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.
Read more about Gila River Indian Community: Attractions, Currently Inhabited Communities, Famous People
Famous quotes containing the words river, indian and/or community:
“Naught was familiar but the heavens, from under whose roof the voyageur never passes; but with their countenance, and the acquaintance we had with river and wood, we trusted to fare well under any circumstances.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The white man’s mullein soon reigned in Indian corn-fields, and sweet-scented English grasses clothed the new soil. Where, then, could the red man set his foot?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The poorest children in a community now find the beneficent kindergarten open to them from the age of two-and-a-half to six years. Too young heretofore to be eligible to any public school, they have acquired in their babyhood the vicious tendencies of their own depraved neighborhoods; and to their environment at that tender age had been due the loss of decency and self-respect that no after example of education has been able to restore to them.”
—Virginia Thrall Smith (1836–1903)