About 90,000 American Indian families are homeless or under-housed.

Providing the right goods in the right time and way for each community.

PWNA serves hundreds of tribal communities in 9 priority states throughout the Northern Plains and Southwest regions of the U.S. We prioritize underserved, under-resourced and geographically isolated Native communities with limited employment opportunities, addressing immediate relief and working toward long-term solutions.

PWNA provides materials and services for immediate relief through six major program categories shown in the Venn diagram above and discussed in the program narrative of our Form 990.

We build upon assets within the communities we serve, bringing together individuals, programs and outside resources to address challenges and support positive change. This community-driven model leverages the social capital of a larger network mobilizing toward a common solution.

Like Material Services, PWNA’s Long-Term Solutions services are critical to our vision of strong, self-sufficient Native American communities. Since 2014, our long-term solutions have been yielding positive outcomes for partners, participants and communities on the reservations.

Every PWNA service supports the self-determined initiatives of our Native community partners and emerging leaders who are working for sustainable gains on the reservations.

Another part of our mission or primary purpose, as stated in our bylaws, is to focus public attention upon the challenges, needs, concerns and conditions of Native Americans. We do this through the PWNA Blog, social media pages, awareness campaign landing pages such as this one, and through direct mail. For 30 years, we’ve used direct mail fundraising to maintain our loyal donor base and educate them on Native community challenges, opportunities and our work. We also use direct mail as a cost-effective (postage-saving) way to inform donors of other actions they can take to support our mission. Typically, these actions ask donors to share the information or insert provided in the direct mail package, or they alert donors to PWNA publications or letters they can send to organizations and news outlets that can help raise awareness (and we track these downloads). This public education is important due to the many misconceptions about Native people, history and funding or entitlements. Since we include some of our public education in direct mail packages, we also follow the Financial Accounting Standards Board guidelines and allocate a portion of our direct mail costs to program services and a portion to fundraising. Call us to learn more about our public education.