Wayne Ducheneaux II is stepping down from Native Governance Center. Here's a look at his legacy

CATHARINE RICHERT: Tomorrow, Wayne Ducheneaux will be stepping down from his leadership position at Native Governance Center. He was the Native-led organization's first executive director and help grow its network from a single program to many, which serve Native nations and their needs. And just recently, Native Governance Center received the Anti-Racism Initiative Award from the Minnesota Council of Nonprofits. The award recognizes nonprofits that do active anti-racism work.

MPR Native News senior editor Leah Lemm chatted with Wayne Ducheneaux II and learned about Native Governance Center's journey. Hello, Leah.

LEAH LEMM: Boozhoo, Catharine. How are you today?

CATHARINE RICHERT: I'm doing great. I'm happy to have you here. So I'm looking forward to hearing more about Wayne Ducheneaux and his work supporting Native nations. What can you tell us?

LEAH LEMM: Yeah. Well, that's very true. The Native Governance Center has a mission to assist Native nations in strengthening their governance systems and capacity to exercise sovereignty. Basically, helping nations set themselves up to be successful. The main programs are tribal governance support, leadership development, and community engagement. And this work is being noticed.

As you mentioned, Native Governance Center just received an Anti-Racism Initiative Mission Award from the Minnesota Council on Nonprofits. And NGC is dedicated to bridging the gap between outdated learnings and authentic Indigenous narratives, providing free educational resources to the public and creating fun informational videos. So earning this award really shows how much impact NGC has had.

And Wayne Ducheneaux has led the organization to where it is today. Though he credits his and the organization's success to all the people he's worked with and learning from failures. He has great insight on what it means to be a leader. So I'm excited to share more about Wayne's leadership and the growth of NGC. So before we get into the details of that, Wayne started us off by doing a virtual smudge with burning sage.

WAYNE DUCHENEAUX: (SPEAKING LAKOTA)

Hello, my relatives. I greet you with a good heart and handshake. My name is Wayne Ducheneaux. I am the outgoing executive director of Native Governance Center.

LEAH LEMM: Wayne has been the only executive director since January 2016, soon after the organization became its own nonprofit. NGC's early beginnings started as a program of the Bush Foundation that focused on Native nation rebuilding.

WAYNE DUCHENEAUX: But after going out and meeting with elected leaders and community leaders, the Bush Foundation landed on the fact that some of the things that were highlighted as tribal governments need help capacity building. We need to train the next generation of tribal leaders.

LEAH LEMM: So from that, the leadership development program was formed called Native Nation Rebuilders. It serves the 23 Native nations sharing geography with Minnesota Makoce, or Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota. The first cohort took place back in 2019, and Wayne, who is from the Cheyenne River Sioux tribe, became involved in the program by participating in the third cohort.

WAYNE DUCHENEAUX: As Bush was going out and visiting with all these folks across their region within these tribal nations, that really was important for an organization like Native Governance Center to be established, to have that ability to respond to tribes in this nation rebuilding way.

LEAH LEMM: Wayne and other leaders in the foundation then looked at how a nonprofit could be formed to better serve Native nations in the region.

CATHARINE RICHERT: It sounds like the program was started with a lot of tribal input, and the Bush Foundation recognized that. By the way, what is nation rebuilding?

LEAH LEMM: So oftentimes we hear the term "nation building." And the term "nation rebuilding" acknowledges that there is existing knowledge, existing values and tools within Native nations. And they may have strayed from what was culturally appropriate for a variety of reasons, often stemming from colonization. But they are re-embracing those ways that had previously led to stability and success. And this year, NGC is hosting the 13th cohort of the Rebuilders Program. And so far, there have been 200 rebuilder graduates, with 70 from Minnesota.

CATHARINE RICHERT: That's a lot of people bringing information to their communities.

LEAH LEMM: Yeah. And I mentioned that Wayne took part in the Leadership Development Program's third cohort while it was still at the Bush Foundation years before becoming executive director. And he credits that experience, learning those principles, with helping him gain a seat on his tribal council in 2012 at Cheyenne River. And he was on tribal council when he was hired at Native Governance center. He knew NGC was in his future and made the tough decision to leave council early.

WAYNE DUCHENEAUX: I actually had to leave my elected position 10 months early, 11 months early, which, honestly, hardest professional decision of my life to leave. I'd always aspired to be a tribal leader. My grandpa was a four-time chairman of our tribe. My dad was a two-time chairman of our tribe. President of the National Congress of American Indians. I had a brother on tribal council. Aunties, uncles, cousins, you name it.

And so when I was elected to tribal council, it was like a dream come true. And then becoming executive director of Native Governance Center was like a dream meant to be.

