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Warm Springs, OR 97761
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Housing close to
resolving findings
Pageant
winner
By Dave McMechan
Tam era Rae M oody is the new
Miss Warm Springs.
Tamera, a student at Lane Com
munity College, was crowned Miss
Warm Springs 2011 at the pageant
last Friday at the Agency Longhouse.
Norene Sampson was runner-up.
The pageant started with some
words from the outgoing Miss Warm
Springs, Jaycelene Frank, and a give
away.
Tamera and Norene then intro
duced themselves, before moving on
to the talent portion of the evening.
Norene displayed her talent by
filleting a fish for the audience, and
explaining how to prepare the fish
to be cooked traditionally over a fire
pit.
Tamera perform ed a Women’s
Fancy War Dance.
Both of the young women an
swered questions from the panel of
judges. An example of the questions:
Can you name all of the tribal en
terprises and the date they were es
tablished?
PAGEANT on
P.O. Box 870
ings, OR 97761
Dept./Seria's
Acquisition
January 26, 2011 Voi. 36, No. U2
Coyote News, est. 1976
See
\M
Spilyay Tymoo
The Warm Springs Housing Author
ity is close to resolving several issues
raised last year by the Department of
H ousing and Urban D evelopm ent
(HUD). Housing Authority employees
made their report last week to Tribal
Council.
Near resolution of the HUD find
ings is welcome news, as the Housing
Authority needs to focus on its mission
of providing housing to tribal members,
said Councilman Ron Suppah.
A goal of the Tribes he said, is to
provide 100 new residences per year
to tribal members.
Last year HUD, w hich provides
funding to the Housing Authority, is
sued to the Tribes a letter of ten “find
ings.”
The findings detailed areas where
the tribes need to demonstrate proof
o f com pliance w ith HUD require
ments. Noncompliance could mean loss
of significant funding.
Health and safety inspections, drug-
abuse prevention, standard wages for
Housing employees, and accounting of
funds are examples of the questions
raised by HUD within its findings.
Two of the ten issues were an
swered quickly last year. Five more
have now been addressed, leaving three
page 6
Tamera Moody represents the
Confederated Tribes as the
new Miss Warm Springs.
(More pictures on page 6.)
findings that still require a response, said
Councilman Scott Moses, Housing Au
thority director.
The three remaining findings should
be addressed easily with some research,
he said.
One of these findings, for instance,
requires proof of a standard wage pro
vision for the employees, which does
exist. Another requires proof of ad
equate law enforcement in the neigh
borhoods.
One of the ten findings last year
asked for an accounting of funding.
Approximately $200,000 was not origi
nally documented to HUD over the
past few years. The $200,000 has since
been documented, with the exception
o f about $9,000, and presented to
HUD for review, said Moses. Docu
mentation of some of the remaining
$9,000 might have been lost in a flood
ing incident at the Housing Authority
offices a few years ago.
The tribes and Housing are currently
requesting a hearing with HUD regard
ing the status of the Housing Author
ity and its federal funding.
Representing the Housing Author
ity at Tribal Council last week were
Councilman Moses, office m anager
Sh aro n Jo n e s, fin an ce m an ager
Saphronia Katchia, project developer
Tom Strong, and housing accounting
specialist Charles Bennett.
Yvonne Iverson/Spilyay
Council
Natural resources discussion with Council considers
By Duran Bobb
Spilyay Tymoo
Tribal Council last week participated
in a two-day workshop where updates
were given on the tribal resource man
agement plan, the Phase II federal law
suit settlements, baseline forest resto
ration, biomass, the cutting contract,
and Vanport.
The first day of the workshop fo
cused on resources. Bobby, Brunoe,
Natural Resources Branch manager,
and Deepak Sehgal, water and soil man
ager, gave a history of the Integrated
Resource Management Plan, and its cur
rent status.
There was also an update and ex
planation of the timber harvest model
from Vernon Wolf, and a brief history
of Phase II settlements.
