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About Smoke signals. (Grand Ronde, Or.) 19??-current | View Entire Issue (March 1, 2017)
MARCH 1, 2017 S moke S ignals 13 Leno calls the agreement 'disheartening' TERO continued from front page 16, Oregon Transportation Com- mission meeting to lodge a strong protest. Grand Ronde Tribal Council Chairman Reyn Leno was accom- panied by Tribal Council members Tonya Gleason-Shepek, Jack Giffen Jr. and Denise Harvey, as well as Acting TERO Director John Mer- cier, Tribal Attorney Rob Greene, Assistant Tribal Attorney Kim D’Aquila and Tribal lobbyist Justin Martin. Leno testified for five minutes during the commission’s public comments period, calling the mem- orandum of understanding between ODOT and Warm Springs “dis- heartening.” Leno’s testimony comes on the heels of Department of Transporta- tion Director Matt Garrett visiting Tribal Council on Tuesday, Feb. 14, where he said that the department had “exhausted all avenues” in try- ing to reach an agreement that was acceptable to both Tribes. The proposed ODOT-Warm Springs agreement would run through January 2019 and include a 60-mile radius that would begin on the Warm Springs Reservation, which would create the contentious overlap on the west side of the Cascades. Leno said before giving his Trans- portation Commission testimony that Tribal Council wanted to explain its position to the mem- bership. And that position boils down to treaties. The Grand Ronde Tribe has seven ratified treaties with the United States, including the Willamette Valley Treaty of 1855 that ceded most of western Oregon to the federal government. The Warm Springs Tribe has the largest Reservation in Oregon that is located east of the Cascade Moun- tains. However, its agreement with the Department of Transportation would give Warm Springs Tribal employment rights over the crest of the Cascade Mountains into Grand Ronde’s ceded homelands. Leno reminded the Oregon Trans- portation Commission that Grand Ronde signed a memorandum of understanding with ODOT in Jan- uary 2014 that ensures contractors engaged in federal-aid highway construction projects within a 60- mile radius of the Grand Ronde Reservation work with the Tribal Employment Rights Office to pro- vide employment preference to qualified Native American workers. Grand Ronde also collects a fee – 2.25 percent for the first $2 million – for qualified construction projects that helps fund the TERO program. “The boundary in the MOU in- cludes the Portland metropolitan area, an area within a reason- able commuting distance from Grand Ronde and part of our treaty homelands,” Leno said. “Since 2014, Grand Ronde’s Trib- al Employment Rights Office has supplied qualified Indian workers, including members of the Siletz and Warm Springs Tribes, to serve in Grand Ronde’s ceded homelands. “The area of overlap is well beyond a reasonable commuting distance for residents of the Warm Springs Reservation, and it includes a large part of Grand Ronde’s treaty homelands,” Leno said. “Recognition and preser- vation of Grand Ronde’s history in the area and the positive contractor relationships we have de- veloped are of the utmost importance to the Tribe.” Leno requested that the Oregon Transportation Commission not move forward with any TERO agreement that creates an overlapping boundary until Grand Ronde, Warm Springs and ODOT devel- op a solution that can be implemented when the ex- isting Grand Ronde MOU expires in January 2019. “Grand Ronde raised with ODOT and Warm Springs these and other concerns with overlap- ping project boundaries when it first learned of Warm Springs’ proposed project boundary,” Leno said. “To our knowledge, our concerns will not be addressed in the Warm Springs MOU. Map created by George Valdez “We understand that Depending on where the center of the Director Garrett is in the 60-mile radius is designated in the Oregon unenviable position of nav- Department of Transportation and Warm igating different Tribal in- Springs Tribal Employment Rights agreement terests, but simply ignoring that is currently being negotiated, the Grand Ronde’s concerns overlap with the Grand Ronde Tribe’s already is a betrayal of our past established TERO area in the Willamette partnerships and govern- ment-to-government rela- Valley varies. From top to bottom, the tionship with ODOT.” overlap changes if the Warm Springs center Leno also cited the Tribe’s is designated from the center of the Warm substantial financial con- Springs Reservation, the town of Warm tributions to state road- Springs or the northwestern boundary of the way projects designed to Warm Springs Reservation