White Earth Band set for youth treatment center
The White Earth Band of Ojibwe will open a youth residential treatment center in Bemidji, Minnesota, on January 1, 2009.

The White Earth Oshki Manidoo Center, or “New Spirit,” provides services to Native youth ages 10-18. The tribe paid $6.5 million for a 40-acre site that includes a pool, basketball courts, sweat lodge and lighted ski trail.

“The best investment any of us can ever make is in our youth,” Chairwoman Erma Vizenor said, The Bemidji Pioneer reported.

A study by the state Department of Corrections found that 47 percent of youth juvenile corrections system in the Twin Cities were Native.

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Vizenor describes plan for chemical dependency residential treatment program for American Indian youth (The Bemidji Pioneer 11/19