MIGIZI
Lake Street is Indigenous Land
Photography by Bruce Silcox
Lake Street is Indigenous land. Lake Street is the traditional land of the Dakota and Objibwe people.
Indigenous people were forcefully removed from the land they called home through genocide, broken treaties and government-sanctioned aggression.
Including on Lake Street.
“Lake Street feels like home. My father would always say, when you're walking down Lake street, know that the dust you are kicking up is the dust of our ancestors, the Dakota & Ojibwe people originally from this area. I hope Lake Street and its businesses continue to reflect the diverse communities that live in Minneapolis.”
Binesikwe Means, Lead Media Instructor for MIGIZI
Native people continued to be misrepresented and shown inaccurately in the media into the late twentieth century. In 1977, MIGIZI was founded as Migizi Communications, Inc. with a goal of countering the misrepresentations and inaccuracies about Native people in the media. In the 1900s MIGIZI found its home base on Lake Street and shifted to focus on serving youth. Most of the students they serve live along bus lines and being on Lake Street makes their programs accessible for their community.
MIGIZI Works with high school aged interns in 3 programs:
Culture, Leadership Academies, and Wellingbeing (CLAW)
Green Tech - interns learn more about careers in the green industry
First Person Productions - a social enterprise that employs youth to work on social media marketing for small businesses and nonprofits.
Binesikwe Means, Lead Media Instructor for MIGIZI says, “MIGIZI is more than just a youth serving organization, we provide opportunities for our youth and empower them to find their own voices. We provide a circle of support for our interns.”
In 2018, MIGIZI began to build a new space for their youth at 3017 27th Ave S. The multi-million dollar project was a success. MIGIZI was able to operate in their new home for almost half a year until Covid-19 transitioned their programming online. Some of their more popular online programming was Medicine Mondays and their online tutoring program.
Then the organization lost everything.
During the civil unrest following the murder of George Floyd, a fire began at a neighboring restaurant and club, El Nuevo Rodeo. The fire destroyed the entire block, including MIGIZI’s 8-month old building.
For the past two years, MIGIZI has been in a temporary location alongside Du Nord Social Spirits, less than a ten minute walk from their former location.
Next Fall 2023, MIGIZI projects to open their new building at 1845 E Lake Street, formerly Little Brothers – Friends of the Elderly. This Lake Street location was selected again due to its ease of access for youth and inseparable ties to the community. The building includes geothermal heating, solar panels, and a recording studio. The new building will be the first time all of the MIGIZI programs are hosted in one space since 2019
“Our hope for the future of MIGIZI is to continue to provide high quality programming for our interns. MIGIZI has always had innovative programming and I hope we are able to serve even more youth as we move into the new space”
Binesikwe Means, Lead Media Instructor for MIGIZI
With Predevelopment funding from the Lake Street Council and support from donors nationwide. However, building today has become much more costly than ever before due to world wide labor shortages and rising costs. Contributions can be made to MIGIZI at migizi.org/rise.