with Highway 26. relieve congestion and im- prove traffic safety, such as $4 million donated to the New- as flaggers, laborers, masons and berg-Dundee Bypass and the Grand painters on more than 38 highway Ronde Road improvement project. projects, including 17 projects in Transportation Commission the Portland metropolitan area. Chair Tammy Baney was the only In 2016 alone, at least 50 workers one of four commissioners in atten- on those projects were sent by the dance to respond and she remained Grand Ronde TERO. Contractor non-committal, thanking Grand feedback on these workers has Ronde representatives for their been uniformly positive. time in attending the meeting. “Because of our long cooperative “I have been briefed on the issue history with ODOT, it was extreme- and the partnership is very import- ly disheartening to learn earlier ant to us,” Baney said. “It is my this week that Director Garrett understanding that there are other has decided to sign an MOU with conversations that will be ongoing. the Confederated Tribes of Warm I very much appreciate you being Springs Tribal Employment Rights here today to share with us. We Office, which includes a project are aware of this and we appreciate boundary that will overlap with the your time spent in bringing this to project boundary covered by Grand our attention.” Ronde’s existing MOU.” The memorandum continues the Leno said that an overlapping Grand Ronde Tribe’s contentious TERO boundary between two relationship with Warm Springs, Tribes likely will create adminis- which continues to pursue inroads trative difficulties and contractor into the Willamette Valley and confusion. Other Tribal Council balked during TERO boundary ne- members expressed their concern gotiations at recognizing the Grand during the Feb. 14 meeting that Ronde Tribe’s treaties. Warm Springs will be teaching In the 2000s, Warm Springs its history to contractors working proposed building a casino in the Columbia River Gorge, which is part of the Grand Ronde Tribe’s ceded homelands. More recently, Warm Springs attempted to ac- quire hunting tags on the west side of the Cascades, but was unsuccess- ful, and the eastern Oregon Tribe purchased 277 acres in Yamhill County as part of the Bonneville Power Administration’s Willamette Wildlife Mitigation Program. “Our expectation is that we don’t go on the other side of the moun- tain. We’re not going over there trying to do that to them. This is really disappointing to us,” Leno said during the Feb. 14 meeting with Garrett in Tribal Council’s conference room. “This is probably one of the most disappointing decisions I have ever seen come out of the state govern- ment,” Giffen said during the Feb. 14 meeting. “We’ve been restored for 33 years and we’ve gone through every agency with a similar out- come. We make compromises. We come to the table and we negotiate and make compromises, but it seems like some of the other Tribes, they come in and demand and get what they want. … We went to the table with those folks and gave them a very, very small piece of language that they just recognize this as our ceded lands and they refused that. Then you folks go and give them the opportunity to fulfill their dreams.” Garrett said that Tribal disagree- ments might become more frequent in the future as the Siletz Tribe seeks to establish a Tribal Employ- ment Rights Office, which would create another overlap between Oregon Tribes. John Mercier, the Grand Ronde Tribe’s Acting TERO director, said that the current program has 317 potential workers, including 30 Warm Springs Tribal members. “We accept all federally recog- nized Indians in our program,” Mercier said. He said the potential solution is a proposal that is being exam- ined in Washington state where a statewide agreement would dictate that overlapping Tribal boundaries require the affected Tribes to share in TERO fees and employment and the closest Tribe would administer the project. “We just want our aboriginal areas acknowledged,” Mercier said. “A lot of people always tend to think that we go argue with other Tribes,” Leno said during the Tues- day, Feb. 21, Legislative Action Committee meeting. “There’s an- other Tribe that is coming in and does not want to acknowledge our treaties and wants to do an MOU that will overlap with our MOU. … We met with that Tribe twice and tried to work things out. Peo- ple tend to think we go and pick fights with other Tribes, but in this case are doing what we need to do to protect our treaties and ceded lands.” The official language of the ODOT-Warm Springs agreement is currently being negotiated, Gar- rett said in the Feb. 14 meeting.