That local model has since become the foundation for something much bigger. Our network has expanded well beyond southern New Mexico, growing into direct partnerships with Native communities and sovereign tribal nations across the state — relationships built on trust, cultural understanding, and genuine on-the-ground presence, not just service delivery. That evolution has put Meridian in a unique position: we're no longer only a connector between individuals and care, we're a bridge between sovereign nations and government. We carry the realities, priorities, and governance structures of tribal communities into the rooms where policy and funding decisions get made, and we carry resources and partnership opportunities back to the communities that need them. That two-way bridge is what allows real, lasting access to get built — not imposed from outside, but grown from relationships that already exist.

There is no single "tribal strategy" that works across New Mexico, and we wouldn't be doing this work well if we pretended otherwise. New Mexico is home to many sovereign tribal nations, each with its own culture, governance structure, and way of making decisions. Our approach starts by understanding each nation on its own terms — its culture, its governance, and the nuances of its decision-making bodies — before we design a single program. That cultural knowledge comes from our own team's lived experience, including decades of Navajo Nation governance experience and Pueblo tribal policy expertise, together with trusted, on-the-ground team members who hear directly from their communities every day.