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About Spilyay tymoo. (Warm Springs, Or.) 1976-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 18, 2007)
SCA JrColl E 75 . S68 v. 32— no. 2 P.O. Box 870 Warm Springs, OR 97761 January 18, 2007 University of Oregon Library Received on: 01-31-07 Spilyay tymoo January 18, 2007 Voi. 31, Coyote News, est. 1976 — Construction begins on Credit building B y Dave M cM echan S pilyay Tymoo Construction is set to begin on the new building that will house the Warm Springs Tribal Credit Enterprise. The 9,200-square-foot building will located on the vacant field west of the Administration Building. The construc tion completion date is late September of this year. The new building will allow Credit to serve the community in more and better ways, said Lori Fuentes, manager of the credit enterprise. “We want to provide banking ser vices and financial education to the W arm Springs com m unity,” said Fuentes. The new building will be a classroom for financial literacy, business planning, and new homeowner training. At Credit there is also a need for private office space for loan officers and others who discuss and work with individuals’ per sonal financial inform ation. Credit needs a more secure place, such as a vault for its files, said Fuentes. Planning for a new building began several years ago, said Evaline Patt, chairwoman of the Credit Enterprise board of directors. “The primary need is more space,” said Patt. “We need to hire more per sonnel, and to increase our services to the community.” Credit became an enterprise about 10 years ago. The enterprise is self funding and pays a dividend to the tribes. After years of planning and sav ing, Credit has about $2 million for construction of the new building. The plan is for Credit to offer basic banking services at its new location. There are plans for check-cashing ser vices, an ATM machine, a drive-up window, and a collection point for payment of electricity, phone and other bills. “We’ll be able to provide services that people usually drive to Madras for,” said Fuentes. The new building could also house a branch office of a bank, she said. The groundbreaking ceremony for the Credit building was sched uled for Wednesday of this week, January 17, after the deadline for this paper. Hatcheries work to replace fish loss (By Spilyay staff and AP wire service.) Close to 200,000 salmon fry ar rived last week at the Warm Springs National Fish Hatchery. The juve nile fish replace some of those lost during a recent accident at the hatch ery that killed about 500,000 of the fry. In July the hatchery will receive' more replacement juvenile fish, said hatchery manager Alike Paiya. About half the fish that were lost are ex pected to be replaced, said Paiya. The fish are being raised for re lease in the spring of 2008. The loss of part of the juvenile stock at the hatchery could hurt tribal and rec reatio nal fishing on the Low er Deschutes River in a few years, when the run returns. The fish died when the water sup ply to the incubator was inadvert- entiy turned off Tuesday while new equipment was being installed. Many factors will determine the extent of the potential decline in the return: ocean and river conditions, dam operations, harvest manage ment and further actions taken to make up the production shortfall at the hatchery are factors, said Paiya. “We experienced a shortfall in smolt production in 1994,” said Paiya. “Due to very low returns that year we were able to release only about 60,000 smolts, yet with a com- S pilyay Tymoo For a portion of tribal elders, bas ketball is much more than just a sport. Traveling to see games also involves some of the most memorable times in their lives— all of which involve spend ing time on a bus with fellow elders. Lawrence “K unya” Squiemphen works with the Warm Springs Senior Program and is responsible for driving the group of elders to the games and on other trips. This year the Senior Program is tak ing a group to four Blazer games in Pordand— and it’s possible because of sponsorship from tribal attorneys Karnopp and Petersen, Kah-Nee-Ta High Desert Resort and Casino, Power Enterprises and Composite Products, Squiemphen said. This is the first year of sponsorship for Karnopp and Petersen, while the other three sponsors have sponsored for three years. The senior program receives spon sorship from Kah-Nee-Ta High Desert Resort and Casino, Power Enterprises and Composite Products for more than just Blazer tickets— they also sponsor itron tage 3TD 761 50 cents Interior official touring casino site Associate Deputy Secretary of the Interior James Cason was scheduled this week to tour the Cascade Locks tribal casino site with officials of the Con federated Tribes. The group was also planning to tour the tribal property at Hood River. Cason is originally from Hood River. In his position in the Department of the Interior, “My job is to work on particularly difficult issues, where the problem has not been solved lower down in the organization,” said Cason. In the department he is the third in command. Aluch of his current work relates to challenges the federal government faces as trustee for Native American land. “We have to manage these proper ties, which