Supporter,

The COVID-19 crisis has presented numerous health, safety, and economic challenges.

But for the Navajo Nation and Hopi Reservation, where unemployment tops 50 percent, few people have health insurance and only a handful of grocery stores and mini-marts service almost 200,000 people, the pandemic has stretched scarce resources to the breaking point.

Our Sierra Club community has the opportunity to help our partners by supporting the Navajo & Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund. Can we count on your donation today? 100% of your gift will support an efford led by tribal members to make protective masks, provide food, water and PPE, and educate the public about the unique risk of COVID-19.

Like many underserved communities around our country, both the Navajo Nation—which as I write has the country's third-highest infection rate—and Hopi Reservation contain high numbers of elderly, diabetic, asthmatic, cancer-afflicted and otherwise immunocompromised—not to mention uninsured—people.

Add other stark realities, like a paucity of running water (which makes handwashing a challenge), unreliable electricity, large food deserts and broken government promises of housing and health care support, and one quickly understands why the spread of COVID-19 in these communities has been so fast—and so worrisome.

That's why we hope you'll rush your donation to support the tribal member-led Navajo & Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund now. Remember, 100% of your donation will go directly to the supplies, services and support these communities will need to weather this pandemic. The Sierra Club works closely with many leaders from these communities, and we are eager to show up for our partners in this time of great need.

Supporter, this pandemic has only magnified and amplified the inequities and injustices we knew existed in communities like the Navajo Nation and Hopi Reservation: health disparities exacerbated by centuries of environmental injustices, overcrowded housing with a mix of ages, including vulnerable, elderly family members, and a glaring underinvestment by the federal government in tribal health care.

Thankfully, our friends leading the Navajo & Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund have stepped in to protect vulnerable communities from exposure to the virus—by sending volunteers to safely purchase and deliver groceries, engaging others to sew fabric masks, running public service announcements encouraging social distancing, and more.

But in order to get this outbreak under control, they urgently need our help now. Please, rush your #GivingTuesdayNow gift to help the Navajo & Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund combat this pandemic and save lives.

While it's so disheartening to see the disproportionate price that indigenous communities and other communities of color are paying during this crisis, I'm inspired—as I'm sure you have been—to see the way that people are coming together to solve problems and save lives.

Thank you for all you have done to help serve the underserved, give voice to the sidelined and silenced, and send a strong message that no community—however remote—is invisible. I'm so grateful for your solidarity and support.

With determination,

Michael Brune
Executive Director
Sierra Club