How Tribes Used Federal Funds Under the CIRCLE Project to Improve Their Justice Systems
Three tribes received funding under the CIRCLE project.[1]
The Pueblo of Zuni
The Pueblo of Zuni focused its budget on:
- Strengthening agencies, including the police department, corrections facilities and domestic violence service providers.
- Building a management information system to better connect police, prosecutors, courts and victim service agencies.
- Expanding community policing programs.
- Developing a model to help stop youth and family violence.
The Northern Cheyenne Tribe
The Northern Cheyenne Tribe focused its budget on:
- Creating a better tribal court by expanding probation programs and hiring more staff.
- Building a juvenile detention and rehabilitation center.
- Expanding the police force.
- Enhancing domestic violence and other victim assistance services.
The Oglala Sioux Tribe
The Oglala Sioux Tribe focused its budget on:
- Expanding youth services.
- Improving its tribal court system.
- Expanding the police force.
- Enhancing victim assistance services.
Notes
[1] The CIRCLE Project - the Comprehensive Indian Resources for Community and Law Enforcement - was a partnership of several agencies in the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) with the Northern Cheyenne Tribe, Oglala Sioux Tribe and Pueblo of Zuni to strengthen the tribes' criminal justice systems. As part of the initiative, the National Institute of Justice and its DOJ partners funded an evaluation of the CIRCLE Project. Learn more about the CIRCLE Project and its evaluation.
Funds came from the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, Corrections Program Office, Bureau of Justice Assistance, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Office for Victims of Crime, Office on Violence Against Women, and Office of the Comptroller. Some of this money would have been invested in Indian Country anyway; however, the native nations participating in CIRCLE received between 40 percent and 400 percent more from participating DOJ agencies than comparable tribes.
