A capital campaign has paid off more than $700,0000 in acquisition funding loans for a parcel of land that is part of Wabanaki ancestral homelands.
The parcel, in Passadumkeag, is 85 acres and is now home to Nibezun, a native-led organization that according to its website “seeks to revitalize and preserve Wabanaki culture, traditions, and life-ways.” The property has the only land connection to Olamon Island (located to the south on the Penobscot River, across from Greenbush). Olamon Island is a traditional land for the Penobscot Indian Nation that was the site of numerous tribal activities, including villages, burial grounds, gathering of medicinal plants, and more.
The parcel almost was lost to the Wabanakis in 2016, however, when it was listed for sale on the open market. At that time, tribals members and others decided to try to secure the parcel and keep it as tribal land.
“It wasn’t going to be easy,” said the Nibezun website. “The substantial obligations required to purchase and permanently secure the property all within a limited time frame would have been enough to overwhelm even the most well-established non-profit organization. For a new and unknown non-profit this seemed almost impossible. But, the planters of this seed and the dreamers who tended it remained steadfast and people of shared vision were naturally drawn to this effort.”
That perseverance paid off. With conservation advice and financial support from The Conservation Fund, Maine Coast Heritage Trust, the Elmina B. Sewall Foundation, The Quimby Family Foundation, and community members and supporters from around the state and the country, Nibezun was able to pay off the bridge financing and took full ownership of the property about a month ago.
“As our community of support grew, we realized that Nibezun is not the land, not any one person, not the buildings; Nibezun is a medicine that binds us all in a common thought, provides a way of being together in a complicated world, and allows a prayer to echo through us all in our own individual ways,” says Dr. Ben Huerth, Vice-Chair of the Board of Directors for Nibezun. “It is this collective prayer that allowed us to succeed in securing Nibezun for the generations to come.
“…Together, we have made this extraordinary dream a reality. Now, we can move forward to see what we can create together, through ceremonies, traditions, customs, and language, to heal the sacred unbroken relationships between the people and the ancestral lands and Waterways of the Wabanaki, while also opening a healing space for people from all corners of the Earth to come together to create a more unified and balanced world.”
The second phase of the Nibezun capital campaign is now underway, and is dedicated to much needed repairs and improvements to the existing facilities. At the same time, Nibezun will be working to further develop its programming, fully staff the organization, and improve operations. Some of the focuses for 12019 will be program staffing and board development; the acquisition of needed maintenance equipment; urgent property repairs and deferred maintenance; structural improvement of existing infrastructure to increase capacity; creation of new ceremonial grounds; and building volunteer accommodations
To donate or for more information, go to nibezun.org.
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