Jesuit Journeys
Spring/Summer 2006

24 hours at the Mission:
Building on hope one step at a time

By Phil Nero

It’s a little after 9 a.m. on a Wednesday. A Lakota drum song plays on the car radio as Mike Valandra pulls up outside the Icimani Ya Waste Recovery Center at St. Francis Mission on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota. Inside, another radio blares out country lyrics about some honky tonk with “cold margaritas and hot senoritas.” The contrast in music is ironic considering everything about the center is the anti-honky tonk – devoted to 12-step recovery from alcoholism, drug abuse, and all the associated destructive behaviors. In Lakota, the center’s name means the good journey, which Valandra, center director, has been on since August 1998 when “I sobered up more or less to go to prison,” he says candidly. Valandra pleaded guilty to federal charges in July 1999. Among the items he took with him to the penitentiary in Waseka, Minn. was a chanupa (sacred pipe), a gift from a relative in fulfillment of a promise if Valandra could stay straight for a year.

Mary Van Winkle, St. Francis Mission executive director, gets a construciton update outside the new addition to the Icimani Ya Waste Recovery Center from Tony Fryberg, project foreman.

Still, he went to prison angry. After all, he was holding only a pound of pot when he was caught and “I knew guys arrested with a hundred times that amount who were serving less time.” But inside prison he began to understand that being unaccountable for his own mistakes and holding onto his anger would only weaken and embitter his heart, crippling any real hope of a true recovery.

“In prison I saw guys who were sober and happy, and, believe me, it’s hard to stay sober in prison.” So he turned to Alcoholics Anonymous and began working the 12-step program to let the anger go and get control of his life. He also attended bimonthly Native American meetings, where he learned that every Indian in the prison at that time came from his home state of South Dakota. He responded by organizing special AA meetings for Natives-only to make it easier for them to open up about their struggles.

He also started a traditional talking circle that helped the sharing process, and he worked with the prison psychologist to establish additional programs, including one for People in Prison Entering Society (PIPES).

Valandra’s re-entry to society came in January 2003. After working as a forklift operator in Rapid City (he wanted to prove to himself he could live off the reservation) he returned to the Rosebud in December and went to work for his sister driving and repairing propane delivery trucks. That’s when he heard Fr. John Hatcher, SJ, the Jesuit superior for the region, on St. Francis Mission’s radio station KINI talking about starting a recovery center for Native Americans.

Fr. John Hatcher, SJ (above, left) and Fr. Dick Jones, SJ preside at a ceremony to bless the new religious education building on St. Francis Mission in fall 2004. The building was named after Fr. Jones.

“I brought my credentials to Fr. Hatcher. He looked at them and asked, ‘when can you start?’”

The Icimani Ya Waste Recovery Center officially opened its doors Aug. 1, 2004 in Drexel Hall, what was once a dormitory at the old mission boarding school. The school was turned over to the tribe in 1974 and now operates as a public school – Valandra is a 1978 graduate. Drexel Hall was badly damaged by fire in 1994. The remodeling it underwent then makes it suitable for a recovery center today.

Valandra begins most work days with a cup of coffee in the office of mission Executive Director Mary Van Winkle. They update each other and talk about the “exciting changes and great things” she hopes will take place on the mission in the years ahead. A buzz of activities and construction projects seem to support her hopes.

There’s a new religious education building about 70 yards east of the recovery center. An old development building about the same distance to the west is being remodeled into a new administration building. The recovery center itself is getting a new wing with additional meeting space and a recreation area where folks in recovery can gather, visit a library, watch a ball game, or shoot some pool or darts in a safe environment. “Until Fr. Hatcher arrived two and half years ago, we had been struggling to create a new identity,” says Van Winkle. “Programs like religious education that once had been [prominent] were non-existent. And only one new program had started – Body, Mind & Soul, our summer youth program. He had a vision for change. I think he saw in Mike someone who could share his vision for a recovery center for natives who struggle with alcohol and drugs and all hardships and dysfunction associated with addiction.” Accurate figures are hard to find, but it is generally accepted that there is about a 30 percent sobriety rate among Native Americans in South Dakota.

A short time later, Valandra is in the recovery center kitchen brewing a pot of coffee for anyone who might drop by to talk. “We want everyone to know we’re here, and if they have any questions they can ask me. We want to plant the seed of self awareness,” he says. “If they’ve done something or feel some frustration, chances are I’ve done it or felt it, and I’ve got my prison ID to prove it. I was a party hound. I drank it. I smoked it. I sold it, and I got caught with it. I’ve done the hard road and the Red Road. We want to help.” By the Red Road he means living life by traditional Lakota ways and values.

“On the Red Road, if you respect yourself and honor yourself you’ll go a long way. Recovery and the Red Road go together to balance life out in recovery,” Valandra says. “It’s a big part of my life now. Just like the Church is. Just like my native culture is. I believe in balance and balancing all these things helps me bring balance to my life.”

While he encourages people to feel free to drop in, his office is often empty. He’s more likely to be out in the community engaging people or coordinating activities and running meetings. It makes for a full week with some unusual hours.

