Bridging the Transportation Divide for SoCal Tribes
Organization: Southern California Tribal Chairmen’s Association (SCTCA)
Funding Request: $500,000.00
Project Summary
“Bridging the Transportation Divide for SoCal Tribes” is a Tribal-led capacity-building project of the Southern California Tribal Chairmen’s Association (SCTCA), a 501(c)(3) multiservice nonprofit established in 1972 that represents 26 federally recognized Tribes. The project advances equity and Tribal sovereignty through sustainable mobility, directly confronting a history in which transportation planning has largely excluded Tribes. Its central aim is to establish a Tribal-led framework for assessing, planning, and funding transportation solutions tailored to the cultural and geographic contexts of Southern California Tribes, delivered through a Technical Assistance (TA) Team designed to be responsive rather than prescriptive.
The work builds Tribal transportation planning and implementation capacity to create a self-sustaining cycle of development, providing technical assistance for strategic planning, options analyses, partnership development, and job training, alongside curated grant opportunities and grant-writing support to move Tribes’ priority projects toward implementation. The project budget includes stipends to compensate Tribes for staff time devoted to engagement, and it integrates climate-health metrics into planning to ensure durable outcomes. A signature deliverable is a comprehensive Tribal transportation toolkit, featuring standardized templates for needs assessments, education, and action planning, that equips Tribes to lead future transportation development independently. Throughout, the project supports and expands the capacity of the Tribal Energy & Climate Collaborative (TECC) as an extension of the Tribes’ internal capacity.
Project Descriptions and Transportation Equity
The transportation inequities facing Southern California Tribes are rooted in longstanding systemic barriers. When the federal government established reservations in the region, it consigned many to land that is remote and arid, with limited infrastructure; many reservations are accessible by only one or a few roads; local roads, bridges, and stormwater systems are inadequate or nonexistent, and EV chargers are rare, with insufficient power distribution to support charging. These conditions hinder Tribal sustainability, create daily mobility constraints, and leave Tribes vulnerable to severe weather, wildfires, and floods, threatening access to essential services and evacuation routes and impairing firefighting and rescue efforts. These barriers persist because Tribal lands in remote areas have not been prioritized for infrastructure investment and Tribes lack the resources to fund priority upgrades alone, leaving them to bear disproportionate climate risks and mitigation costs.
The project addresses these inequities by creating an ecosystem of support that engages directly with Tribal leaders to identify specific needs and align outcomes with Tribal priorities. It focuses on mobility needs identified by the Tribes themselves, including for low-income families, youth, and elders, the groups most at peril when transportation infrastructure fails. The TA Team will perform Tribal and inter-Tribal needs assessments and planning, identify grant opportunities, and provide grant-writing support, producing 26 individual Tribal Needs Assessments and Community Transportation Plans alongside a Collective Needs Assessment and an Intertribal Transportation Plan. By integrating climate-health metrics and leveraging SCTCA’s relationships with regional partners such as SANDAG and SCAG, the project ensures that planning advances both equitable access and long-term climate resilience.
Community Benefit
The project community comprises SCTCA’s 26 Member Tribes and their lands across four counties, totaling nearly 583,000 acres, home to Tribal members, families, workers, and guests whose mobility depends on Tribal transportation infrastructure. Populations most directly affected by current inequities include permanent residents and visitors whose access to essential facilities is impaired by inadequate roads, with low-income families, youth, and elders at greatest peril when infrastructure fails in hazardous conditions. The project benefits these populations by building Tribal planning and implementation capacity, providing technical assistance for strategic planning, options analyses, and partnership development, plus curated grant opportunities and grant-writing support to advance priority projects.
As priority projects are completed, the benefits will vary by Tribal context but include safer roads, reliable transit for elders, and more sustainable, climate-friendly transportation systems, with compounding gains such as improved access to Tribal lands and services, greater resilience against climate impacts, modernized infrastructure supporting economic development and job growth, and more self-sufficient communities. The engagement approach is deliberately Tribe-centered: at the request of participating Tribes, the TA Team supports their own community engagement and education processes, including materials that increase community understanding of clean transportation options. This ensures equitable access to project information while respecting the sovereignty and confidentiality of each Tribe in serving its members, making decisions, and stewarding its cultural and knowledge resources.
Partnerships and Structure
The partnership is governed through SCTCA and TECC’s existing inter-Tribal governance framework, ensuring ongoing consultation, reporting, and accountability to SCTCA’s Member Tribes. The roles are organized as follows:
SCTCA (Lead Applicant): A nonprofit created to deliver shared services and facilitate collaboration among Southern California Tribes, SCTCA provides overall governance oversight through its Board of Chairpersons from all 26 Member Tribes, plus administrative support and program guidance from staff, including Executive Assistant Pei-Chen Chang and Director of Technology Matt Rantanen.
Prosper Sustainably (Sub-Applicant): A woman-owned microbusiness and TECC partner responsible for project management and implementation, including contracting subject-matter experts and subcontractors to respond to Tribal TA requests. Its role is led by Joshua Simmons, Principal Consultant and TECC Co-Director, and it brings deep experience with Tribal clean-energy projects, including solar+storage microgrids, battery storage, and EV charging.
Los Coyotes Band of Cahuilla & Cupeño Indians (Sub-Applicant): Serves as a pilot partner for the planning and capacity-building scope, guiding the TA Team to ensure program design addresses the needs of underserved Tribes and encouraging participation by other eligible Tribes.
Ray Teran (Community Partner): Chair of the TECC Executive Board and Resource Management Director for the Viejas Band of Kumeyaay Indians, guiding to ensure the program addresses the needs and priorities of all 26 Member Tribes.
Decision-making authority is managed through TECC’s platform for inter-Tribal governance, whose Governing Board mirrors SCTCA’s Board of Chairpersons from all 26 Member Tribes. The structure builds equity directly: the TA Team works to maintain alignment with Tribal interests and transparency in reporting, and the budget includes participation stipends to help Tribes bear the costs of engagement, calculated at $100 per hour based on estimated level of effort, consistent with TECC’s existing stipend policies.