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Cherokee Nation
Posted: Jan 22, 2026 9:57 AMUpdated: Jan 22, 2026 9:58 AM
Principle Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr. Talks Opportunity Zones in Cherokee Nation
Tom Davis
Appearing on COMMUNITY CONNECTION on KWON Radio on Thursday, Cherokee Nation Principle Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr. said, "What I know, and I think everybody knows in the United States, which is there's nothing more powerful for somebody to fight poverty, there's nothing more powerful for a community to lift itself up than a private sector job."
With that, Chief Hoskin started talking about the benefits of Cherokee Nation Opportunity Zones. Hoskin said, "We look across the region, and we find that there are pockets of poverty still in Northeast Oklahoma, which means there's pockets of poverty still in the Cherokee Nation, as well as in Bartlesville. We don't call them poverty zones anymore. We call them opportunity zones."
Hoskin explained,"We look at these census tracts which contain 19% or more reported poverty, or a county that's in persistent poverty. We our using our loan programs to do a couple things." He added, "One, we're going to lower the interest rate in order to lower this barrier to entry for people to get loans to start a small business. And we've never done this--We're going to remove the citizenship requirement."
Why? According to Hoskin, "If we can get jobs created in what I think is West Bartlesville, where the economy is relatively weaker than the rest of town, that's a win for our people, because somebody's creating a job.
Hoskin said they'll do the same in the rest of the Cherokee Nation, where there's about 180 of these census tracts. He said, "We just feel like we've got to do our part to make capital available to create that job. Because if you create a job for somebody, you've done something more than, as chief, I could ever do, or a council could ever do in terms of social safety. "
Details can be found at Cherokee.org.
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