An elusive dream
The Gathering Place facing hard timesJudy Jim works at her computer at the Navajo Co-Op in Thoreau. The small artist co-op has run into challenges in recent years as business has declined and grant money has dwindled. — © 2008 Gallup Independent / Brian Leddy

Copyright © 2008
Gallup Independent
By Elizabeth Hardin-Burrola
Staff writer

THOREAU — It sounds like a great nonprofit organization: The Gathering Place on Paradise Lane.

Unfortunately, hard times have befallen the Thoreau organization that once served many local low income families. Few people are gathering there anymore — for quilting, for GED preparation or literacy training, or for health services — and paradise is certainly nowhere in sight, except on the street sign.

Maxine M. Brieno, talked about the financial needs of The Gathering Place. Brieno, her “skeleton crew” of staffers Judy Jim and Jennifer Muskett, and the organization’s board of directors are trying to keep the association afloat. On Thursday, Brieno, Muskett, and Margaret Mitchell, a former interim director and current board member, talked about the struggles The Gathering Place is facing.

The economic picture they painted was a far cry from the organization’s once optimistic early years. The Gathering Place was established 21 years ago by Sister Angela Bianco, a member of the Sisters of Loretto, and a group of local Navajo people who wanted to help promote economic development, educational opportunities, and health care services for local people, most of whom are Navajo. To that end, they established the Navajo co-op, an artists’ cooperative that promotes Native arts and crafts, and they started literacy programs and the Shima Yazhi (“little mother”) Program, which was designed to address the needs of expectant and new mothers and their children.

Back in those days, the early organizers had dreams of opening a Montessori childcare center, a Native “college without walls,” and a “one-stop shopping” center to house local social service programs.

According to Brieno, about all that is left now is the Navajo Co-op, but its sales are slipping, along with the nation’s economy. The loss of important grants from New Mexico’s Children, Youth and Families Department and the Con Alma Health Foundation proved devastating, she said, and budget cuts forced the literacy program to fold two years ago. The rising cost of gasoline and vehicle maintenance forced the Shima Yazhi Program to move from being home-based to center-based, she added, and now the program is on hold while Gathering Place officials try to obtain funding.

Brieno’s own dream of opening a shelter for battered women and their children appears unlikely to materialize.

“We’re keeping the door open through donations,” Brieno said. The Gathering Place has continued to receive grants from McKinley County and New Mexico’s Rural Housing Service in Albuquerque, she said, but most of the remaining money has come from out-of-state charitable donations. Brieno explained she regularly sends out donation letters and is preparing to send out another one soon. But what funding The Gathering Place has received, she said, hasn’t been enough to keep the social service programs operating.

Brieno explained she is also looking for assistance from the Navajo Nation, since most of the people who have benefited from The Gathering Place’s programs over the last two decades are Navajo. Mitchell and Brieno said the communities in the Thoreau and Crownpoint area are filled with families struggling with problems related to alcoholism and other addictions, domestic violence, child abuse, and teen pregnancies. If The Gathering Place would soon close its doors, Brieno asked, would the Navajo Nation be able to step in and offer programs to address those problems?

Although Brieno faults the nation’s slowing economy for some of the organization’s financial woes, she admits that the organization has suffered over the years from “everything” — bad calls, bad judgment, and over spending — by previous administrators.

“The people who were running it misused it,” she said.
Muskett, who has worked for The Gathering Place for 11 years, said the organization once had a very positive impact on the local community through its hands-on training and one-on-one programs that built “trust and relationship” with the local people.

Mitchell and Brieno would like to see that positive impact restored. Through the interview, they explained, they hoped to make people aware of The Gathering Place, its programs, and its need for funding.

“We’re trying to keep this program alive because there are people out there who need it,” Brieno said.

Information: The Gathering Place, P.O. Box 838, Thoreau, N.M. 87323; (505) 862-8236; www.Navajo-Coop.org

Jennifer, Muskett, front, Maxine Brieno, Margaret Mitchell and Judy Jim are the ladies who run the Navajo Co-Op in Thoreau. The small artist co-op has run into challenges in recent years as business has declined and grant money has dwindled. — © 2008 Gallup Independent / Brian Leddy