Notah Begay: Snyder's Redskins foundation a 'gimmick'

Notah Begay III, a four-time winner on the PGA Tour who runs a foundation promoting healthy kids in American Indian communities, calls a philanthropic venture started by Washington NFL team owner Daniel Snyder a public relations gimmick.

Snyder answered critics like Begay on Tuesday at a ceremony after his football team donated $100,000 toward a high school athletic field in the Virginia suburbs of Washington, citing a letter he wrote last month to announce his Washington Redskins Original Americans Foundation.

"I wrote a letter to the fans and it speaks for itself," Snyder told reporters. "It tells you we did our homework, unlike a lot of people, and we understand the issues out there. We're not an issue. The real issues are real-life issues, real-life needs, and it's time for people to focus on reality."

The National Congress of American Indians said in a statement: "Dan Snyder lives in a world where he can get his way throwing his money around. The reality is that he is stubbornly defending the use of a slur."

Ray Halbritter, Oneida Indian Nation representative, said in a statement: "Here's a reality check: The longer (Snyder) insists on slurring Native Americans, the more damage he will keep doing to Native American communities."

Begay, whose Notah Begay III Foundation will receive a national award Wednesday, spoke to USA TODAY Sports before Snyder spoke. Begay called Snyder's foundation "a gimmick ... to try to offset some of the public disdain for the name of his football team. The Washington football team's front office has tried to make the issue about them and it's really not about them. It's about, unfortunately, the NFL and its owners and its corporate partners condoning use of that word.

"I don't think if a similar racially offensive word was used for the Hispanic, African American or Jewish communities that it would be tolerated. But because the American Indian people historically have not had much political leverage, or because we don't represent a great amount of buying power from a retail standpoint, we don't get the same level of treatment that everyone else in this country gets."

The NB3 Foundation withdrew support from a charity golf tournament in Arizona this month when it learned the OAF was title sponsor. Begay, who is Navajo, Isleta Pueblo and San Felipe Pueblo, is on the golf broadcast teams for NBC and the Golf Channel. Begay's foundation won the Steve Patterson Award for Excellence in Sports Philanthropy in 2012 (named for the late UCLA basketball star Steve Patterson, who also played in the NBA.) Today Begay's foundation and the Philadelphia Eagles Youth Partnership will each receive $10,000 as winners of the Legacy Award that goes to Patterson Award winners that best used the award as a platform for growth.

Each of the 18 winners since 2005 was considered for the one-time award.

The NB3 Foundation raised $3.25 million in the two years since it won the Patterson Award, including grants from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation as well as from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which funds the Patterson and Legacy awards.

"Notah's foundation works in an area of philanthropy that is really under-resourced," says Alisha Greenberg, executive director of the Patterson Award. "Less than 1% of funding in philanthropy goes toward Native American populations."

Begay says his foundation began as a mom-and-pop foundation in 2005 with simple soccer and golf programs but expanded over time and today its focus is fighting obesity and type 2 diabetes in American Indian and Alaska Native youth. He says his degree in economics from Stanford helps him in his work.

Begay says he speaks often with former Stanford teammate Tiger Woods, who is rehabilitating from back surgery. "It's going very well," Begay says. "His pain has been eliminated. He just has to continue to take it easy for a few more weeks and that's probably the hardest thing for him to do right now."