Grass Valley, CA – The Nevada City Rancheria Nisenan Tribe has a time-limited opportunity to purchase a land parcel encompassing 232 acres (roughly one square kilometer) located on a historic Nisenan Village site called Yulića near Nevada City in Northern California. This is the Tribe’s best opportunity to re-establish a homeland in more than half a century and we need everyone’s help to make it happen. A fundraising goal of $2.4 million includes the purchase price, government-mandated improvements, and an operating endowment. Phase 1 fundraising: $1.5 million by April 4, 2024.
Background: The Nevada City Rancheria Nisenan Tribe
The Tribe was federally recognized by the Executive Order of President Woodrow Wilson in 1913, and voted to organize as a Tribal government under the Indian Reorganization Act (IRA) in 1935. The Tribe resided on a 75-acre Rancheria in Nevada City, California, until 1964 when the U.S. illegally sold the land. In violation of federal law, the government treated that land sale as having terminated the Tribe. Since that time, the Tribe has been without a homeland and has suffered the impacts of historical and generational trauma, poverty, and near erasure.
In 2014, the Tribe created a nonprofit – the California Heritage: Indigenous Research Project (CHIRP). As a Tribally-guided 501(c)(3), its mission is to Preserve, Protect, and Perpetuate Nisenan Culture. As a California non-profit corporation, CHIRP has legal status to serve the Tribe and is duty-bound to its approximately 140 members.
Today, the Tribe continues its 45-year battle to restore Federal Recognition. In recent decades, the Tribe has made significant progress in building visibility, support, and recognition with the
State, local government, and the public. This is evidenced by, among other things, the unanimous resolutions of recognition and support passed by the Nevada County Board of Supervisors, the city councils of both Nevada City and neighboring Grass Valley, the Nevada County Historical Society, recognition by the State under the California Native American Heritage Commission, the California Natural Resources Agency, by the local community’s support of the Ancestral Homelands Reciprocity Program, Visibility Through Art exhibitions, the ‘Uba Seo Gallery, and other CHIRP programs.
A NEW Opportunity for a Tribal Homeland
CHIRP entered into a purchase agreement on January 8, 2023, and the funds to purchase must be raised by April 4, 2024. If the Tribe is unable to raise the funds in this small window of time, the owner must list the property on the open market.
Beginning in 1963, the current owner, College Park Friends Educational Association, operated the site primarily as a Quaker boarding school, summer camp, Friends meeting house, and experiential education in the principles of peace, social justice and sustainability. The property includes 20+ buildings including a meeting center, offices, classrooms, homes, A-frame cabins, a dining hall, commercial kitchen, a pottery studio with a unique Japanese climbing kiln, and maintenance buildings, a creek, medicine and grinding rocks, and hiking trails. Transitioning the land back to the Tribe embodies Woolman’s values and is a spiritual endeavor to promote right relationship between its recent stewards and the land’s original inhabitants.
This unique opportunity will allow the Tribe to return to their land and re-establish:
- Housing for Elders and other Tribal members
- Ceremonial spaces
- Reconnecting traditional practices for today’s Tribal members
- A community center for Tribal meetings
- Cultural education and activities for Tribal members and the public
- An interpretive center
- A performance pavilion
- Cultural, arts and crafts facilities and classes
- Wellness center, traditional healing spaces
- Environmental protection and education
- Gardens, Indigenous food, traditional medicinal and craft plant cultivation
Everyone is invited to support the Tribe’s effort by donating and sharing:
- GoFundMe: https:/gofundme.com/f/homeland-fund-initiative
- Checks can be made to CHIRP (memo line: “Homeland Return”) and mailed to: CHIRP, P.O. Box 2624, Nevada City, CA 95959
- Contact Shelly Covert, Tribal Spokesperson, Nevada City Rancheria and Executive Director, CHIRP. Email: info@chirpca.org Phone: 530-237-0707
NOTE: All funds raised for purchasing the Woolman land, will be applied exclusively for the identification and purchase of a property that fits the needs identified by the Tribe, should the Woolman land purchase fall through for any reason.