The Na’ah Illahee Fund is an Indigenous women-led organization that supports and promotes the leadership of Indigenous women. Founded in 2005, the Seattle, WA-based nonprofit seeks transformative change through grantmaking, capacity-building, and community-based intergenerational programming fueled by culturally-grounded leadership and organizing. The Na’ah Illahee Fund acknowledges and thanks the original and current stewards of the land where they are based in the Pacific Northwest for allowing them to be guests. The community programs of Na’ah Illahee Fund include: Youth program, Yahowt Indigenous Foods Program, Wise Action, Cedar Rising Coalition (CRC) Partner and Mamook Sikhs. Through these programs, they educate and preserve their people’s culture for generations to come.
2020 Native Census Engagement
Spanning urban, rural, island, and reservation-based communities, Na’ah Illahee Fund (Mother Earth in the Chinook jargon language) works to ensure a thriving Indigenous future for Alaska, British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming. The group believes that stronger female-identified, gender nonconforming, and non-binary leaders are central to the regeneration and revitalization of Indigenous cultures and communities. Their Food Sovereignty Grant supports projects such as community gardens, sacred seed saving, traditional food and medicine workshops, Native food cooperatives, food sovereignty assessments, and climate resilience planning. The Yahowt Land & Food Restoration program focuses on Indigenous ecology, traditional food and medicine stewardship, and environmental restoration. And NIF’s E’lip Tilikum Native Land Conservancy – the first in the Pacific Northwest – aims to address centuries of dislocation, displacement, and forced separation from Mother Earth by reuniting Native land to Native hands.
