CD: MSU partnering with Choctaw Nation on green projects

TIM PRATT

PEARL RIVER — The Smith John Justice Center is a place where juveniles on the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians’ Neshoba County reservation are sent when they run afoul of the law.

By this spring, youth offenders at the facility in Pearl River will spend time learning the farming techniques of their elders and, hopefully, develop responsibility and job skills for the future, Director of Court Services Daniel Mittan said.

The Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians is working with the Environmental Collaborative Office at Mississippi State University and the U.S. Justice Department to build a traditional Choctaw garden at the Smith John facility. Choctaw elders will work with the 13- to 17-year-old offenders housed at the facility to plant a garden featuring corn, beans and squash, which is known as the “three sisters,” Mittan said.

Plans also are in the works to begin building community gardens next year in each of the reservation’s eight communities, Mittan said, with youth and elders working together on a new plot of land annually. A greenhouse also is in the works, though it is still in the planning stages, he said.

Mississippi State’s Environmental Collaborative Office is assisting with technical advice and planning for the project, ECO Director Jeremiah Dumas said. A $700,000 U.S. Justice Department grant will help fund the endeavor, Mittan said.

Read complete article at Commercial Dispatch.