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About Spilyay tymoo. (Warm Springs, Or.) 1976-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 14, 2008)
News from Inchon Country Page 9 SpiIyay Tyrooo February 14-, 2 0 0 8 Gaming restrictions could hurt tribes to ?lU all°Ays ^ diai¥ 1 ° start charter school O K L A H O M A CITY (AP) - A proposed new federal restric tion on the types o f slot m a chines tribes can offer at casi nos could cost O klahom a tribes millions o f dollars each year, b u t w ould b o o st funding fo r the state's education system. T he N ational Indian Gam ing C om m ission wants to create a g re a te r d is tin c tio n b e tw e e n Class II games based on bingo and Class III, or Las Vegas-style, slot machines. T he distinction is im portant because states can only collect a portion o f tribes' profits from Class III games. Indian gaming experts have said the vast majority o f exist ing Class II m achines w ould b ecom e illegal in 2013 if the new regulations, as proposed, take effect. Tribes have alm ost univer sally denounced the plan as an unfair im position on their sov ereignty. Two O klahoma congressmen seem to agree, according to their recent letters to the commission. “I rem ain deeply concerned that there has n o t been sufficient consideration o f the economic im pacts o f these proposed regu lations,” Rep. D an B oren, D - Okla., w rote in a Dec. 20 letter, B oren joined Rep. T om Cole, R-Okla., in a second letter ask ing that the com m ent period on th e p ro p o sed changes be ex tended until June. H owever, a letter signed by 10 o th e r co n g ressm en urges “p ro m p t adoption” of the p ro posed rules. B oth B oren and Cole are on th e H ouse N atural Resources Committee, which oversees In dian gaming. T he 30,044 Class II machines in O klahom a at the end o f 2006 rep resen ted 59 p ercen t o f all such machines in the country, e c o n o m ist A lan M eister re ported in a study prepared for the Indian gaming commission. In 2004, O klahom a voters ap p ro v ed co m p acts allow ing tribes to offer modified Class III slot machines. In return, tribes m ust pay the state 4 percent to 6 percent o f the revenue. T h a t m oney goes to fu n d teac h er pay raises an d o th e r education programs. Tribes paid the state $54.5 million from Class III m achine revenue in 2007, according to the Office o f State Finance. M ost state tribal casinos have incorporated Class III games, and a few have m oved solely to com pacted machines. However, Class II machines still comprise a large m ajority o f the games available in O klahoma, Meister reported. M eister said th e p ro p o sed Class II restrictions w ould force tribes to use only com pacted machines by 2013. I f th at happens, O klahom a tribes w ould have to pay the state an estim ated $122.3 mil lion a year in revenue-sharing costs, M eister reported. O k lah o m a's c u rre n t trib al g am in g c o m p a c ts e x p ire in 2020. ! Agents accuse smuggler o f stealing N.M . artifacts SA NTA F E ( A P ) - A ce ramic p o t and a 1,000-year- old ladle looted from N ew Mexico's E l Malpais National M o n u m en t are am ong th e stolen artifacts identified in a five-year federal investiga tion into the sm uggling o f Asian and American Indian antiquities. D ozens o f federal agents raided a Los Angeles gallery and four museums in South ern California, including the Los Angeles County Museum o f A rt, searching fo r arti facts taken from p rotected archaeological sites in Thai- latid, M yanm ar, C hina and N ew Mexico. “There's no question there is a p ro b le m ,” said E ric B linm an, head o f th e M u- seum o f N ew Mexico's O f fice ’o f Archaeological Stud ies. “T here is so m uch public land, and there are so few enforcem ent officials in any o f th e fe d e ra l ag en cies. People; can g et away w ith looting, at least for the short term .” r R obert E. O lson, a 79-year- old dealer from Cerritos, Calif., was targeted in the latest raid, according to a search warrant. H e allegedly told an undercover N ational Park Service agent in 2003 that he had rem oved ar ch aeo lo g ical re so u rces fro m N ational Park Service and U.S. B ureau o f L and M anagem ent lands, the search w arrant for his hom e showed. O lson allegedly said he had arranged for buyers to contrib ute som e o f these artifacts to m useum s to claim fraudulent tax d e d u c tio n s, th e w a rra n t showed. O lso n rep o rted ly to ld the agent he had the largest collec tion o f N ative A-merigan .ladles., in the w orld — seven o f which were from Chaco Culture N a tional Historical Park in n o rth w estern N ew Mexico, the war rant