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Spilyay Tymoo, Warm Springs, Oregon
Year in Review ~ 2019 ~
April
A t the Agency Longhouse
this month Charisse Heath
gave a demonstration of
skills—one of them rare and
potentially life-saving, the
other lighter and more famil-
iar—at recent Miss Warm
Springs 2019 Pageant.
She first demonstrated her
skill in cardio-pulmonary re-
suscitation, a life-saving tech-
nique she learned at school.
She followed this with the
more familiar Native youth
skill of basketball, at which
Charisse excelled in high
school.
At the Pageant she also
gave a talk on traditional
foods, and food preservation
techniques. Charisse is the
2019 Miss Warm Springs. A
graduate of Yakama Nation
Tribal School in Toppenish,
she attends Yakima Valley
Community College.
She first became interested
in being Miss Warm Springs
some years ago. “When I was
younger we would go to the
powwows, like Lincoln’s Pow-
wow,” Charisse says. “And I
always looked up to the pow-
wow royalty.”
Her friend Thyreicia
Simtustus, 2018 Miss Warm
Springs, suggested Charisse
give this year’s Pageant a try.
And the judges agreed that
she would make a great
2019 Miss Warm Springs.
Elsewhere:
A new book published in
April— Power in the Tell-
ing by Brook Colley—exam-
ines a story of the Warm
Jayson Smith/Spilyay
Miss Warm Springs 2019 Charisse Heath with
aunt Colleen and uncle Roosevelt Johnson.
Springs Tribes, inter-tribal re-
lations, and the effort to
build a casino on Ceded
Land at Cascade Locks.
The author is now the as-
sistant professor of Native
American studies at South-
ern Oregon University.
Brook spent several years re-
searching and writing Power
in the Telling.
Council chose Raymond
Tsumpti, longest-serving
member, as chairman; and
Lola Sohappy, former tribal
judge, as vice-chair.
There are many worth-
while project ideas on the
reser vation—from eco-
nomic development, hous-
ing, a new community cen-
May
The first week of May
the 11 members of the
Twenty-Eighth Tribal Coun-
cil of the Confederated
Tribes took office.
After the swearing-in cer-
emony the Council met for
preliminary businesses—
electing the chair and vice-
chair, and reviewing the
tribal major documents: the
Treaty, Constitution and By-
Laws and others.
The 2018 Tribal
Member Art Show
concluded in
January of this year.
Entries included
this M&M painting
by Travis Bobb.
Continued
ter, a traditional foods pro-
cessing plant, to name just a
few. There are grant and
other funding sources avail-
able to tribes, yet a poten-
tially greater source of rev-
enue also exists.
These sources are the tens
of thousands of charitable
trusts and foundations—
1,600 in the Pacific North-
west alone, and more than
110,000 nationwide. These
sources become available
when an entity has 501(c)(3)
non-profit recognition.
The tribes received great
news in May, as the federal
government
awarded
501(c)(3) non-profit status
for the Warm Springs Com-
munity Development Orga-
nization. Tribal executive
management, the community
development director, Tribal
Council and legal counsel ini-
tiated the application process
two and a half years ago.
Elsewhere in May of this
year:
December 4, 2019
The Confederated Tribes
Community Health Nurse
team works with the nursing
and medical teams of Warm
Springs IHS in assuring that
children and adolescents
receive their scheduled
vaccinations.
This health partnership
has been a success: The rate
of immunization of young
people for meningitis and
human papillomavirus on
the reser vation greatly
exceeds the overall standard.
And for this cooperative
effort, the clinic team has
received
national
recognition, earning the
2019 IHS Area Director’s
Award—Fostering
Relationships.