includes extensive litigation, on long-term stewardship,” he said. “I spend a lot of time working on the underlying causal factors for the liti gation. I look at all of our programs, trying to redesign how they work and to stream line how we m anage the land and natural resources that are in our care. New high school focus of discussion Leslie Mitts/Spilyay Warm Springs fish hatchery workers Kevin Blueback (left) and Joe Badoni place newly arrived juvenile fish, from the Pelton-Round Butte hatchery, into a Warm Springs hatchery pool. bination of Warm Springs and Round Butte stocks we had a good return four years later.” At the hatchery, water norm ally flows through incubators containing trays full of salmon fry, which are about half the size of a pinkie finger. “We were installing a new piece of equip- ment, and we inadvertendy turned off the water supply to some of our fish,” said Paiya. “Normally, the water is continuously flowing through the in cubator, so the water got stale for a period of time,” Paiya said, See HATCHERY on 10 Elders travel for love of the game B y L eslie M itts vss concert tickets, honor senior days and jackets that seniors have worn to con ferences and to the opening o f the National Museum o f the American Indian in Washington D.C. “They really appreciate doing this,” Squiemphen said of the sponsors. According to Squiemphen, the trips to see the Blazers are only a small part of what the senior program does— they also take trips throughout the year to a variety of events. “It’s just one facet of what goes on,” he said. One thing is for sure, he added: there is a misconception about the fund ing of the trips. “The seniors pay for it on their own,” Squiemphen emphasized. “They pay for their room; they pay for their needs.” “A lot of times it’s the same group,” he said, because those are the seniors that express interest in traveling. However, Squiemphen added, any one is welcome. “I try to get as many people to go as possible,” he said. Maxine Switzler and Faye Waheneka are part of the group that tries to travel to Portland regularly to see the Port land Trail Blazers in action. U I do this because I love my elders. 99 Lawrence Squiemphen According to Switzler, “We’ve had several avid Blazer fans, and win or lose we’re still faithful to our Blazers.” “I think us old people really enjoy going to games,” Waheneka said. “Once we board the bus, we talk about fun days that we had,” she con tinued. “We laugh together, we cry to gether, we eat together—we take care of each other.” At times, she said, they pool together m oney to help out someone who doesn’t have enough money to travel with them. “It uplifts a lot of us,” she explained. “A lot of us are lonely.” Waheneka continued, “I don’t think anyone’s ever had a cruel word for anyone on the bus.” However, she said, their good time can often be misconstrued— once they were even rumored to have been in ebriated while at a game, something that was not the case at all, they said. “We just know how to have fun,” Waheneka said. O f course, they all have their opinions about how the team is cur rently functioning. “I don’t know what to think of the new group,” Waheneka said. In her opinion, the solution to many problems can be found in the coaching. “I feel a coach has a lot to do with what happens to a team,” she explained. “We really enjoyed that season when they were all on the dream team,” Switzler added. “They had a really good system and they were w inning a lot of games, and then all of a sudden something went wrong,” Switzler said. “It seems like they couldn’t win after that.” In Switzler’s opinion, the staff at the senior program has taken extra steps to help make their lives enjoy able. She said, “I appreciate Kunya and the rest of our staff for making it possible for us to enjoy the few things we have left to enjoy.” See SENIORS on 10 Representatives from the new W il low Creek Community High School will be hosting two m eetings in Warm Springs on Wednesday, Jan. 24. Parents can attend an informational meeting at the Family Resource Cen ter at 6:30 p.m. During the day em ployees from the Willow Creek Com munity High School will meet with com munity representatives. Open student enrollment for the school began on Jan. 17, and staff ap plications will be available during mid- February. In addition, employees from the high school hosted meetings at Aladras High School on Jan. 9 and Jefferson County Aliddle School on Jan. 17. For more information, contact Julie L afayette at 475-8266 or jlafayette@509j.net. Students will receive personalized educations in the new, small school that will include community and family en gagements, real-world learning and col lege preparation. In order to prepare them for the real world, students will complete intern ships with local businesses. School officials said approximately 30 percent of the student population will be Native American—matching the percentages of the current school sys tem. The school is set to open in Sep tember. Youth art show opens next week The Fourteenth Annual Tribal Youth Art Exhibit begins next Thursday, Jan. 25 at the Museum at Warm Springs. The opening reception honor ing youth artists will be from 5:30 to 7 p.m. on Jan. 25 in the mu seum lobby. 1 1