Rosebud Tribe gets $12 million from Interior Department to electrify and upgrade homes

Less than a month after an $8 million federal award for electric transportation, the Rosebud Sioux Tribe has been awarded nearly $12 million to electrify homes across the reservation.

The $11.8 million award for Rosebud is the largest in the second round of funding from the Interior Department through the Bureau of Indian Affairs’ Tribal Electrification Program.

The money is meant to hook up electricity for homes that don’t have it, transition current homes to “zero-emissions” energy and pay for repairs and retrofits to support zero-emission hookups.

The Department of Energy’s Office of Indian Energy reported that 16,805 tribal homes across the U.S. lacked electricity as of 2022, leaving 54,209 people without it.

The electrification program “continues to provide tribes with the assistance they need to ensure their communities have safe, reliable electricity, which is essential to daily living,” Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Bryan Newland said in the news release.

The state of South Dakota declined to apply for funding through that program, with Gov. Kristi Noem’s office saying there were too many “strings attached” to the money. The city of Sioux Falls offered a similar explanation for its decision not to pursue the funds.

Rapid City applied for and received a $1 million planning grant through the program.