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About Spilyay tymoo. (Warm Springs, Or.) 1976-current | View Entire Issue (May 16, 2012)
More News from Indian Country Pgge 9 Judge may decide fate Okla. casino TULSA, Okla. (AP) s- A federal judge could decide whether a little-known Indian tribe o f 350 m em bers can legally build a casino in the Tulsa suburb o f Broken Ar row, even as construction at the 20-acre site continues amid protest from thousands o f area residents, lawmakers and pastors. Oklahoma’s attorney gen eral has sued the tribe and is asking U.S. D istric t Judge G regory K. Frizzell for an injunction to halt building at th e site, saying th e trib e d o esn ’t have the authority under federal law to operate a gaming facility. A hearing is scheduled for this w eek in Tulsa federal court. The Kialegee Tribal Town, headquartered in Wetumka in so u th e a s te rn O k lah o m a, b ro k e g ro u n d on th e Red Clay C asino site n ear th e Creek Turnpike late last year Items returned to M ontana tribes POPLAR, Mont. (AP) — Cultural items seized at a M ontana and Canadian border crossing by U.S. of ficials who uncovered an illegal smuggling operation have been returned to the Fort Peck Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes. T he 16 item s include cerem onial clothing, war bonnets, a beaded knife sheath and other items dat ing from the late 19th cen tury and early 20th century. Terry Thibeault o f the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Ser vice and D ep artm en t o f Interior says the items were seized in D ecember 1999. The case was never adju dicated because the m an accused o f smuggling the items died during the inves tigation. T h ibeault says th e 16 item s are a p o rtio n o f som e 78 items being re tu rn e d to several o th e r M ontana tribes and one tribe in N orth Dakota. and has trucked in several p re-fabricated buildings in recent , weeks to temporarily h o u se slo t m achines. T he tribe plans to open sometime this sum m er in the trailers and says a perm anent facility will be built next year. The tribe has yet to win approval from the Bureau o f Indian Affairs and the N a tional Indian Gaming Com mission to allow it to conduct gaming at the site. The town king, Tiger H obia, sg.ys his tribe is exempt from a fed eral review, and has said the Casino would give the tribe its only chance to provide pro grams for its im poverished members. Hobia, who did not return calls seeking comm ent on the project, has said that 65 percent o f tribal members are unemployed and o f those w ho are em p lo y ed , m o re th an 90 p ercen t only earn minimum wage. Seminole leader hopes to build modern tribe W EW OKA, Okla. (AP) - Leonard Harjo sees his job as a builder. Actually, he con siders himself a rebuilder. H arjo, w ho was elected principal chief o f the Semi nole N ation in 2009, says his goal as chief is to rebuild his tribe into a modern, economi cally diverse Native American nation. A fter w atching the trib e struggle th ro u g h the 1990s, he said, he wants to make the m odern Seminole N a tio n an eco n o m ically strong, diverse group. Based in Wewoka and pri marily in Seminole County, bpnyaystaTTpnoto. Drum group at the Agency Longhouse for Honor Seniors Day of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. Calif, approves casino deal R O H N ER T PARK, Calif. (AP) — A N ative American tribe’s plans for a Las Vegas-’ style casino about 50 miles n orth o f San Francisco ap pears to have cleared its last hurdle. T h e state A ssem bly on Thursday ratified' an agree m e n t b etw een Gov. Je rry year-old Harry Hintsala o f Warm Springs was found guilty Wednesday in a trial before a federal judge in Portland. The abuse took place betw een 2007 and 2011 on the Warm Springs In dian Reservation, accord ing to reports. Failure to register as a sex offender Lei Walker Calica, 31, primary address un known, has failed to reg ister as a convicted sex of fender with the Warm Springs Sex Offender Registration office. Physi cal description: 5 feet, 9 inch. Weight 200 pounds. Contact the sex offender registry office with infor mation, 541-553-2214. SALAMANCA, N.Y. (AP) — A Seneca Indian N ation business has been awarded an $18.5 million contract to de sign and build a U.S. Army R eserve C en ter in u p state N ew York. T h e w estern N ew Y ork tribe said that the contract was awarded to SCMC LLC, which opened in, 2008. Seneca President R obert O daw i P o rter says it’s evi dence o f the Senecas’ efforts to d iv ersify th e tr ib e ’s econom y and its ability to com pete for national co n tracts. The new center will serve 12 Army Reserve units in the Albany area. . , T h e In d ia n n a tio n has been taking steps in recent years to broaden its economy beyond the discount cigarette shops and casinos for which it’s best known as state and federal law changes have cut into the tobacco business. Coeur d’Alene Tribe may buy historic Idaho site for $750,000. Ancestors o f the tribe and Catholic priests built the Mis sion o f the Sacred H eart in Cataldo in the 1850s. Last O ctober, the Coeur d’Alene Tribe opened a $3.2 million visito r cen te r at th e park. Short’s land includes an old cemetery with the graves of Jesu it priests, trails to the C o eu r d ’A len e R iver and 1,300 feet o f waterfront. Crowd gathers for languages workshop Ex officer convicted of abuse (AP) - A retired Warm S p rin g s p o lic e o ffic e r, H ead S tart teach er and child protective services w o rk e r faces u p to 10 years in federal prison af te r his c o n v ic tio n on charges o f abusing five young girls. P ro s e c u to rs say 62- May 16, 2012 Seneca Nation firm wins $18.5M NY Army project the nation has a total tribal enrollment o f about 18,800, records Show. O f that figure, COEUR D ’A L E N E , a b o u t 13,500 S em in ó les Id a h o (AP) —, T h e C o eu r m ake their hom e in O kla d’Alene Tribe is negotiating homa. It also includes about with a private landowner to 2,000 Sem inole freedm an, buy land surrounding