Southern California’s San Manuel Indian Tribe will donate $14 million to Claremont Graduate University (CGU) to create a health research center on the campus of the Inland Empire school.
The official announcement is expected Tuesday. The donation will be used to purchase the Huntley Bookstore building at the center of the Claremont Colleges campus. The building will be converted into the Yuhaaviatam Center for Health Studies, a multi-disciplinary health research center rooted in a health and well-being initiative launched more than a year ago.
The tribe, which is headquartered in the San Bernardino County community of Highland, operates San Manuel Casino, located roughly 60 miles from downtown Los Angeles.
The name of the new campus facility translates to “People of the Pines,” which refers to the San Manuel tribe’s ancestors who inhabited the Inland Empire area.
The center will facilitate collaboration among CGU researchers, scientists, and outside partners to address health and well-being challenges. The effort will focus on the underserved and vulnerable populations of the Inland Empire and Indian Country.
The Los Angeles area is home to the largest population of Native Americans found in an urban area of the U.S. San Manuel leaders said the tribe understands obstacles facing many of the region’s underserved communities because of its own past economic and health-related struggles.
“In our role as stewards of our ancestral lands, we support our neighboring communities, in addition to our Tribe,” San Manuel Tribal Chair Ken Ramirez said in a statement. “For generations, low-income communities and underserved populations have needed quality healthcare. Our gift is an investment in future healthier communities, and one we are happy to make.”
In February, the San Manuel Tribe donated $9 million to the University of Nevada, Las Vegas to fund tribal development programs through the university’s hospitality college and school of law.
The Huntley Bookstore building, a 23,000 square-foot facility, has served as The Claremont Colleges’ central bookstore for 50 years. The School of Community & Global Health will serve as the anchor tenant.
CGU President Len Jessup said the partnership between the university and the tribe makes it possible to create “powerful new collaborations on preventive and proactive responses to the kinds of chronic illness affecting so many today.”
Discussion of the gift began in 2019 but was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic crisis.
San Manuel’s partnership with CGU began in 2006 with the establishment of the university’s Tribal Administration Program, which provides intensive training in areas of management related to tribal governance and administration. The Huntley building also will serve as that program’s home and the location of an envisioned tribal community governance and jurisdiction center focused on health, well-being, and other issues affecting Indian Country.
“Real, substantial breakthroughs happen when people from many disciplines come together and collaborate. That’s the hallmark of our transdisciplinary philosophy,” Jessup said. “The purchase of the Huntley makes it possible to create such a space for that kind of engagement on our campus.”
The San Manuel Tribe is renovating its casino by adding a $550 million expansion to create a full-scale resort that includes a 450-room hotel tower, a 3,000-seat events center, new restaurants, and other non-gaming attractions.
The tribe’s business and government operations employ more than 4,000.
Former San Manuel Tribal Chair Deron Marquez, a CGU alumnus and member of the university’s board of trustees, said the center’s work will resonate far beyond Southern California.
“The types of health and well-being research that will be tackled by the center are relevant to the needs and situations of so many today. Its benefits will ripple out,” Marquez said. “To bring together the university’s pioneering approach to research with San Manuel’s philanthropic vision is truly exciting.”
Howard Stutz is the executive editor of CDC Gaming. He can be reached at hstutz@cdcgaming.com. Follow @howardstutz on Twitter.
