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About Spilyay tymoo. (Warm Springs, Or.) 1976-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 21, 2006)
News from Inclín Country ■mm «SH Comanches hope to acquire building lease ror museum LAWTON, Okla. (AP)— The /Lawton City Council may act upon a lease agreement with the Comanche Nation that would allow them to open the Comanche National Museum and Archive in a building. T h e C om anch e B u siness Com m ittee approved a lease agreement this week between the tribe, the Percussive Arts Society and the City o f Lawton. “We’ll finally have a museum, which tribal members have been asking fo r fo r 20 or m ore years,” said John Plata, tribal lawyer. The agreement will require the tribe to pay the Percussive Arts Society $250,000 for all Pdge 9 Spily^y Tymoo rights to the existing lease. The agreement also requires a one-time $100,000 donation to the City o f Lawton for bik ing, walking and running trails around the community, officials said. In return, the Com anche Nation will be able to occupy the building rent-free for the remainder o f the existing lease agreement, including all lease extensions. The Percussive Arts Society, which is moving to In dianapolis, has a 99-year lease, which includes an option to ex tend the lease an additional 99 years. The tribe has wanted a place to archive and display their arti- facts, Plata said. Plans include cataloging artifacts and opening an office that deals solely with Native American Graves Pro tection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) issues, officials said. Plata said if all goes well at the council meeting on Tuesday, things should move forward very quickly in a way that will benefit the tribe and the city. “It (the museum) fits in with the city’s downtown renovation project,” he said. Officials hope the doors to the museum will be opened and some exhibits placed on display for the Comanche Nation Fair in September 2007. December 21, 2006 «yiillli rBIIII l fìlBilÉjpilW I I ■ lll lll lllilllBlliMBIIIiliTl i'lí I 111 I Girlfriend named in death of former Colville tribal chairman SPO K A N E, Wash. (AP) — Jude Clarence “Jude” Stensgar Sr., a former chairman o f the Colville Confederated Tribal Business Council Chairman, is dead, and his girlfriend told the F B I she shot him in self-defense. Stensgar, 77, was fatally shot Nov. 27 at his home in Inchelium, and his death was reported to tribal police by his girlfrien d , Lisa Denobrega, 46, a tribal member also known as Lisa Trevino, according to an affidavit for a search warrant filed in U.S. District Court. In the warrant, F B I Agent Wesley Floyd wrote that Denobrega told tribal police she opened fire after Stensgar tried to choke her during an argument. She was wiping up blood near the head o f Stensgar, who was lying in a hallway, when officers arrived and directed them to a pistol in the living room, Floyd added. Investigators have taken a .357-caliber Mag num pistol, a .22-caliber rifle, spent shell cas ings and a “dream catcher” decoration with a bullet in it as potential evidence, according to the affidavit. The document indicated Denobrega is un der investigation for first-degree murder. The F B I is handling the probe because the shoot ing occurred on an Indian reservation. Stensgar, a native o f Inchelium on the east ern end o f the sprawling reservation, spent 20 years in the Air Force before retiring as a technical sergeant and returning to the reser vation in 1971. He served on the tribal coun cil for 18 years during the 1980s and '90s and was chairman in 1989. A funeral Mass was held Dec. 4 at the Inchelium Community Center. Hurdle cleared for Catskill casino Cherokee leader forsees Indian governor OKLAHOMA C ITY (AP)— The former chief o f the Chero kee Nation believes the time will come when an American Indian serves as governor o f Oklahoma. “Someone just needs to step up,” former Cherokee Nation P rin cip al C h ie f W ilm a Mankiller said. Mankiller, 61, was formally sw orn in as c h ie f o f the country’s second-largest tribe on Dec. 15, 1985. Since she retired in 1995, M ankiller has been asked more than once to run for Oklahoma’s 2nd Congressional District seat, now held by Rep. Dan Boren, D-Muskogee. She always declines. “It’s just not in my way o f thinking. My vision, my life is in the tribe,” she said. As Oklahoma’s centennial ap proaches, Mankiller said state- tribal relations are improving, although a* certain tension is unavoidable because o f ques tions o f jurisdiction, tax author ity and gaming. “I ’m hopeful in the future there will be more o f a partner ship,” she said. Mankiller said it will be hard for her to celebrate the centen nial because “that period o f time was so tragic and so difficult for so many o f the tribes.” Instead, she sees the centen nial as an opportunity to edu cate people about Indian con tributions to the state, histori cally and now. W hen Mankiller governed the Cherokee N ation, it had about 140,000 enrolled mem bers, an annual budget o f more than $75 m illion and about 1,200 employees. Bingo was the tribe’s only form o f gaming. Today, Principal Chief Chad Smith presides over a tribe o f more than 232,000 members and a $377 million annual budget fu eled largely by seven casinos. “We came to gaming a little late,” Mankiller said. ‘W e tend to be a little cautious, and we took our time deciding how we wanted to do it, whether we wanted to do it and where we wanted to do it.” She thinks the move, while controversial, was the right one because it gave the tribe an un- restricted revenue stream. “It allows them, for the first time, to set their own priorities,” she said. While an honored guest at many C herokee fu n ction s, Mankiller said she is “almost never” asked to advise the cur rent administration. “I don’t want to muck around in what they’re doing. Our man agement styles are probably dif ferent,” she said. At the time she assumed of fice, she was the first female chief o f a major tribe and one o f only. 83 female tribal leaders among 550 federally recognized tribes. Today there are about 130. Economic growth fueled by gaming has allowed tribes to ex pand services, and many women have stepped in to head those programs, creating a pipeline into tribal leadership, she said. “They