EAGLE BUTTE, S.D. — Some residents of the Cheyenne River Indian Reservation are still without electricity and running water more than two weeks after an ice storm.
Crews continued working through snow and below freezing temperatures to rebuild above-ground power lines. Federal officials were traveling across the reservation in north-central South Dakota and elsewhere to assess damage for possible aid.
And Joe Brings Plenty, in his first term as elected chairman of the impoverished, 8,000-member Lakota Sioux Nation, asked why it took an emergency to get the attention of a government he and many other Indians say has broken its treaty obligations to care for Indians who gave up their land to make way for white settlers.
“There are a lot of issues in tribal lands that go unheard of because there’s not an interest from the state, there’s not an interest from the federal government until something like this happens where people pay attention to such a disaster,” Brings Plenty said.
Cheyenne River was part of a broad area in northern South Dakota that lost electricity. The South Dakota Rural Electric Association said 15,500 customers lost power at some point. Those still without power are outlying ranches where crews may have to replace a mile of poles and transmission line to restore service to a single customer, spokeswoman Brenda Kleinjan said. The Associated Press
