HomelandsGet the appA note from Danny
The story
I grew up on the Spokane Indian Reservation, and I'm a citizen of the Spokane Tribe, with family ties to Kamloops too. That community raised me, and it's shaped everything I've built since, including this app.
Where the idea came from
In 2021 I learned that the remains of more than 200 children had been found at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia. Some of my own relatives went through that school. I didn't know how to sit with that news, so I did what I know how to do. I ran. I organized a relay covering 215 miles, one for every child. The runners who showed up stayed with me.
The next year I organized a virtual run. Log your miles, then figure out whose Native lands you'd covered. People showed up, but getting an answer was a mess. You had to bounce between a fitness app, a website, and a separate lands database. A lot of people gave up partway through. Not because they didn't care. Because it was too much work for something that should be simple.
That's when Homelands started. I wanted the answer to just show up. The picture in my head was simple: finish your run, even one you recorded on a watch, and know whose land you were on without a second search. The app you can download today records the run on your phone.
How I got here
I went to Spokane Community College, then Washington State University, where I earned a degree in business administration and economics, with a focus on comparative ethnic studies. From there I did Gonzaga's MBA in American Indian Entrepreneurship. It's a program built for Native students, and the only one of its kind in the country. That's where I found my voice as a leader, not just as a student with ideas I kept to myself.
Today I'm the finance director for the Spokane Indian Housing Authority. Outside of that I'm an ultra runner and a certified running coach. Homelands is where those things meet: business, community, and the trail.
What I'm building toward
Most people and organizations treat a simple land acknowledgment as the finish line. In actuality, it is only the starting line. Homelands is my answer to that. I want it to be the guide on your path.
For a lot of people, that path is the middle of a run, a hike, or a ride. Not a plaque, and not a website they'll never open. Land acknowledgment, and land back, belong in something people already do.
Down the road, I want the app to hold living history: pages built with tribes, in their own words. I want it to give back. Profits toward my community, and someday a youth cross-country team on the reservation, so kids out here grow up running and knowing whose land they're on.
Bringing it to life
I started the branding and the feel of the app myself, then brought on Appsketiers to build it. What stood out was that they were as excited about it as I was. My friend Beau Denison has been part of this from early on, handling marketing and the first Homelands website.
The app is on the App Store and Google Play. I'm glad people can use it, and I still want to hear what feels right and what doesn't. If you try it, tell me.