as I think one of our TTSs already mentioned, all of our communities are in different locations, going through different things and have very different political structures, depending on where they're at. So knowing the ins and outs of that are really vital. And then we did talk about a couple do nots. One of our big do nots was do not assume that people are experiencing or understanding the same thing that you are. And then our other one was always, or it's always good to ask permission before going in and doing something. So those were our two big do nots. Awesome. Thank you. And was there another breakout that I'm missing? Yeah, we had a breakout. This is Tanya. And we talked through that we do feel it's important and helpful to learn about the communities and the programs that we're serving and that we do agree that this can change outcomes and connect with sustainability and really like support sustainability. But only if it's done right and there are the resources in place to support what you're finding in the community. Because we've we talked about an instance in a small tribe where they've identified a need and they have something they're trying to bring forth. Leadership wants them to do it and verbally supports them. But then the resources and the structure isn't necessarily there to put that into action and put that into place. So, you know, there's a caution against, you know, having this kind of conversations with the communities and looking what do you need and how can we help you and not necessarily being able to follow through the afterwards with that help. We still think there's value to asking the question so that you know, but we want to strengthen the ability to actually follow through and make the changes that we're hearing as a need in the community. We also talked about the importance of trying to meet at least monthly in a big scale with the organizations and with, you know, the communities to just talk about who is doing what, how they're doing it, what capacity they have. And then this allows people as providers, if you have folks come to you with a certain need that you're not able to meet at that time, you know what's happening in the community around them, around you, and you know how to link people into care so that you're taking intentional steps to break down silos by way of communicating with the community and the programs around you. Yeah, awesome. That was a great discussion and thank you for sharing all of that and I know that everything everybody shared will be mindful of as we go back into the work that we're doing. So next slide please. So here we go. This is like a subset of the prior section, but it's considerations for how we actually engage. So we're going to just take it a step further and think about things that can be helpful for us to be mindful of as we think about the previous information that we've gone over. So next slide please. All right, so let's get a little bit deeper. One of our primary focuses today is working with leadership and administrators and governance. And so we've talked a bit and you guys have had discussions in the breakouts about approaching tribal governance and have very helpful suggestions. And the second bullet point actually came up in what you guys shared out in terms of seeking and obtaining proper permissions. So sometimes when we're utilizing best practice, it's important to know in our programming before we start doing what we're going to do. Do we need permissions? And it's always helpful to let others know and share what it is that we're doing and really understand if those things are needed. And sometimes leaning on people that are either already working in community or from the community can be very helpful to understand what's the best way for you to go about doing the activities that you're supposed to be doing. And then looking here, here comes communication again. And here we're looking at what is the most effective strategy for communicating with leaders. So is that verbally, you know, is it written communication? Also in terms of permissions, like to think about is it helpful to have like a written type of communication with those permissions or not? And I'll tell you, I'll give you an example. So I work in the Southwest. And one of the pieces with a lot of the communities that I work with is that the leadership and tribal governance changes every single year. And so, for example, a project may start maybe mid time of that or the activities or initiatives are just getting off the ground. And so you may have some verbal permission or start doing that work. And then in the middle of that, you know, governance can switch or change. And so then it can be very helpful if you gain these permissions and you have that in writing for the next governance to see or to share that information with them so that a lot of times that can help with the continuation of work and kind of not having to start from step one again. So that's just one example. And I know that every single community is different, so it'll look different. But really thinking about these things before actually starting the work can be really beneficial and just help like once you do start doing what you do, like really propelling it forward. And so when we utilize these things, then our services are more successful, especially when thinking about substance use disorders. A lot of times people have a lot of thoughts around that. And it's very important just to bring people alongside the work or help to share that information. All right. So developing collaborative relationships and providing education. So when we look at this, in order to collaborate