Anyone who has driven through or lives on the reservation can tell you the living conditions there are less than ideal. Gaping holes in houses are patched by tarps, electricity and telephone lines are few and far between, and cell phone coverage is spotty at best. In a country that likes to bill itself as the greatest nation on Earth, there are people in the Navajo Nation who still have to drive miles to a chapter house to shower because their homes have no running water.

The Navajo Nation has been rocked by a lot of upheaval in recent weeks. With controversies over political ethics and a new power plant, it’s time for the leadership of the reservation to look to the future and decide what they want to be in 10 years — a thriving economic powerhouse or a third-world country.

Modernization has come slowly to the reservation, but it doesn’t have to stay that way. With just a little federal help — a tiny fraction of the national budget — new pipelines could be laid to bring water to rural communities, and the communications framework for increased cell phone, television, radio and Internet use could be made widely available.

Of course, there are other issues to overcome, such as questions of sovereignty and cultural contamination. However, the opportunity should at least be given to the Navajo people living in the nation to have the same conveniences the rest of America enjoys. It’s only fair to extend equal opportunities to everyone; otherwise, the reservation will continue to stagnate and fall behind the pack when it comes to technology.

Great strides have been made in bringing these services to the people who could benefit from them, but progress is slow, thanks in part to a Navajo Nation Communications and Utility Department that has only 12 full-time employees. It’s no wonder that change has not come more swiftly to the nation.

While the Navajo Nation is a semi-autonomous country within the United States, it is still dependent on America, which gives our representatives in Congress a responsibility to the Navajo people. There are untold billions of dollars floating around Washington, D.C. If only a tiny fraction of that money could be brought back to improve telecommunications and utilities on the reservation, the quality of life for people living there would increase dramatically. We have a moral obligation to our fellow Americans to maintain an equal standard of living for everyone.