Spilyay Tymoo, Warm Springs, Oregon
August 3, 2016
Page 3
Sacred Hoop, White Bison founder coming to W.S.
W arm Springs Health
and Human Services and
Community Counseling will
welcome Don Coyhis and
the Sacred Hoop to Warm
Springs this Friday, August
5.
This Wellbriety Move-
ment event will be from 11
a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at the
Community Center Social
Hall. Lunch provided.
Mr. Coyhis, of the
Mohican Nation, is the
founder of White Bison
Inc., an American Indian
grass-roots non-profit orga-
nization based in Colorado
Springs.
Courtesy photo.
Sacred Hoop
The mission of the Sacred
Hoop:
Healing individuals, fami-
lies, communities and na-
tions. Some background:
The Hoop was built in a
sweat lodge in May of 1995.
Don Coyhis with the Sacred Hood.
White Bison
In that year an Elders’ gath-
ering was held Wisconsin,
providing prayers for the
Hoop, and aligning its pur-
pose to the coming healing
time. The Elders placed the
four gifts of Healing, Hope,
Unity and Power to Forgive
the Unforgivable into the
Hoop.
Warm Springs OSU
Extension, OSU
Veterinarian School,
and the Natural
Resources Range and
Ag Department hosted
a horse clinic recently.
At left are an OSU
Veterinarian student,
Range and Ag director
Jason Smith, and Dr.
Jacob Meachm. This
was a horse castration
clinic.
Photos courtesy of Sue Matters/KWSO
Commercial fishing season set
The twelfth commercial
fishing season of 2016 has
been set.
The season began on
Monday of this week, and
lasts through 6 p.m., Satur-
day, August 13.
The open area is only the
Bonneville Pool in Zone 6.
When the Sacred Hoop
comes to a community, the
people gather for ceremo-
nies and talks about living
sober and healthy lives. The
origin:
In Black Elk’s vision, the
Hoop of the World referred
to the communities of Na-
tive people. In his vision he
saw the Native people going
through a long time of suf-
fering, during which the
hoop was broken.
And then he saw that the
people would begin to heal.
Elders have said we are in
the time of healing. The Sa-
cred Hoop is the symbol of
that time of healing.
Allowed gear is setlines
with 9/0 or larger hooks.
Allowable sales are stur-
geon between 38 and 54
inches fork length in the
Bonneville pool which may be
kept for commercial sales or
subsistence use.
Sturgeon within the legal
limits caught on scaffolds or
with hook and line gear may
also be sold or kept for sub-
sistence.
Fish may be sold after the
open period closes as long as
they were landed during the
open period.
White Bison and the
Wellbriety movement pro-
vide culturally based heal-
ing—from addiction, abuse,
and other trauma—to the
next seven generations of
Indigenous people.
On the Warm Springs Res-
ervation, the Wellbriety Sons
and Daughters of Tradition
program led to creation of
the Soaring Butterflies and
Warrior Spirits student and
youth programs.
The Warm Springs Tribal
Court has a Wellbriety alter-
native to criminal court. And
last year Community Coun-
seling formed the adult
groups Guiding Butterflies
and Mighty Warriors.
Sarah Wolfe at the Coun-
seling Center has been an
advocate of the local
Wellbriety movement. The
tribes hosted a Wellbriety
Celebrating Families! training
earlier this year, the first
such training on the reser-
vation.
For more information on
the upcoming visit, call Sarah
at 541-553-3205; or email:
sarah.wolfe@wstribes.org
Don Coyhis
Since founding White Bi-
son 26 years ago, Mr. Coyhis
has developed a series of
culturally-based programs to
address recovery and treat-
ment, youth prevention,
healthy families and healing
from unresolved grief and
traumatic loss due to inter-
generational trauma.
These programs have been
implemented throughout In-
dian Country in the U.S. and
Canada. Mr. Coyhis was the
2009 winner of the Purpose
Prize Award.
He has been called upon
to provide technical assis-
tance by national policy orga-
nizations such as the White
House Office of Drug Con-
trol Policy, Substance Abuse
and Mental Health Services
Administration, as well as
other national recovery orga-
nizations.
Around Indian Country
Cowlitz win major court hearing
The BIA can place land in
trust for the Cowlitz Tribe of
Washington, the D.C. Circuit
Court of Appeals ruled last
week in a closely-watched
gaming case.
By a unanimous vote, a
three-judge panel of the court
said the Cowlitz people were
“under federal jurisdiction” in
1934 even though their for-
mal government-to-govern-
ment relationship wasn’t final-
ized by the BIA until 2000.
That means the tribe can
follow the land-into-trust pro-
cess.
Writing for the court,
Judge Robert L. Wilkins said
the BIA considered a slew of
evidence before approving
the tribe’s land-into-trust ap-
plication. Failed treaty nego-
tiations that led to the illegal
taking of the tribe's land and
other actions are proof of
federal status, he said.
“The Cowlitz refused to
sign an 1855 land cession
treaty proposed at the
Chehalis River Treaty Coun-
cil, whereby Governor
Stevens of the Washington
Territory and other federal
agents sought to move the
Cowlitz to a reservation on
the Pacific Coast,” Wilkins
wrote. “The Cowlitz resisted
relocation and refused the
treaty, but years later the
The casino will be
the closest tribal
gaming facility to
Portland...
United States offered the
Cowlitz’s land for sale to set-
tlers without compensation
anyway.
“As the district court ex-
plained, the fact that the gov-
ernment nevertheless took
the Cowlitz land even after
the tribe resisted the treaty
corroborates that the govern-
ment treated the Cowlitz as
under its jurisdiction.”
The decision represents a
strong rebuke to opponents
of ilani, the tribe’s fast-rising
casino in Clark County. Con-
struction started earlier this
year despite the lawsuit and
the facility is due to open on
April 17, 2017.
The casino will be the clos-
est tribal gaming facility to
Portland, and that’s one of
the reasons why the Confed-
erated Tribes of Grand
Ronde have tried to stop the
new development. The Grand
Ronde operate the Spirit
Mountain Casino about 90
miles from Oregon’s most
populous city.
“The tribe continues to be-
lieve it is wrong for the
Cowlitz to build a casino in
Clark County, a region histori-
cally belonging to the tribes
and bands of the Confeder-
ated Tribes of Grand
Ronde,” Chair man Reyn
Leno said in a statement on
Friday. “We are reviewing the
decision and are evaluating
our next steps.”
Leno’s tribe could ask a
larger panel of judges on the
D.C. Circuit to rehear the
case. Or the trie could take
the dispute to the U.S. Su-
preme Court—which is still
down one member following
the death of Justice Antonin
Scalia in February.
Back in February 2009,
the Supreme Court ruled that
the BIA can only place land
in trust for tribes that were
“under federal jurisdiction”
when the Indian Reorganiza-
tion Act became law in 1934.
But the Carcieri v. Salazar de-
cision did not define the ex-
act meaning of that phrase.
That left an opening for
the Obama administration to
develop a two-part test that
takes into account numerous
factors to determine whether
a particular tribe meets the
test. A federal judge and now,
the D.C. Circuit, have upheld
the validity of the analysis
with respect to the Cowlitz.