Recounting a story from her Choctaw Nation, Nanette Star describes two brothers fishing in a river. Someone is drowning. One brother dives in to save them. More near deaths follow, and the other brother has a realization: He needs to go upstream to prevent others from falling in.
“That is our work and why we do intervention — which you can see in early learning, child welfare and juvenile rehabilitation,” Washington state’s newest director of tribal relations said in an April 24 interview with The Imprint. “We have to be upriver to see how to prevent that, and how to provide more community support.”
Star, 49, sees her new post with Washington’s Department of Children, Youth, and Families as an essential “bridge” between tribes and the state. Her first day was April 16. She is responsible for building and maintaining relationships with tribal leaders, ensuring that the agency’s more than 5,500 employees and their policies are aligned with tribes. Star reports to Secretary of the Department of Children, Youth, and Families Tana Senn, and part of her job will be to provide oversight on legislation that impacts tribal nations.
Washington state is among a small number of states around the country with a similar director position. California, Colorado, Oregon and Arizona have tribal relations or tribal affairs offices within their human services systems.
Star has 15 years of experience working in tribal, county and state governments.
For the past three years she directed policy and planning for the California Consortium for Urban Indian Health, a nonprofit working to improve health care access among urban Indigenous communities. She has previously worked in public health positions in California and Alaska.
“Her work has centered on helping systems better align with Tribal sovereignty and on strengthening government-to-government relations,” said Senn in a press release. “I look forward to seeing her build strong and meaningful relationships that will ensure Tribal children, families and communities in Washington receive services that are high quality and respectful of Tribal cultures.”
Star is the state’s third director of tribal relations, a post established in 2018.
“We are looking forward to working with the new director in her critical role with assisting tribal families and supporting government-to-government relations in Washington state,” a spokesperson for the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe said in a statement.
