Mdewakanton Sioux Community Awards $1 Million Grant

The has awarded a $1 million grant to the Upper Sioux Community to help with construction of a new wastewater treatment plant.

The new facility will replace the current drainfield type system which is nearing the end of its life cycle. The facility provides services for about 50 homes and four tribal enterprises, including Prairie’s Edge Casino Resort. The same project was funded with a $1 million grant in fiscal year 2011. 

They are proposing to construct a membrane batch reactor (mbr) wastewater treatment plant, because the current system is inadequate to sustain the community into the future. Construction will begin late this summer and they expect the plant to go online early summer of 2013 with a projected cost of $4.3 million.

The Upper Sioux Community and the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community have had close social and cultural ties for generations as members of the Oceti Sakowin, the Seven Council Fires of the Great Sioux Nation.  

The Upper Sioux Community near Granite Falls, MN, has an enrollment of 486 tribal members, with a land base of approximately 2,000 acres. Their 1938 reservation boundaries consisted of 734 acres. 

In 2001 the SMSC funded Prairie’s Edge Casino Resort with a $21 million loan. Since 1997 the SMSC has provided the Upper Sioux Community with more than $12.4 million in assistance.