The 574 federally recognized Indian tribes and 229 Alaska Native villages in the United States are very diverse in terms of culture, economy, geography, size, and climate. As a result, programs that can be successful in one tribal law enforcement agency may not be adaptable to others. However, there is one approach which has shown to increase public safety for all: community policing. An actionable strategy that underlies all law enforcement activities, it is based on the principle of crime prevention through collaboration with the communities’ law enforcement serves—collaboration based on mutual trust. For 30 years, the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS Office) has been advancing the practice of community policing by the nation’s state, local, territorial, and tribal law enforcement agencies by providing technical assistance and grant resources.

Since 1994, the COPS Office has awarded more than 3,200 of these grants to more than 300 tribal law enforcement agencies. Altogether, they have provided nearly $800 million for training, technology acquisition, community policing initiatives, and the hiring of more than 2,200 officers in tribal nations. Though these programs vary to meet specific needs, they can be broadly categorized as support for Hiring, Technology and Equipment, Community Policing Development, Innovative Practices, Officer Mental Health and Wellness, and Technical Assistance.

Hiring Tribal Law Enforcement Officers

Since 1995, the COPS Hiring Program (CHP) and its hiring program predecessors have provided funds directly to hundreds of tribal law enforcement agencies, enabling them to increase their community policing and crime prevention efforts by hiring new or rehiring former law enforcement officers. In 2023 alone, six tribes received CHP funding for this purpose, and 18 others received funds from the COPS Office’s Tribal Resources Grant Program-HIRE (TRGP-Hire) (DOJ Coordinated Tribal Assistance Solicitation [CTAS] Purpose Area 1), which also supports the procurement of equipment and training for the newly hired or rehired officers.

Through various COPS Office programs, including CHP and TRGP, Alaska Native agencies have also received support for hiring, equipping, and training law enforcement officers, including Village Public Safety Officers, Village Police Officers, and Tribal Police Officers.

Another source of support for hiring, which also benefits tribal youth, is Community Policing Development (CPD) Microgrants. In 2014, Idaho’s Nez Perce Tribe was awarded CPD funding to foster a new generation of Native law enforcement leaders through the creation of the Indian Youth Explorer’s Police Academy (IYEPA), which encourages teenagers to consider a career in law enforcement by introducing them to police work through a variety of engaging activities.

Technology and Equipment

The acquisition of technology and equipment, ranging from computers and body cameras to police vehicles, is enabled by the COPS Office’s TRGP-Equipment and Technology (TRGP-E/T), which has awarded more than 2,000 grants to hundreds of American Indian and Alaska Native communities. One example grantee is the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska, which provides public safety services on a reservation of more than 12,000 acres across two states. In 2017, they used a TRGP/CTAS grant to upgrade their technology. In addition to purchasing critical communications equipment, the tribe acquired the certification training necessary for providing public safety services in both states.

The Technology and Equipment Program (TEP) is another COPS Office grant program designed to help tribes acquire equipment, technologies, and interoperable communications for responding to and preventing crime. Among the tribes that have received TEP funding is the Oneida Nation in Wisconsin, which was awarded funds in 2022 to upgrade current equipment and safety support operations while addressing possible violence and public health threats.

Community Policing Development and Innovative Practices

Since its inception, the COPS Office has awarded funds to hundreds of tribal law enforcement agencies to develop innovative strategies and adopt effective crime prevention practices. In 2021, CPD grants were awarded to several nations. Among them was the Cahto Tribe of Laytonville Rancheria in California, which used the funding to collaborate with the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office, the Laytonville Fire Department, and other tribes to develop culturally sensitive de-escalation techniques.

These and other grants are also awarded to stakeholders who collaborate with Indian country law enforcement. One example of this is the Arizona Association of Chiefs of Police’s Law Enforcement Accreditation Program (ALEAP), which received CPD funding in 2021 for training, technical, financial, and technology assistance which enabled them to help tribal law enforcement gain state accreditation.

Another is Western Oregon University, which received a TRGP-Technical Assistance grant to create a tribal-centered approach to address the concerns of American Indian and Alaska Native communities regarding Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons (MMIP). This effort included development of a training program, Effective Multi-Jurisdictional Collaboration in Missing or Murdered Indigenous Persons Cases, which is available in the COPS Office’s Training Portal as well as the COPS Office library of memoranda of understanding (MOU) and memoranda of agreement (MOA).

Officer Mental Health & Wellness

To improve the delivery of and access to mental health and wellness services for law enforcement through peer support, training, family resources, suicide prevention, stress reduction, and other promising practices, the COPS Office provides funding awards through the Law Enforcement Mental Health and Wellness Act (LEMWHA) program.

Since this program was first offered in 2019, the COPS Office has provided these funding awards to seven tribal law enforcement agencies. Among them was the Muscogee (Creek) Nation (MCN) of Oklahoma Lighthorse Police Department (LHP). In 2020, the department received LEMWHA funding to provide the agency’s officers, administrative staff, and dispatchers with tools to handle the mental and emotional challenges of working in the law enforcement field. According to Daniel D. Wind III, Deputy Chief of Police, it enabled a program that met the LHP’s needs with a program tailored to the challenges of being a first responder on a tribal reservation.

Technical Assistance

The COPS Office Collaborative Reform Initiative Technical Assistance Center (CRI-TAC) provides customized technical assistance resources to state, local, territorial, tribal, and campus law enforcement agencies to meet a wide variety of needs, and has been assisting tribes since its inception. In 2019, the Klamath Tribes of southern Oregon received resources and technical assistance to create a tribal police department. Working with CRI-TAC and supported by a team with Indian country policing experience, they established a department that received enthusiastic tribal community buy-in. In the same year, the COPS Office also implemented a technical assistance plan to advance public safety in Alaska’s Native villages through CRI-TAC resources. This plan included direct support to Native villages with training for both Tribal and Village Police Officers.

In addition to CRI-TAC, the Tribal Resources Grant Program - Technical Assistance (TRGP-TA) can help a tribe enhance their law enforcement agency, develop policies and procedures, and address jurisdictional challenges through training and technical assistance customized to specific tribal needs.

Recent projects have included assistance to tribes regarding developing Tribal Community Response Plans to address MMIP and updating the COPS Office’s Public Law 280 training curriculum.

New Funding Opportunities for Indian Country Law Enforcement

Every year, the COPS Office offers new funding opportunities to federally recognized Indian tribes and Alaska Native law enforcement, as well as to government agencies, community groups, faith-based institutions, and other stakeholders who collaborate with them.

Though all of these grants are designed to achieve the same overarching goal—the safety of the law enforcement officers and the communities they serve—they are awarded to meet the unique needs and objectives of each tribe and nation. For more information, please see the COPS Office website.

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