a his descendants o f black Ameri toric mission site in northern cans brought into the tribe in Idaho. the late 1800s. A nd though E d Short, the real estate deeply engrained in state his agent who owns the land next tory— the nation is one o f the to th e O ld M ission S tate state’s five civilized tribes be P ark, said he believes the cause o f its written language ' Coeur d’Alene Tribe would be ^ -o v er the past decades it has the best owner o f the prop n ot had the rapid economic erty. H e’s listed the property growth o f its neighbors, the Chickasaws and Choctaws. Teens find old artifact A LBU QU ERQ UE, N.M. (AP) — A group o f N ew M exico sev e n th -g ra d e rs have found w hat could be one o f the m ost signifi cant archaeological dis coveries in a while. S e v e n th - g r a d e r s from Sandia Prep dis- > c o v e re d a N ativ e American pot, about 18 inches high and 14 to 16 inches wide and pos sibly 900 years old, while on a field trip l a s t. m o n th in C ibola County. “It was like a gray pot, with zig-zag stripes and dash patterns all the way going around it,” seventh-grader Isabel Jerom e said. “Yeah, it was a really incredible find.” State officials aren’t revealing the artifact u n til th ey c o n su lt nearby pueblos. Spilygy Tymoo Brown and the Federated In dians o f G rato n Ranchería for the casino near Rohnert Park in Sonoma County. The vote was 64-3. The state Senate had rati fied it earlier in the week. T he deal now goes to the federal gov ern m en t for fi nal approval, w hich is ex pected. The agreement between the tribe and governor al lows for the operation o f card games and 3,000 siot machines. Up to 15 percent o f the c a s in o ’s n e t w in n in g s would go toward gambling mitigation and regulation. ' A N C H O R A G E , A laska (A P)'^- T wo decades ago, H ish in la i’ K ath y Sikorski could n ot speak her ancestral language, G w ich ’in A th a bascan. N ow she teaches it at w ho spoke at the daylong event hosted by the Alaska Historical Commission. Par ticipants attending in person include Alaska Native groups and governm ent representa th e U n iv e r s ity o f A la sk a tives. Alaska’s three-m em ber Fairbanks. “W hen I was hired as a UAF language instructor in 2002, I w as scared , very scared because I had no idea how to teach a language,” Sikorski told a crowd gathered in A nchorage to talk about efforts to revitalize Alaska Native languages. Sikorski, who began learn ing G w ich’in 17 years ago, developed her teaching skills by learning even m ore about the learning process, eventu ally creating her own lesson plans and making her own materials “from scratch,” she said, reading from a prepared statement. “Language learners need support, emotional or other w ise, fro m fluid speakers, politicians, educational set tings, et cetera,” she said. She was am ong people congressional delegation sent recorded messages. State Sen. D onny Olson, D -N o m e , p a rtic ip a te d by p h one, review ing a bill he sponsored and approved by lawmakers, that would create a state-backed council aimed at revitalizing Alaska Native languages. O lso n u rg ed people to write to and call the office o f Gov. Sean Parnell encouraging him to sign the legislation into law. Parnell spokeswoman Sharon Leigh- ow said the bill has n o t yet b e e n tr a n s m itte d to th e governor’s office for review. SB 130 Would establish the Alaska Native Language Pres ervation and Advisory Coun cil, which would evaluate the sta te ’s 20 in d ig en o u s la n guages and make recom m en dations for preservation, res toration and revitalization. Oklahoma tribe’s accounts to remain frozen OKLAHOM A CITY (AP) A rap ah o T ribes officials are d isap pointed with a federal judge’s decision to keep the tribe’s acco u n ts at an O klahom a bank frozen until an internal leadership dispute is resolved, a spokeswoman said, The tribe had asked U.S. D istrict Judge David Russell to lift the freeze on about $6.4 million by Clinton-based First Bank and Trust Co., but Russell allowed the freeze to remain in place. H e cited the ongoing dispute between the tribe’s governor, Janice Prai rie ChiefiBoswell, and its one tim e lie u te n a n t g o v ern o r, Leslie W andrie-H arjo, over who is the tribe’s leader. A hearing on the leader ship and banking issues is set H C heyenne, and for June 8 in Custer County D istric t C o u rt, w h ere the bank filed for the administra tive freeze. Tribe spokeswoman Lisa Liebl said that the workweek for about 500 tribal employ ees has been reduced to 32 hours because o f the frozen funds, and checks written by the tribe to workers, contrac tors and vendors have been returned because o f insuffi cient funds. ■ “Now, we’ll just wait for our court date on June 8.... T h at’s all we can do at this point,” she said. “We’re still locked out o f those accounts, th o se fro zen funds, so we have no idea w hat’s happen ing with all o f that.” T he judge’s order, issued last week, noted that depend ing on which side wins the g o v e rn a n c e d isp u te , “ th e bank faces potential liability for the payment o f money at the request o f an unautho rized signatory.... In light of the ongoing governance is sues, about which Plaintiffs have presented no evidence, the C ourt cannot conclude that Plaintiffs will ultimately prevail in their quest to have th e a d m in is tra tiv e freeze Ufted.” Homelessness on reservations persists ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) « A new study finds that despite housing im prove ments on M innesota’s In dian reservations, hom e lessness still persists. R esearchers w ith the nonprofit health and hu man services organization A m herst H. Wilder Foun dation visited eight o f the state’s 11 reservations. They found nearly 2,100 people w ho are homeless or living in cro w d ed c o n d itio n s w ith frien d s o r relatives. T he study’s author, Ellen Shelton, said the poor economy off set im provem ents in housing and social services since the last count,of the homeless on reservations in 2006.
