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braska because South Dakota officials insisted they had enough beds to serve the population. But Louden, whose district included Whiteclay until last year, said the South Dakota nursing homes are located at least 100 miles from the desolate reservation.
• "You take them 150 or 200 miles from their home, and they never get to see any of their relatives again," Louden said. The project "should be on its way, it just might be a slow process."
• Louden said Nebraska taxpayers will not shoulder the facility's service costs for low-income residents. Sixty percent of the funding will come from federal Medicaid dollars, he said, and the federal Indian Health Service will cover the rest.
• The cooperation between the tribe and Nebraska is noteworthy because they have been at odds for years over the town's four beer stores, which sold the equivalent of 4.3 million, 12-ounce cans of beer last year. The town has fewer than a dozen residents, and critics say the beer sales fuel alcoholism on a reservation with one of the nation's highest alcohol-related mortality rates.
• Oglala Sioux Tribe President John Yellow Bird Steele said the facility is expected to take 16 months to build and will serve residents who struggle to care for themselves as they age.
• "These elderly residents have called me, wanting me to bring them home, but I had no place to put them," he said. "Traditionally, we take care of our elderly. But with these days and times, without a home being handicapped accessible, people just can't. It's impossible."
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