Regarding the settlements, in the
early 2000s, the tribes filed a lawsuit
in federal Claims Court alleging that the
BIA had not properly managed a vari
ety of tribal assets. This claim was split
into two, with the first phase being
settled out of court between the tribes
and the federal government.
Phase II dealt with grazing and other
cultural resources. It was found that the
BIA had mismanaged, compromising
values that the tribe had in protecting
watersheds, etc.
Meanwhile, both the tribes and the
government agreed that forestry man
agement would move from the BIA to
the tribes.
The first step in the transition was
completed last year, with information
exchanged between the BIA and tribes.
The second phase of the settlement
started in 2006 and was completed in
January 2009.
The next step called for a baseline
timber assessment, with funds provided
for in the settlement agreement. These
funds cannot be used for any other
purpose.
Under the 638 Contract the BIA still
has trust responsibility, tribal attorney
Dennis Karnopp said. “Day to day,
hands-on, that’s tribal. But there still is
a Bureau trust responsibility. This is a
unique, one-time, unmatched settle
ment agreement from the government
standpoint. It’s now up to the tribes to
do their part.”
‘W e’re the ones who are going to do
this,” Chief Delvis Heath said at the
workshop. “We’re going to say that our
people can do just as good as anybody.
We’re going to put trust into our people
by putting our people to work. A lot
of years ago, it was said, hire Indian
people. Now we have people coming
back to the reservation. They tell us,
you told us to go to school... now
where’s my job?”
Youth Art
Exhibit
opening
The Tribal Youth A rt Exhibit
opens this week at the Museum at
Warm Springs.
The opening reception for the
show is this Thursday, Jan. 27 from
5:30-7:30 p.m.
Artwork this year focuses on In
dian can oes. T he ex h ib it runs
through April 10.
The students (at right) from.
classroom B-2 at the Early
Childhood Education Center
show the canoes they made for
the exhibit.
Spilyay tymoo
The second day of the workshop
focused on the enterprise aspects
of forestry.
Mill operations
Chris Ketchum, Vanport general
manager, and Paul Owen, president
of Vanport Inti., were both present.
Vanport is w orking with Warm
Springs Forest Products Industries
on timber matters.
“At the time that we arrived on
the reservation,” Ketchum said,
“my understanding is that tribal em
ployment at the mill was 70 per
cent. Today, we have 141 tribal
members employed at the mill, or
74 percent.”
The Warm Springs logo has be
come a name-brand in the timber
in d u stry th ro u g h o u t Ja p a n ,
Ketchum said.
See
RESOURCES
on page 7
enrollment
ordinance
By Duran Bobb
Spilyay Tymoo
Tribal Council is considering a draft
enrollment ordinance intended to ad
dress various tribal enrollment issues.
The draft ordinance, which was a
project of atwai Madeline Queahpama,
w as brought to council by O livia
Wallulatum and Howie Arnett.
Variations of the ordinance have
been discovered from as early as 1983.
The tribes currently don’t have an or
dinance governing enrollments.
“Council has adopted policies inter
preting the [tribal] constitution,” Arnett
said. “There have been a variety of
de facto policies not in writing, but fol
lowed.”
An example given to Tribal Council
were the requirements of residency for
automatic enrollment.
“The constitution says, for the pur
poses of auto-enrollment, that at least
one tribal member parent should main
tain residency on the reservation,” said
Arnett. “There could be two tribal
member parents...but one o f them has
to be a resident. This has been inter
preted a variety of ways to mean that
people off-rez (engaging in college,
military, etc.) should be deemed as hav
ing satisfied those requirements. The
goal here is to be consistent.”
Both Anglo and Native American
interpretations o f “residency” were
points of concern.
“They used residency,” Chief Delvis
Heath said, “meaning that you had to
be in this area at this time. They meant
that the people who lived here were
from here. That caused some big prob
lems.”
See
ENROLLMENT
on page 7