with somebody, they have to understand and know and have an idea of what we're doing and co-contribute. And so it's really helpful for us to think about, like, what type of education are we going to actually give to the leaders? Because it might look very different. So the education, like I work with a lot of prevention teams, people that do case management, behavioral health, and education is always a primary piece of what we do, right? But sometimes, like, does that education look different when we're going to go out to community versus when we're going to work with leaders? So just to be mindful that kind of one size fits all sometimes doesn't work. You might want to think about, like, what type of information specifically would be helpful for the leaders, for the governance administrators. Sometimes the information they need might be a little bit different than what it will be for a community. The other thing is, how will we address stigma? Also knowing and doing research about, like, how does the community feel about these issues, about substance use disorders, about substance misuse? What are the thoughts and what are the beliefs around that? And really, that will help us to look at how we might develop our plans to address any stigma that exists. And so really here, the key word, I think, in all of this is partnership, developing partnership, and being mindful about how we approach doing these things to create a supportive environment. Next slide, please. All right, this is the last breakout. We're getting close to closing up here. But let's go in. And one thing that can happen is that, like, we talked about gaining proper permissions. And sometimes in our work, because we're so excited about what we're doing, or we're working under grants, and we have all of these deliverables that we feel have to be met, and we're just in rush scenarios for whatever reason, it can be frustrating when we have to wait. And the timelines might not work the way that we maybe anticipated them to. There might be a lot of pressure. And so it can be very frustrating when things take longer than usual. And maybe even getting in to get to know leadership, that might take a little bit longer than what you anticipated. So two ideas that you use to manage when things do take longer than usual, and then two strategies, like it's important to bring people together. Again, the key word in that last slide was partnership. And so what strategies have you used to bring people together for a similar cause, especially things like substance misuse prevention? Sometimes that's not easy to talk about, intervention or treatment. And so how do you bring people together at a like cause? So let's break out, and then we'll come back and share out and finish up our last couple slides. Okay, perfect. So we are all back and we'll go through that same process so we can all learn from one another. Twyla. Oh, wait, were you with Terrence again? Yeah, I can share on our behalf. We had great discussion so I'll make it quick. We had a really good thought and reframing. So just checking when we are frustrated is probably also coming from a place of deep investment and caring. So just how do we reframe our frustration because we are putting so much time and care into this work. So just acknowledging that we are probably frustrated also out of, you know, we're caring for our communities. Another piece we talked about of strategies of bringing people together is planning way in advance and being mindful about other cultural events or programming that may be happening that can also pull in folks. And I gave a good example that this past spring, I attended the conference in Albuquerque, one of the health board conferences, but they planned it during the state championship game. So I'm like, oh, this is maybe why they did it because they're going to get a huge attendance because all of us Natives are coming in for basketball. So it was such a good turnout. So the health board, I think, was strategic in that way. So just thinking about way down the road and Terrence brought a good example too. He was like around NFR season, you know, everyone might take leave. So just being mindful about how we're bringing people together in strategic ways and how we're planning around that in advance. Thank you. That's awesome. I love that. That is a great way. I wouldn't have thought of that a basketball game or state tournaments. That's good. Okay, Tanya. Yeah. So our team, similarly with Twyla's reframe on, you know, the frustration is really an expression of how much you care and how much you're trying to move this forward. And we talked about a couple of ways to manage that is one of the ways is knowing when to step back from the thing that's frustrating you and kind of create some of those, bring in some of those protective factors from yourself. And focus on some of the things that are not obstructed that you can move forward that are still advancing your cause or your mission or serving your community. We also talked about the importance of really documenting your efforts to try to move things forward so that you can show if ever needed like, okay, I continue to do what I could do. And I've done all the things that are within my control to do to move this forward and that how just kind of doing that can help, you know, okay, I'm doing what I can. And I'm doing the best that I can. And it's okay. And, you know, that's enough. At this point, we also talked about for bringing people together, we talked about hosting events and things that kind of draw people in. And one of the examples was giving, doing a backpack giveaway and the backpack had some harm