The California Valley Miwok Tribe – located at 10601 Escondido Pl., Stockton, CA (As listed in the Federal Register of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, BIA/DOI), a federally recognized tribe eligible to receive and distribute services from the federal government – on Monday, December 6th, held the final USDA food distribution for 2010. The Tribe is hopeful that 2011 will bring a new beginning, where many services not currently being made available to the Tribe will be released, so that the Tribe may lessen the suffering of the many Native Americans it now assists with what little it currently has within its service area.
The Tribe again was obligated to store distributions for some families that due to bad weather or current financial distress, were unable to attend. Mark Fountain, Vice Chairman of the Calaveras County Mountain Me-Wuk, helped during the distribution, as did Richard “Windfeathers” Muniz, Commander of the San Joaquin Native American Veteran’s Lodge. This distribution also saw the addition of another very special individual whom helped throughout the event; Mr. Freddie M. Canez.
Mr. Canez is the founding president of the local Viejitos Car Club of the San Joaquin Valley. It is a family oriented organization that itself does food drives, toy drives and other special events and activities within the local communities. Mr. Canez was in the United States Marine Corps. Echo Company, 2nd Battalion, 4th Marines, 3rd Division when they were sent into Saigon at the end of our involvement in Vietnam in 1975 to evacuate the remaining Americans in the U.S. Embassy. He was actually on the last helicopter that left the roof top of the Embassy, with a hail of bullets blanketing their departure. The Tribe is honored that Mr. Canez took the time out of his busy schedule to assist us with this program.
The Tribe would like to thank the Tule River Tribe, the Tule River Food Distribution staff and the United States Department of Agriculture for the great inter-tribal and government-to-government relationships that it enjoys with all previous mentioned entities. The Tribe is very proud of the image that it has projected in its local Native American community through its selfless works and self-sacrifice, while emphasizing the utmost ethical and moral standards that it has so inspired people of distinction such as Mr. Canez that they align themselves alongside the Tribe in helping to better the lives of not only Native Americans, but everyone whom resides locally and in the surrounding communities.