showed. O lson also reportedly told the agept a m u seu m o w n er w ho regularly lo o ted A nasazi sites took him to E l Malpais National M onum ent near G rants, where they found a ceramic storage jar, the w arrant said. T he next day, O lson rep o rt edly said he returned to the site and noticed som ething white in a crack in the cliff, reached in and pulled out a ladle that was 1,200 years old, according to the warrant. Removing archaeological re sources from public lands w ith o u t a p erm it is a violation o f th e 1979 A rchaeological R e sources P rotection Act. T he U nited States is one o f few countries in the world where a n tiq u itie s can be p riv ately owned, Blinman said. “People have a finders-keep- ers attitu d e to w ard any n eat stuff. Archaeological stuff quali fies,” P hil Young, a form er federal enforcem ent agent, said the lo cation o f "ru in s" are m arked on old U.S. Geological Survey maps. ‘T h e w ord gets out as far as where archaeological resources and artifacts can be found. A nd it only takes orie bad actor to destroy the contextual and sci entific inform ation for everyone else,” he said. T im Maxwell, an archae ologist w ho form erly headed th e M u se u m o f N ew Mexico's archaeology office, said, “people see M im bres pots in art catalogs. They see the prices. T h at certainly gets people m otivated econom i cally.” Kayci Cook Collins, the su perintendent at E l Malpais, said the 115,000-acre m onu m en t has thousands o f ar chaeo lo g ical sites ran g in g from the archaic period to Spanish colonial contact. T he m onum ent staff gets som e help from volunteers w ith the state H istoric Pres- ervafean-Divisiy>n's site watch program , but “it's hard to be everywhere atronce,” she said. She said it's im portant to n o t remove, antiquities from their context. “There's n o th ing wrong with being delighted at seeing a potsherd on the ground. B ut how m uch bet ter it is to p u t it dow n so the next person will be delighted in the same way,” she said. O K L A H O M A CITY (AP) - Indian tribes could start charter schools in O klahom a and Tulsa counties under a bill that w on approval by a Senate com m it tee. The bill passed through com m ittee M onday and now goes to the Senate floor for consid eration. State law currently allows only the state's largest school districts and public universities to establish charter schools. Senate Co-President Pro Tem G lenn C offee says expanding the num ber o f groups that can set up charter schools will give p a re n ts m o re e d u c a tio n a l choices for their children. C harter schools are public schools established by contract w ith sponsors. T hey are less re g u la te d th a n o th e r p u b lic schools and often p ro m o te a Specific curriculum or learning method. Archaeologist dig may have found Chumash home foundation SA NTA BARBARA, Calif. (AP) - Archaeologists digging in a garden at the Santa Barbara M ission m ay have un earth ed the complete stone foundation o f a Chum ash house. T he dig is expected to be completed Wednesday under the watchful eyes o f A merican In dian representatives. T he foundation o f the hom e is believed to be part o f what's left o f a Chum ash village at the site, which is at the northeast ern edge o f an Indian pueblo at the mission. M uch o f the village remains were destroyed over the years. In one instance, portions were graded to make way for a park ing lot in the 1950s and 1960s. Mass, governor uses Indian casino bid to trumpet his own B O ST O N (AP) - G ov Deval Patrick, trying to persuade law makers to bring casino gambling to Massachusetts, is bolstering his jobs-and-revenue pitch with the argum ent that the Mashpee W am panoag Indian tribe will beat everyone to it. | T h? tribe • wants -the .-federal Bureau o f Indian Affairs to ap prove its request to place 540 acres in M iddleborough in to federal trust - a key step for the tribe to build a $1 billion casino. E ven though the tribe's ca sino could be years away, Patrick is using it to try to gain support for his plan to license three re s o rt casin o s, w h ich he says w ould generate thousands o f jobs and $400 million in annual tax revenue. H e's w arning that the state w ould lose o ut on a significant am ount o f tax money, leaving lawmakers to dig into state sav ings to cover budget deficits, if the tribe wins federal approval, for.its la n d - „ “We can eith er do this or have this done to us,” Patrick said. Patrick even p u t $30Q mil lion in would-be casino licens ing fees — separate from annual tax revenue — in his state bud g et p ro p o sal an n o u n ced last m onth, in an effort to prod the Legislature.
