The Indian Health Service, also known as IHS, announced seven projects to build or renovate health centers and inpatient hospitals throughout Indian Country. Among those beneficiaries will be Arizona's Ak-Chin Indian Community.
The tribe's chairman, Gabriel Lopez, is grateful for being picked among other tribes in Alaska, California, Oklahoma and South Dakota to participate in the latest round of the IHS Joint Venture Construction Program.
More than two dozen tribes across the U.S. have partnered with IHS since 1991.
That announcement was recently highlighted by Health and Human Services Sec. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who met with Lopez and the Ak-Chin Indian Community in Scottsdale last month.
"The elders in the community have to drive 60 to 80 miles to get decent care," said Kennedy in a social media post, "and they have to go through Maricopa County with all the traffic, so it's an inconvenience and it can be a lethal inconvenience."
Lopez told KJZZ that going to medical appointments is typically an all-day affair, with most tribal patients driving in and around the Valley to Casa Grande, Marana and even as far as Sun City.
Now, Ak-Chin will construct a 60,000-square-foot facility and lease it at no cost to IHS for two decades. In exchange, the agency will lobby Congress on behalf of the tribe for federal funding to staff and maintain that building.
"Currently, we have a satellite facility, which is 2,000 square feet, it's a triple-wide trailer with minimal services," added Lopez. "It is promising. In a roundabout way, we're looking at maybe about two years to be up and running."
Doing so will not only expand access to primary, dental and radiology care for Ak-Chin near the city of Maricopa but other neighboring tribal members from the Tohono O'odham Nation, Pascua Yaqui Tribe and Gila River Indian Community.
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