Community Programs
Cross-Cultural Programs
Celebrating our diversity as a community, acknowledging the past, and moving forward, together.
Since 2021, Montezuma Land Conservancy (MLC) has been partnering with the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe (UMUT) to build relationships with the Tribal community and increase understanding and application of Indigenous perspectives in our conservation and lands work.
Traditional Harvest Project
Originally developed by the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe’s Environmental Department, the Traditional Harvest Project addresses habitat loss and degradation on Tribal lands, and increases Tribal access to culturally significant plants on ancestral homelands off the reservation through relationship building with landowners in the region and voluntary access supported by the conservancy.
We are inviting Ute Mountain Ute community members to share their stories and knowledge of traditionally harvested plants and their past or present locations in our region.
We also are seeking landowner partners interested in having the plant communities on their properties assessed, receiving habitat management recommendations, and participating in pilot programs that create plans allowing tribal members access on their properties during pre-specified traditional harvesting times of year.
Fall Event
Relationships are the cornerstone of MLC’s Cross-Cultural Programs.
This annual gathering, collaboratively planned and hosted by MLC and our partners in the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, brings together a diverse audience of community members, organizations, and funders to focus on storytelling, sharing perspectives on connection to land, and planning our collective work.
“Our connection to landscape and to our culture is through stories.”
— Regina Lopez-Whiteskunk, MLC Cross-Cultural Programs Director
Sarah Schwab
Youth & Community Engagement
The future of cross-culturally informed conservation work relies on the development of leadership among tribal youth and increased engagement across our full community.
Our work prioritizes educational opportunities for the students of the Kwiyagat Community Academy in Towaoc, provides paid internships in conservation work for tribal youth and young adults on and off the reservation, and encourages further lands-based programs through cross-cultural and intergenerational knowledge sharing through programs such as the Traditional Harvest Project.