Robbie McDonough, Vice President of Land and Government Relations at Crestwood Equity Partners, joined The Crude Life to discuss a community celebration and major announcement in Mandaree, North Dakota, on the Fort Berthold Reservation.
Crestwood hosted a traditional community feed under a big tent to kick off a capital campaign for a new Head Start facility. The company committed a $1 million lead naming-rights gift to the tribe.
The building will be known as the Crestwood Magiddeshta Center—Magiddeshta meaning “children” in Hidatsa—or the Crestwood Children’s Center. Crestwood also pledged its corporate resources and relationships to help raise any remaining funds needed to complete the project.
“We felt that inviting the community under the big tent, where we could all break bread together, have a meal, and make this exciting announcement was the best way to get the word out,” McDonough said. A few hundred people attended—an impressive turnout for a community of roughly 400 to 500 residents. Local council members, representatives, and others expressed strong support.
Crestwood is a midstream company whose tagline is “Connections for America’s Energy.” It gathers crude oil and natural gas from the wellhead and moves it to interstate takeaway pipelines.
The company also operates the largest crude-by-rail facility in Epping, North Dakota, and a trucking operation in Watford City. Its footprint extends across 37 states.
The company chose Mandaree because its North Dakota gathering system is concentrated on the west segment of the Fort Berthold Reservation.
“We felt that that’s a particular community that we wanted to give back to because we have such a concentration of operations there,” McDonough explained. Giving back to the places where the company works and where its employees live is a corporate pillar.
McDonough framed the project as a long-term statement during an industry downturn. Crestwood, like others, had taken austerity measures, yet the company maintains a multi-year view.
“We’re not parachuting in and then bailing out. That’s not Crestwood’s way… We’re going to invest. We’re going to put our roots in the ground,” he said. The visible nature of midstream work—pipelines, right-of-way, and surface activity—creates a direct relationship with landowners and communities that encourages sustained investment in places like Mandaree.
The announcement aligns with a broader pattern across the Bakken in which energy companies support lasting community infrastructure rather than one-off events. McDonough noted that relationships with landowners continue to improve through measures such as the Agricultural Commissioner’s Pipeline Ombudsman and growing sophistication on both sides.
The Crestwood Magiddeshta Center represents both a concrete investment in early childhood education for MHA Nation families and a public affirmation that the company intends to remain part of the Mandaree community for the long haul.
Interview from July 2019.
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