A different kind of Fraternity, a different kind of Spring Break.
April 4, 2004--Over the University of Illinois' Spring Break a group of 9 students, 8 of whom are members of Illinois Alpha chapter of Sigma Phi Epsilon Fraternity, helped build houses in Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, South Dakota. Led by Senior Matthew Houseward, the group traveled 980 miles from Champaign, Illinois, to Pine Ridge, South Dakota to work with Pastor Leon Matthews of Pine Ridge Gospel Fellowship to further his intention to better the Lakota people. The group also partnered with Oglala Sioux Tribe Partnership for Housing, Inc., (OSTPH) and worked on it's Self-Help facility for the week in order to assist them in their efforts to provide housing for reservation residents.
Pine Ridge Indian Reservation is the second largest reservation in the United States. The poorest county in the nation, Pine Ridge is plagued by an unemployment rate of almost 80% and alcoholism reaching 90%. The reservation sprawls across thousands of acres of beautiful countryside which is intermittently broken up by small worn homes and fleets of broken down cars that litter local yards. The SigEps stayed near the center of town where many people lived and where you could find several gas stations, grocery stores, residents, schools, and municipal buildings. There is no industry in Pine Ridge, and there are no natural resources. The economy and the residents of Pine Ridge are almost completely dependant on government assistance for basic subsistence and housing. One of the natives that works with Self-Help, Lyle, a skilled contractor, stated that after he served in Vietnam he often found it difficult to find work on the reservation and went back into military service several times before finally retiring to Pine Ridge. According to Pastor Matthews, military service is very common on the reservation, in fact, he said, per capita there are more servicemen serving overseas from Pine Ridge than anywhere else in the nation. Lyle expressed his desire to have a factory built in the area to create jobs and stimulate the local economy but admitted that businesses largely don't trust the native people because of the high rates of drug and alcohol abuse and their dependance on government assistance that undercuts many residents' motivation to work.
The SigEps spent the week with Pastor Leon and drove 40 miles each day to work with Self-Help. At Self-Help a half dozen homes are being built for residents at the same time to be trailored to their final destinations when construction is completed. The residents for which the homes are being built are able to save on labor costs of their homes because they assist in the building of home under the guidance and supervision of several on-site contractors. Since the houses are identically styled and being built in the same place at the same time they are also able save on materials. According to the contractors the average savings per homeowner is about $30,000.
The SigEps were able to assist in every aspect of the contruction: framing and raising exterior as well as interior walls, painting, flooring, installing trusses to support the roof as well as roofing from plywood to the last shingle. They worked closely with native contractors who shared their wealth of knowledge about carpentry, their culture, and their experiences living on the reservation. When the SigEps had time to spare they visited the mass grave at Wounded Knee with Pastor Matthews and listened to him as he described the events leading up to the Wounded Knee Massacre. Leon commented that the words “Mass Grave” usually instill images of Nazi Germany, Bosnia, or Iraq, and rarely do we as Americans remember the mass grave we dug in South Dakota. On another day after work Pastor Leon took the SigEps to Sheep Mountain in Badlands National Park and took them hiking through the hills. Of course, no college Spring Break trip could be complete without college shennanigans, and their was plenty of that as well: driving under the stars in the pitch black over gravel roads, Lyle taught us how to use a lasso and how to drive a fork truck, nail-gun shooting from the roof, wrestling matches, and hot sauce drinking contests in which there are no winners.
In total the SigEps were able to put in about 350 hours of labor and were able to raise $3,500 to alleviate the costs of the trip and to donate to Pastor Matthews. Those that went on the trip learned a great deal, had a great experience, and intend to make the service trip to Pine Ridge an annual event. Although, the problems that face the reservation are extensive, and the efforts made by Sigma Phi Epsilon can barely scratch the suface, they took great joy in the opportunity to aid members of the Pine Ridge community and to give back to a community from which so much has been taken.
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