reduction supplies or overdose prevention supplies, clothing, things like that. And they had put flyers out saying they were doing this and that helped them to involve the community, but it also brought to their attention when, when a youth came and said they were looking for a backpack for school that they were missing a need in that community that they didn't know. And they were able to connect with the community organizations to say, hey, there are youth who need school supplies and backpacks and they were able to put an event together to meet that need as well. So they found and identified a need in the community. They also realized that the way that they were marketing their events was not necessarily reflecting what exactly they were doing or who it was for. So it helped to inform how they can market their events in the future. Awesome. Thank you so much. And Jonah? Yeah, so focusing on what we can do instead of what we can't do, moving forward on what we can do. So I thought that was a great mantra he said that he used on how to manage some of the frustration and stay focused. Community meeting. So strategy to bring people together. Community meetings to discuss topic. The challenge is getting people to show up. But they did have a meeting on like the opiate settlement funds and had to grain feedback from the community on how to spend those. And also communicating with the stakeholders and getting their input. So not all the community stakeholders always get involved. And so making sure that they're involved. Focus on learning and growing growth versus just focusing on the problem. Like if there's a lesson there, even if there's some struggles. Have food, which is huge in Native communities. So that's how you're going to get anybody together is to have food. Community meetings, coalitions, making it easy as possible for people to attend. So that might mean having it also held by Zoom. And then the question of who's the messenger. So is the person you're bringing in to communicate. Do they have the facilitation skills. Can they be objective and can they be helpful to those that they are serving. Perfect. Thank you. Are we missing anybody. I know that we're here right about time and I apologize. I have a thing when time I kind of get caught in the moment and and forget to look at the clock. But anything else from anybody. If not, I will turn it back to our facilitator. Thank you. So I think at this point, we would like. Are we going to open it up for any questions. Has anything come in that questions folks have you can either put it in the chat. I don't think I see any in the chat at the moment. You can also just raise your hand. Okay. So, that comment you made about sitting in silence, that's something I'm still working on. I think there's a lot of really good information to process here for folks, so it's okay if you don't have questions at this time. We just want to close by letting you know how ORN can support you and some of the ways that we can support you. We can provide you with consultation for implementing treatment and recovery services, prevention services. We can help you if you are looking to put forth harm reduction practices in your community. We can help with you on topics around training tribal leaders and tribal council and communities about reducing barriers to treatment, trauma-informed care practices, building culture into clinical practice, anti-stigma education. Really what we can help you with is working with your identified need or gap and working with you to best understand and prioritize what do we need to do, what does our community have the capacity for, the people that we're trying to train, and what are we looking for, and we'll help you to kind of build out what that training, what that education looks like, and we will bring it to you at no cost. We just want to support you in connecting your programs with your materials and your curriculum and things like that that are rooted in indigenous culture and that are really being responsive to you and your community needs. Next slide. And again, we're here for you. These resources and our team, we are at no cost to you for the education, training, and consultation services that we can provide, and we're working to enhance efforts addressing opioid and stimulant use disorders primarily, and like I said earlier, we have consultants and we have technology transfer specialists in every state and territory to deploy across the spectrum of services, and you can just submit a request to us at any time at the opioidresponsenetwork.org. There will be a big button in the right-hand corner at the top, and we will be in touch with you within 24 business hours to learn more about your needs and how we can help you. And just a reminder, if you could take a look at this QR code, sign yourself up for our next webinar, September 26th, and it's Whole Native Substance Use Disorder Treatment Care Examples, so we'll send out invitation links as well, and Twyla just dropped it in the chat for you there. Next slide. And please, please, please take a couple minutes out of your day to fill out our survey. Let us know how we are doing, and just give us some basic demographic information. This will really, really help us to continue to bring the webinars like this, this series, and targeted technical assistance, training, and education to you free of charge, and thank you so much. Next.

Tribal Leaders

Substance Use Disorder

Economic Development

Tanya Tavares

Kenneth Hanover Sr.

Cultural Practices

Recovery Process

Strength-based Approach

Community Demographics

Effective Communication

Tribal Leadership

Opioid Response Network

Stigma