History

Red Feather Development Group’s History of Service in Action

Established in 1994 as a 501(c) (3) tax-exempt, nonprofit organization, Red Feather Development Group was founded by Executive Director Robert Young and his wife, Anita, after becoming aware of the intergenerational poverty and dire housing issues afflicting many American Indian reservations throughout the western United States.

In 1993, Rob was on a business trip in Taos, New Mexico, where he happened to pick up the newspaper, Indian Country Today.  An article explained the tragic story of tribal elders on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota freezing to death due to inadequate housing and the harsh winter conditions prevalent in South Dakota.  He describes that moment as one where he “could no longer simply turn the page,” as we so often do amidst the onslaught of tragic news.  He decided to visit Pine Ridge Reservation, where he saw what some characterize as third world conditions.  

A Harvard study described the devastating personal and family level despair of Pine Ridge this way: “Poverty and unemployment twice the national average; consistently lower educational success than the national norm; alcohol-related mortality rates triple the national average.”  

But Rob also saw something more than those detrimental issues.  He saw rich community assets in the children, families, traditions, and culture that often seemed invisible to our nation and the world.  When he returned home and described the situation to his wife, they both felt a sense of urgency and recognized that they could make a difference in the lives of individuals by building one house at a time.  So in 1995, Rob, Anita and a small group of volunteers (mostly friends) built a home on the Pine Ridge Reservation for Lakota elder Katherine Red Feather.

For the first six years, Red Feather was a seasonal endeavor operated solely by Rob and Anita.  Red Feather built conventional homes, renovated dilapidated houses, and built wheelchair ramps for tribal elders and the disabled.  During that time, Rob sold his business, and Anita left her position with a multi-national corporation to focus their full-time efforts on achieving the goals established for Red Feather Development Group.  In 1999, with the assistance of the University of Washington College of Architecture and Urban Planning, they launched the American Indian Sustainable Housing Initiative.  The initiative combines community development education with sustainable hands-on, volunteer-friendly straw bale home construction as a feasible means for reservation communities to use their own resources to improve the housing issues facing many of their reservations.

The motivation to establish Red Feather came from a belief that healthy homes are the foundation for healthy families and communities.  We also recognized the benefit to American Indian communities that comes from sharing the financial burden of home construction by providing tribal families in need with the expertise in straw bale construction management, education, and volunteer labor.  Each home project became a site for training tribal members and reservation organizations about sustainable solutions to their housing needs.  That initial motivation continues today as Red Feather begins the difficult work associated with community engagement and program transfer, and we look forward to the time that our program not only builds more homes each construction season, but reaches out to more tribal organizations and community leaders who can bring to fruition housing programs of their own.