CATHARINE RICHERT: Lots of leadership in Wayne's family, it sounds like.

LEAH LEMM: That's right. And Wayne doesn't take leadership lightly.

WAYNE DUCHENEAUX: I've surrounded myself with people across the way from the top to the bottom of the organization that are smarter than me, more talented than me. And then just gave them the opportunity to be successful. Now that's come with growing pains. Not everything we've tried has been a success. Not every initiative taken has had dramatic change.

But it's also one of those things where having been afraid of failure in this role, and trust me, I have failed in seven years. But try to take every opportunity where we didn't achieve our goal to try to learn from that. And then pivot to see what lessons can we take to ensure future success, and what lessons can we then share with people so that they can have that success?

LEAH LEMM: And Wayne faced a lot of growth while at NGC. It was his first go at running a nonprofit. One major hurdle that Wayne had to overcome was being able to ask for money to fundraise. But he leaned on support and examples of leadership in his own community for guidance and the teachings from the Rebuilders Program.

CATHARINE RICHERT: So what was the switch?

LEAH LEMM: Well, what it came down to was approaching asking for money as giving funders an opportunity to support Native people and partner in that process. So what began as a perspective of, NGC doesn't have enough money, please help us, became we have this ability to work with Native nations. Help them with their goals and learn from their brilliance. You, funder, now have an opportunity to help us do this.

WAYNE DUCHENEAUX: There are solutions that come from community. And there are great things to highlight about our people. Especially in the realm that we work that need to be lifted up so folks can understand that there's an inherent wisdom in Indigeneity. And our people here on this continent, that where we share the-- our very DNA is shared with this land. The way we governed ourselves, how we lived on the land.

And don't get me wrong, it wasn't a utopia. Right, there were war, there were famine. There were things that affected our people. But we were able to live here in a balance for time immemorial and have these practices with which saw us build a resiliency that allowed us to succeed past colonization and genocide to still be here today.

CATHARINE RICHERT: So there's a lot that larger society can learn from Native nations, it sounds like.

LEAH LEMM: Right. And things like agricultural practices, wildfire technology, and so on, are actually being embraced far and wide.

CATHARINE RICHERT: And to learn from one another takes a common language, a common understanding.

LEAH LEMM: Bingo. So the resources that NGC shares out benefit Native nations and a much wider audience. There's a whole knowledge set that isn't taught in school. And with NGC, there are Native Nations 101. There's governance and Native change lessons. And there's a topic called Beyond Land Acknowledgment that is also available to the public. And this helps increase the ability to communicate ideas back and forth. So there's helpful information for everyone, all with the mission to serve and strengthen Native nations.

WAYNE DUCHENEAUX: And I think nearly every tribal leader that you would talk to in this region, there's a lot of work to be done to getting tribes to the place where they feel like their government and governance is best representing them. And that's across the board, what some people would view as the most successful tribes are down to those tribes that maybe need the most help. Every tribal leader understands that it's about continually growing to better serve your people.

LEAH LEMM: So I'd like to point out another success. You might have seen in the latest census data that the total population of American Indian and Alaska Native, so alone or in combination, increased 85% from 2010 to 2020. Now there are many reasons for this, and Wayne believes this statistic is still underreported. But NGC helped their region's 23 tribes with tools to help complete the census. And a couple nations in Minnesota even, Red Lake Nation and Grand Portage Band, reported 100% response rate from eligible households on their reservation.

CATHARINE RICHERT: I mean, that's a lot. But why with all the success is Wayne actually going to leave?

LEAH LEMM: Yeah. Well, Wayne told me it's been a tough year with losses and hardships in his community. And he's refocusing on family.

WAYNE DUCHENEAUX: It was time for a change. Not only in my personal life, so figuring out how I can best be here for my family to take care of people. But then professionally, to find my next thing. I feel heartened that Native Governance Center is as strong as it's ever been. And I feel like the work I've done in the last seven years has created a strong foundation with which the organization can survive without me.

LEAH LEMM: And after he leaves, Wayne will continue to support Native Governance Center. They're in talks to continue his interview show called Wings With Wayne, where Wayne visits with Indigenous changemakers from the region to explore what sovereignty means to them while eating spicy chicken wings.

CATHARINE RICHERT: That sounds like a lot of fun. Thank you for sharing more about Native Governance Center and Wayne Ducheneaux's work.

LEAH LEMM: You're welcome. And as a note for full transparency, my spouse has done contract work with Native Governance Center. Tribal Finance Pilot Program.

CATHARINE RICHERT: Thanks so much.

LEAH LEMM: Miigwech.

CATHARINE RICHERT: Leah Lemm is MPR Native News senior editor.