Miccosukee Wellness Center/Health Department
Lorraine Flock, Nutrition Services Coordinator
PO Box 440021 Tamiami Station
Miami, Fla. 33144
(305) 223-8380
(305) 223-1011 fax

Even after the Seminole Nation made its peace with the American government and began doing business with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, their cousins of the Miccosukee tribe remained uneasy about the white man's intentions and moved deeper into the Everglades.

To this day the tiny tribe of about 600 members remains isolated in the watery expanse of the Shark River Slough, a "river of grass" that runs through the Everglades from Lake Okechobee to the Gulf of Mexico, where their reservation incorporates a three-mile stretch of country road lined by small, neat houses, and a scattering of rural "camps" where some tribal members choose to remain in traditional "chickees," the traditional four-posted thatched huts that their ancestors used for generations before the Europeans came.

In modern times, buoyed by income from a gigantic bingo parlor located miles east on the outskirts of the Miami metropolitan area, the Miccosukee have developed an attractive tribal center of coral and stucco buildings including a modern school, police and fire departments, day-care and Head Start and senior-citizen buildings and other facilities making up a complete town center.

But despite an intense tribal pride that makes it difficult to identify problem areas, much less quantify them, the tribe in recent years has begun an array of social services aimed at bringing health, welfare and nutrition services to the tiny community located in the Everglades some 50 miles west of Miami and 75 miles east of Naples.

One of the most innovative approaches, the Miccosukee Wellness Center, is an effort to preventatively ensure good health and nutrition through outreach and education. Boosted by a startup grant from state Hurricane Andrew Recovery Program funds, the Wellness Center -- located in a converted garage building -- features a sparkling array of weight and exercise machines and a skilled staff, making exercise and workout equipment accessible and inviting to anyone who wants to use it.

And that's just the start. The Center also provides a variety of community wellness and fitness classes and activities, ranging from discussions of sexually transmitted diseases, cancer prevention, menopause and premenstrual syndrome and depression. Other workshops and courses cover parenting; stress management; and prenatal education.

A more recent innovation, Nutrition Services, offers similar education and training focused on healthy eating. Staff provides individual nutrition screening, assessment and counseling to improve individuals' dietary situations, with workshops focusing on nutrition and diet, healthy shopping and cooking, and much more.

One key challenge has to do with access to food. Except for one small general store, the nearest grocery store to the reservation center is in suburban Miami, 25 miles away, and fresh produce is rarely available. The group is seeking funding to pay vendors to bring in fresh produce at least once a week, and/or to install a cooler in the general store to make it feasible for fresh produce to be sold there.

All the feature stories on @GRASS-ROOTS.ORG's pages are reported and written by Robin Garr, a prize-winning journalist who has visited more than 500 innovative grassroots programs in all 50 states since 1990.

Browse his book, Reinvesting In America, at Amazon.com.

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