get good experience as administrators. That’s what hap pened to me,” said Mankiller, who was the founding director o f the Cherokee Nation Com munity Development Depart ment. U.S. government intervenes in Indian voting case ity voting. Frem ont County Attorney Ed Newell on Friday referred q u estio n s to the M ountain States Legal Foundation, but ! efforts to reach lawyers there | were unsuccessful. In its notice o f intervention filed in the lawsuit this week, the Civil Rights Division o f the U.S. Departm ent o f Ju stice stated that the United States has a right to intervene in any lawsuit in which the constitutionality o f federal laws is questioned. Laughlin McDonald, director o f the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project in Atlanta, said Friday that he believes abolishing at- large elections would help every one in Fremont County. “I think if we succeed in th is su it, n o b o d y lo s e s ,” M cD onald said. “I f we suc ceed, and if we get a system that allows all the groups in that county to participate in that process, that really fulfills the premise o f democracy.” McDonald said the lawsuit is set for trial in February before U.S. District Judge Alan Johnson in Lander. Federal appeals courts have already rejected M ountain States Legal Foundation’s argu ment that the Voting Rights Act is unconstitutional in a Montana case. The U.S. Supreme Court ultimately declined to review that case. In last month’s general elec tion, Frem ont County voters elected Keja Whiteman, a mem ber o f the Turtle M ountain Band o f Chippewa, to one o f three open seats on the county commission in an at-large elec tion. The ACLU announced that it would continue with its law suit nonetheless. “It frequently happens that minorities won’t get elected un til a lawsuit is filed, it’s happened in a num ber o f cases,” McDonald said, adding that the fact that a minority person was elected didn’t resolve the issue. Frem ont County Attorney Newell last m onth told The (Riverton) Ranger newspaper that W hitem an’s election “a great thing for Fremont County.” Newell said Whiteman’s elec tion was proof that the county “isn’t full o f racists who vote along racial lines.” And he said he believes Whiteman’s success has weakened the ACLU’s case. “The entire premise o f that lawsuit was an American Indian couldn’t get elected, and this is clear p r o o f that prem ise is false,” Newell said. “She clearly got support from many Repub licans and non-Indians to win like she did. She deserved to get elected, and she did.” In a field o f six candidates, W hitem an received 6 ,4 2 2 votes— more than 18 percent o f all votes cast. She won four o f the six precincts in Lander, where most o f the voters are not American Indians. Legal Aid Services of Or- eqon which provides free le- gal advice and representation to low-income Oregonians, is in Warm Springs the first Mon- day of every month, from 1 to 4 p.m.,atthe Family Resource Cen- ter, 1144 Warm Springs Street. To contact Legal Aid Services of Or- egon, write to it at Legal Aid Ser- vices of Oregon, Central Or- egon Regional Office, 1029 N.W. 14th Street, Bend, Ore., 97701; or call (800) 678-6944, or (541) 385-6944. C H EY EN N E, Wyo. (AP)— The U.S. Department o f Justice is intervening in a federal law suit in which five American In dians are challenging Fremont County’s system o f holding at- large elections. The department filed notice Thursday that it is intervening in the case for the limited purpose o f defending the constitutionality o f the fed eral Voting Rights Act. Five members o f the East ern Shoshone and N orthern | Arapaho tribes, represented by the Am erican Civil Liberties Union, sued Frem ont County last year. They claim the county’s system o f holding at-large elec tions violates Voting Rights Act by impermissibly diluting the American Indian vote. The Mountain States Legal Foundation, based in Lakewood, C olo., is defending Frem ont County. In its answer to the law suit filed late last year, the foun dation argued that it would be unconstitutional to hold F re mont County to the section o f the Voting Rights Act which pro hibits practices that dilute minor M O N T IC E L L O , N.Y. (AP)— A proposed Mohawk casino in the Catskills re ceived environm ental ap proval from federal o ffi cials, bringing the long de layed $600 million project a step closer to reality, tribal representatives said Friday. The Interior Department approved an environmental review o f the St. Regis M ohaw k Indian, trib e ’s project, said tribal spokeswoman Leslie Logan. That means the agency found the proposed ca sino on 30 acres n ext to Monticello Gaming and Race way in Sullivan County would not have a significant environ mental impact. “It’s a terrific Christmas gift fo r the trib e ,” Logan said. “That’s how we’re feeling.” The Mohawks, whose res ervation straddles the U.S.-Ca- nadian border, are among a number o f groups that have been trying to build a casino in the B o r s c h t B e lt fo r years. Proponents say casino gambling will bring back tour ists to an area where big old hotels sit boarded up. Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D- Hurley, said Friday the casino would bring thousands o f construction jobs and then employ thousands more. Indian education act headed for Legislature cm; RAPID S.D. (AP) - A state Indian Edu cation Act would guarantee a long-term commit ment to American Indian students, according to state Secretary o f Education Rick Melmer. “The Indian population is growing in our state,” Melmer said. “We recognize it as a significant part o f our population today in out schools. It will only grow in the future.” Melmer began previewing the proposed legis lation with Indian education leaders throughout the state the past week. Melmer discussed it Thurs day at a Rapid City forum that included Keith Moore, the state director o f Indian education, and Stacy Phelps, o f Oglala Lakota College. The legislation would ensure the continuation o f duties that the Department o f Education is already handling and adds other duties necessary to improve Indian education, Melmer said. It would Authorize the Office o f Indian Edu cation and an advisory council on Indian issues, both o f which were created at Gov. Mike Rounds' request in 2003.