There’s an AA meeting on Tuesday night. Thursdays he is at the Rosebud Jail conducting a traditional talking circle to help prisoners discuss their problems openly. On Friday nights, the sweat lodge behind the center is often busy. On Saturday mornings anywhere from 20 to 30 people might show up for the 11 a.m. AA meeting. And once every month, usually on a Friday, a medicine man conducts a traditional Lakota Healing Ceremony. It attracts people from both a Mass and a sweat ceremony that conclude at about the same time.

But it’s a Wednesday, and that means four people from Rapid City Catholic Social Services are in town to begin a weekly schedule of complementary programs and services. Social worker Helen Gutierres heads the team of counselors and therapists, which includes Ray Elk Nation, Marcie Pudwill, and Christie Haberman. They stay for two nights and three days providing services for adults and students of all ages – during and after school hours.

Their various works take them to several towns on the reservation, including Spring Creek (where there’s a new afterschool center), Rosebud, Mission, and White River, where there’s a satellite recovery center under the direction of Jim Stands, another Lakota man whose experiences with addiction and the law help him help others.

“Fr. Hatcher has made it easy for us to forget about bureaucracies while we’re here and concentrate on providing services,” Gutierres says. Through grants and other contributions Fr. Hatcher provides the funding for two full-time and two half-time social workers for the three days they’re in town. Gutierres is married and a mother of three children, so her time on the Rosebud comes with a personal price, one she willingly pays in part because her own childhood gave her “a strong awareness of how helpful treatment and counseling can be for at-risk families. I think that’s always in the back of my mind. And I’m a Catholic…. Sometimes God tells you what to do and you do it.”

Jesuit Superior Fr. John Hatcher, SJ teaches a group of children attending Body, Mind, and Soul, a summer youth camp at St. Francis Mission for children ages 8-12. The program’s success relies on volunteer staff, including counselors from two Jesuit universities – Xavier University in Cincinnati and Fairfield University in Connecticut. Faith, self esteem, team building, drug awareness, Lakota culture, and other relevant issues are emphasized.

On this Wednesday evening, God has her conducting an anger management workshop with Valandra. She’s been a social worker for about 20 years, and her education credentials include “enough alphabet soup” after her name that Valandra can count his work with her toward certification as a chemical dependency counselor.

About a dozen men and women show up. When the hour-long meeting ends, one attendee asks if she can participate in what is a rare Wednesday night sweat lodge ceremony. She joins a group inside the tiny lodge where water poured on red-hot stones creates a climate that could cook clams. Sweat falls from bodies as steam, native chants, and prayers fill the air. Souls are bared as an older member of the group confesses he has faltered and taken a drink. A younger man seeks the courage, support, and perseverance to quit alcohol and journey the Red Road. Valandra extends the ceremony long after some choose to leave.

Across the road from the mission, in a double-wide modular home dubbed the Hatcher Hilton, the team from Catholic Social Services settles in for the night. The house is not only their home two nights a week, but also the regular residence of Tom Freece, a retired school teacher from outside Rapid City who works in the mission’s Religious Education Program. When Fr. Hatcher is in town, he stays there as well.

By 11:30 p.m. only Gutierres remains awake, determined to see a DVD of Walk the Line through to conclusion. It’s after midnight before June Carter accepts Johnny Cash’s marriage proposal.

The next morning the common area of the Hatcher Hilton is abuzz with pre-work activities as team members grab breakfast and prepare for a busy Thursday. Late to bed, last to rise – Gutierres joins the group and offers a quick review of the movie to the curious. Conversation shifts to the topic of the show they will record later at KINI, “The Dangers of Inhalants.” Then they all disperse for their day’s work.

Gutierres and Valandra meet briefly before she begins counseling sessions at St. Francis School. Valandra drives a short distance to a local grocery to talk with Mike Whiting, a 26-yearold Lakota man who helps his sister run the store. Also a talented artist, Whiting proudly proclaims his sobriety date – April 13, 2005. He sought out Valandra after police stopped a car Whiting was driving and arrested everyone in it for possession of pot.

“I spent 22 hours in jail. That was enough for me. Weed wasn’t supposed to be a big deal, but we were facing serious charges.” There was more marijuana in the car than Whiting knew. Eventually one of the passengers confessed that the bulk of it was his and charges against the others were reduced or dropped.

“I went right into recovery. I didn’t drink a lot, but I’ve got a five-year-old son who I have custody of, so that takes up a lot of my time,” he says. “I was looking for someplace to sober up and I found it.”

Now Whiting looks forward to when the additions at the recovery center are complete. Besides taking advantage of the 12-step meetings, he likes the idea of having a recreation area and a place for social activities that are drug- and alcohol-free.

Whiting and Valandra say goodbye. Outside the grocery store, as he walks to his car, Valandra urges a young man who’s very late for school to quicken his step. “Go get an education,” he says.

It’s a little after 9 a.m. on Thursday. A Lakota drum song plays on the car radio as Mike Valandra drives to the Rosebud Jail to lead a talking circle for inmates there.