Brian “BB” Melendez is a Northern/Southern Paiute-Western Shoshone from the Great Basin, and an enrolled Tribal citizen of the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony. For the past two decades, he has been a Grassroots Organizer, a Spiritual Leader (Sundance Chief of his Tribe’s summer ceremonies and other ritual dances), a formerly elected Tribal Legislator, a Law Enforcement Officer for the State of Nevada, a former Federal Operations Officer for the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the CEO of Lucentree, LLC (an Indigenous Consulting Firm), a published American Indian Spirituality Scholar, the host of the Coffee with an Indian Podcast, and the President/CEO of Tribal Minds, Inc., a Native Non-Profit. Brian has a bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice, a master’s degree in Justice Management and is currently applying to Law School. In his free time, Brian is composing a novel and hoping to be completed with this task by the year's end.