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'Strengthening Our Generations' Helps Fill Needs For Transient Community

Taylar Dawn Stagner

Strengthening Our Generations is run by the Northern Arapaho Tribe and is part of Wind River Cares. Donna Trosper is supervisor for the group, which has been focusing on getting food, clothes, and other supplies to the transient community on the Wind River Indian Reservation, especially during the pandemic.

She said that includes making sure they have been fed, have somewhere to stay, as well as having their medical needs met.

Trosper also said that since Strengthening Our Generations started two years ago, the Riverton Police Department has seen fewer people on the streets. The group is also interested in youth programming, though Trosper said right now the focus is on getting through the pandemic.

Last weekend, the group handed out t-shirts and McDonald's gift cards to encourage folks to participate in a mass vaccination clinic.

Liz Salway said that it was a way to make sure everyone got a meal after getting vaccinated. She's the education and outreach coordinator for Strengthening Our Generations. She said part of her daily routine involves checking in on the transient population in Riverton. That includes her daily morning drive into Riverton.

"I make sure I go by City Park to make sure to see if anyone's there. Try to make sure that they at least have something to eat and they are warm," she said.

The group also gets boxes of food together for families that have tested positive for COVID-19. Salway said they fill in where there is help needed.

Taylar Dawn Stagner is a central Wyoming rural and tribal reporter for Wyoming Public Radio. She has degrees in American Studies, a discipline that interrogates the history and culture of America. She was a Native American Journalist Association Fellow in 2019, and won an Edward R. Murrow Award for her Modern West podcast episode about drag queens in rural spaces in 2021. Stagner is Arapaho and Shoshone.
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