GRANTS DEPARTMENT IS GLUE THAT BINDS RESOURCES
By Vivian LaMoore, Inaajimowin Editor
Tucked inside the Administration offices is a small team of four individuals working behind the scenes to keep programs and services available to Band members. The grants team keeps its finger on the pulse of the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe to under stand the current and future programs and services and identify grant opportunities that will be a good fit for the programs.
The Grants Department is housed under the Executive Branch, Administrative Department, and consists of Brittany Wind as Director, and three Grant Development Specialists, including Renee Bayerle, Naomi Kristiansen, and Nate Stoll. With the combined experience of the team spanning over 24 years, this team is proud to say they have a success rate of over 82%.
There is a quiet positive energy within the team. They have all become like family; celebrating each other’s successes and are there for each other in times of need, all while keeping the needs of the community as a priority.
The grants team works with other departments within the Band with the development and submission of grant proposals, and proper management of budgeting and reporting. They are also responsible for supplemental research, writing grant nar ratives, narrative/work plan modifications, budgets, and bud get justifications; they will also assist with program reporting and overall compliance with the grant requirements.
Because the Grants Department provides services to all MLBO departments, it is essential to maintain consistent procedures to ensure a positive and effective process to meet foundational, state, and federal deadlines. The grants team must be aware of the various activities in each department.
“We have monthly or bi-monthly meetings with departments to learn what they have going on programmatically and what their needs will be,” Wind said.
Then they will seek grants through websites that list all of the opportunities available and “if there is something cool we found we will send it to a department to ask if it would be suit able for projects they are looking for,” Kristiansen said.
The grants staff have a high level of strategic sense of how different departments work what their needs are and what the needs of the Band are as a whole and constantly track of the different priorities of the Band. All grant funding for 2025 is set and the team is working on grants for 2026 through 2030. The process does not happen overnight. For instance, if they were to apply for a grant today, it would not be active until next year. The majority of grants take about one year to complete.
A point of ambiguity is that the specialists work with departments for grant funding but funding often overlaps with other government funds. “We have to have our finger on the pulse of what is happening in other areas as well,” Nate Stoll said.
The grant specialists work with the subject matter experts in each department throughout the course of the life of the grant.
“We are very much behind-the-scenes people,” said Kristiansen. “We like to see the programs come to fruition and see the funds in action. Everyone on the grants team cares very deeply for this community, and everything we do is in service to them.”
That is one reason they ask Band members to participate in surveys when they are posted. It is very important to complete the surveys that are requested by various departments, as the results of those surveys help programs and the grants depart ment determine what grants to pursue. “We won’t know what to pursue if we do not have their feedback,” Wind said.