Wednesday, October 3, 2012

Red Cloud Humanitarian Fund

The organizers of the Hoka Hey Motorcycle Challenge are proud to announce that we have teamed up with the Red Cloud Humanitarian Fund in a commitment to help provide for the fundamentals to health and well-being for Indian people.
 
The Red Cloud Humanitarian Fund was organized in December 2004 as an unincorporated association in order to raise funds for meeting the basic needs of the residents and citizens of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota.  


Poverty and a lack of economic opportunity have created deplorable conditions for the residents of the more remote Indian reservations like Pine Ridge where many residents live in substandard housing which lack the life sustaining resources that most of us take for granted.  The mission of the Red Cloud Humanitarian Fund is to raise funds for the provision of running water, adequate plumbing, food, and shelter for these people.  

It is a fitting match because, the Hoka Hey Motorcycle Challenge intends to be a vehicle that brings awareness to the deplorable conditions found on Pine Ridge and other of the Nation’s poorer Indian reservations.  To help accomplish this goal, a feature length documentary is being created by Oscar nominated producer David Roma. 

The documentary film is based on the 2011 Challenge and will follow in the footsteps of David Roma’s previous documentaries in that it will be both entertaining and socially informative. The social cause at hand of course is the current situation of Native Americans, specifically those of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, whose struggle has been ongoing for hundreds of years with no clear remedy in sight. With some of the worst levels of poverty, unemployment, infant mortality rates, teen suicides, adult diabetes, cervical cancer and overall life expectancy in the world, Pine Ridge is often seen as ground zero for Native causes. The film weaves together the trials and tribulations of the Hoka Hey Challengers with those of the Native Americans; who struggle everyday just to survive.


Beyond the film however, several thousands of dollars were raised for the Red Cloud Humanitarian Fund through the efforts of our Hoka Hey participants and supporters during the 2012 Challenge.  In fact, special appreciation goes out to Rob Carlo, Tim Menzie, Dominick Zappolla and Matt Klebe (Kelley Babbin) for selflessly returning their prize award checks to the event as a contribution to Red Cloud Humanitarian Fund!  

With this kind of support, the Hoka Hey Motorcycle Challenge and the Red Cloud Humanitarian Fund can promote pride and dignity to the community by improving living conditions and restoring a sense of comfort and well being through the development of life sustaining resources such as the development of water, housing, food, shelter and other basic life resource necessities on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and elsewhere. 

Every gift makes a difference.