‘Build it and they will come’ Crownpoint Youth Complex marks grand opening

By Rick Abasta
Navajo Housing Authority

CROWNPOINT

The Crownpoint Youth Complex is officially open.

After countless years of manifesting the day of opening a new facility for area youth, the Office of Diné Youth – Crownpoint Agency celebrated the new 27,140-square-foot building Sept. 24, with an open house celebration and traditional Navajo blessing.

Funding from the Indian Housing Block Grant provided by the Navajo Housing Authority, Navajo Nation Council Sihasin Fund, and Navajo Abandoned Mine Lands Public Facilities Projects made the project a reality.

The youth center includes a gymnasium, locker and shower facilities, storage area, kitchen, weight room, student lounge, arts and crafts workshop, library, offices, equipment rental space, and classrooms.

Hataałii Rex Lee Jim, the former Navajo Nation vice president, provided the traditional blessing of the facility with a prayer to ensure the growth and hózhó of area youth that will be using the youth complex.

Jim’s prayer included smudging the building in the four cardinal directions, a Navajo chant, and an offering of corn pollen for attendees. When his blessing was completed, the audience entered the gymnasium for the program’s start.

Visit to Alamo, an inspiration

Virginia L. Nelson, the delegated program manager I at the ODY-Crownpoint, provided a history of the youth complex, noting that a fateful visit to Alamo, New Mexico, was the inspiration.

“The community had a beautiful facility (for the youth), and it sparked something inside me to look for a complex for our community,” she said.

She asked the staff many questions at Alamo, and Nelson was referred to Mike Coppedge and his son, Tom. It was the mastermind – Weller Architects – that designed the Alamo facility.

Nelson traveled to Albuquerque and met with the father and son team. They encouraged her and shared a blueprint of the Alamo youth center, which inspired her to begin planning for a new building.

“I was sitting in my office one day with our intern and I told her about my vision,” she said. “She just told me, ‘Build it and they will come.’”

She jotted down the iconic phrase and placed it in plain view inside her office space as a daily reminder of building something substantial for the kids.

Soon after, a yearlong fellowship provided Nelson with new opportunities and skill sets, including learning how to write a grant proposal.

She submitted a proposal to Navajo AML for PFP funding and it was denied five times. Undeterred, she submitted another grant proposal.

“On my sixth time, I got a letter from (the late) Madeline Roanhorse congratulating us on our grant award,” she said.

The award letter was dated April 22, 2014.

From there, Nelson and her staff began designing and outlining the vision for the building.

The collaboration included submitting a proposal to NHA for Native American Housing and Self-Determination Act funding.

The group penned a proposal and submitted it for review by the NHA Board of Commissioners.

However, the board denied the project because it lacked construction documents.

Former CEO Aneva J. Yazzie encouraged Nelson not to give up and said NHA would provide Crownpoint ODY with $500,000 to get the construction documents in order.

A full circle

With the funding, things came full circle for Nelson because her design team included Weller Architects. Together they hosted a bid opening at Route 66 Casino on May 10, 2018, for construction of the youth complex after receiving eight bids.

The design team selected Arviso Construction Company Inc. as the contractor and began work on the new building. By the time Oct. 29, 2018, rolled around, Nelson secured $7,432,446.02 in IGBG funding as stated in an award letter from Nellie Gilmore, the NHA grants manager.

Dorothy Laurkie and Ramsey Singer served as project managers for NHA.

By this time, it was 2020 and the coronavirus pandemic drove up prices for construction materials.

“There wasn’t enough money to build our facility, and we had to go before the Navajo Nation Council to request Sihasin funding,” Nelson said.

ODY-Crownpoint received $2.5 million from the Council and was able to complete the project.

“Never give up on your dreams,” she said. “Today, young people have a safe haven and they’re going to be successful.”

Roy Tracy, the Department of Diné Education acting superintendent of schools, and a statistician by trade, spoke about Title 10 of the Navajo Nation Code and said its enactment dated back to 1975 with the Indian Self-Determination Act and the Indian Education Assistance Act.

Title 10 also goes back to 1988, with the Tribal Controlled Schools Act, and to 1994 with the School Improvement Act, and finally, to 2001 with the No Child Left Behind and Native American Education Improvement Act of Title 10.

“Back in 2005, we had the Navajo Nation Sovereignty in Education Act,” he said. “Title 10 is important, and I really hope that you, as parents, as tribal advocates, and as politicians, read it and understand it.

Education, the grassroots level

Education comes from the grassroots level, where Haashch’ééłti’í saw Asdzą́ą́ Nádleehé and said, “Nizhoni and yá’át’ééh.”

“Those were the first two words that were spoken. From there on, Asdzą́ą́ Nádleehé grew and became who we are as people, with clanship within the Four Sacred Mountains,” he said.

“Title is based on that, the continuation of Navajo culture,” Tracy noted, adding that it’s the root of Title 10.

Ernest Franklin, the NHA chief operating officer, spoke next and commended the tenacity of Nelson for seeing the project through to completion.

He said the NHA Development and Construction Services Division is responsible for managing costs, scope, and schedule for construction projects such as the Crownpoint Youth Complex.

“Let’s have a round of applause for Virginia Nelson and her staff. Talk about not letting go of a dream. She did whatever it took to make this happen,” he said.

NHA manages how a project is constructed, which requires monitoring quality control and constant coordination between the architect, project managers, third-party inspectors, and vendors.

“We make sure that everything passes (quality control), and that testing is being done from the foundation to the roof,” he said. “All of that took tremendous coordination with the contractor, architects, and our project managers to make sure this building is as it is now.”

Franklin said the prayer provided by Jim was about walking in peace as the world rotated, from the sunrise to its ecliptic to the south and its travel west for sunset and the night sky.

“That prayer was about bringing the mind and heart into harmony,” he said. “That’s what this building is for, to be a safe haven to guide the minds and hearts of the children.”

He shared the NHA mission statement: “Hooghandęę’ éí hahóózhǫǫd iiná silá dóó noosééł.”

“That’s something that you guys should consider; this is a place where life grows and thrives for the future of the next generations,” he said.

---