The Gila River Indian Community is an Indian reservation in the U.S. state of Arizona, lying adjacent to the south side of the city of Phoenix, within the Phoenix Metropolitan Area in Pinal and Maricopa Counties. It was established in 1859, and formally established by Congress in 1939. The Community is home for members of both the Akimel O’odham (Pima) and the Pee-Posh (Maricopa) tribes.
The reservation has a land area of 583.749 sq mi (1,511.902 km²) and a 2000 Census population of 11,257. It is made up of seven districts along the Gila River and its largest communities are Sacaton, Komatke, Santan, and Blackwater. Tribal administrative offices and departments are located in Sacaton. The Community operates its own telecom company, electric utility, industrial park and healthcare clinic, and publishes a monthly newspaper. The Gila River Indian Community Governor is Gregory Mendoza(2012). It has one of the highest rates of type 2 diabetes in the world, around 50%. The community has been very helpful in type 2 diabetes research, participating in many studies of the disease.
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Famous quotes containing the words river, indian and/or community:
“There is a river in Macedon, and there is moreover a river in Monmouth. It is called Wye at Monmouth, but it is out of my prains what is the name of the other river; but ‘tis all one, ‘tis alike as my fingers is to my fingers, and there is salmons in both.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“I confess what chiefly interests me, in the annals of that war, is the grandeur of spirit exhibited by a few of the Indian chiefs. A nameless Wampanoag who was put to death by the Mohicans, after cruel tortures, was asked by his butchers, during the torture, how he liked the war?—he said, “he found it as sweet as sugar was to Englishmen.””
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
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—Bernice Weissbourd (20th century)