Urban Indians suffer from highest poverty rates across nation

Monday, April 15, 2013  

More and more American Indians and Alaska Natives are living in urban areas but they continue to suffer from highest poverty rates in the nation.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 50 percent of the Indian population in Rapid City, South Dakota, lives in poverty. In Minneapolis, Minnesota, 49 percent are in poverty.

“Our population has dealt with all these problems in the past,” Jay Bad Heart Bull, the president and chief operating officer of the Native American Community Development Institute in Minneapolis, told The New York Times. “But it’s easier to get lost in the city. It’s easier to disappear.”

About 70 percent of American Indians and Alaska Natives live in urban areas, according to the Census.

Get the Story:
Quietly, Indians Reshape Cities and Reservations (The New York Times 4/14)

Poverty rate highest for American Indians and Alaska Natives (2/21)