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About Smoke signals. (Grand Ronde, Or.) 19??-current | View Entire Issue (March 3, 1995)
Smoke Signals March 3, 1995 Page 8 Former construction worker: Haller's new work is building dreams, jobs By Frank King '"" '" JIIJ "" "'" "I "."I '"' , v. J -Y": X i rr tirwMinnii i n i 111 nniiiiim ihiimi Bob Haller has been a member of the nine-person Tribal Council for almost six months. In that time he had learned there is a lot to do and learn. "There is much study, preparation and thought that goes into council decisions and actions. Before I was on the council, I did not know how much effort and time is spent on arriving at decisions," he said. About ten years ago, Bob and his wife, Leveta, decided that they wanted to live in an area close to both of their families. "This is where we wanted to be," Bob said. The move was a pilgrimage home for the Haller family. Bob's father worked in sawmills and the woods in Northern Califor nia and the Willamette Valley, and moved between the places in when Bob was young. He had 18 brothers and sisters. "I was right in the middle," Bob said. The Ha Hers moved to Turner, Oregon when Bob was in his jun ior year of high school "Shortly after that I got into the union and became a construction worker," he said. That early decision was a first step in a career that took him through out the United States and to Ven ezuela. "I followed construction jobs, mostly the big dams," he said. He worked on the huge, multipurpose water resource projects on the Lower Snake River, and a big dam job in South America. "I did a lot of work for Guy F. Atkinson Co.," he said. When he ended his heavy con struction career, Bob was a concrete placement supervisor. He had worked his way up from laborer to a management job. After 20 years in construction, the Haller's wanted to put down roots in their cultural homeland. "All of our relatives lived in this area, and we decided this is where we wanted to be," Bob said. To keep busy, he began buying old home, fixing them up, and sell ing them. Bob decided to run for a position on the Tribal Council after several people approached him on the sub ject "When I came back to the area, I started listening to sonic of the con cerns. I just decided to get involved and run," he said. He believes that the Tribe should provide more health and welfare benefits for all tribal members, re gardless of where they may live, as revenue begins to grow from tribal economic development programs. The most satisfying experience to Bob Haller as a Tribal Council member? "Just meeting all of the people -being part of the decision making," he said. Bob said that when he was grow ing up, Indian children and youths frequently faced the pain and iso lation of racial discrimination. "It was a very real thing," he said. "Times have changed. There is less obvious discrimination, and being an Indian now is a good thing. Now everybody wants to be an Indian." The Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon 9615 Grand Ronde Road Grand Ronde, Oregon 97347 Organizational development, environment. Self-governance has created an opportunity for us to re design these programs based on community needs and goals. The Tribe has established two re-engineering teams; one in Family Services and one in Health Services. The teams will be looking at all aspects of service design, including internal systems and processes, communication and services to clients, dealing with outside agencies, dealing with vendors and complying with regu lations. The Family Services Team has met three times. The first meeting was for orientation and an introduction to re-engineering. It was the first time these particular people had come together as a group. The purpose of the second meeting on January 31, 1995, was to establish a common starting point for the Team's work in re engineering programs and services affecting families of the Tribe. The meeting began by identifying significant historical events which have impacted families and indi viduals. The process then moved through a discussion of accom plishments and regrets to the identification of key trends the Team envisions will impact fami lies in the future. After the identification of key trends, the Team shared its hopes and fears for families in the future. Next, the Team identified key values essen tial to healthy families. The final step was to create a shared vision, including a vision statement, of what the family service program should be in the year 2005. The Team's last meeting on February 17, 1995 provided an explanation of the re-engineering process and allowed the Team to discuss their next course of action. The Health Services Team will go through the same steps as the Family Services Team. Their initial meeting is scheduled for March 1, 1995. Human services, in an effort to decentralize decision making and planning, has estab lished three other planning teams. The teams are broken down into the following categories: Informa tion Services, Researching and Facility Design. Another step in the Tribe's development efforts is for all staff to attend, "Techniques for an Empowered Workforce." This team building training is offered by division, and is facilitated by Kit Devine, Human Resource Director. The teams go through a series of training modules which continued cover topics including: assessing improvement opportunities, valu ing differences, determining causes, working in teams, reaching agree ment in teams, targeting improve ment ideas and implementing ongoing improvement. Three divisions have completed the training and are utilizing the techniques learned to address improvement opportunities. A large part of the Tribe's reason for increasing focus on organizational development and efficiency stems from the upcom ing opening of the gaming facility. While we try and position our selves for the impacts of gaming we cannot know them all. We must take advantage of the quickly closing window of opportunity to prepare ourselves. The efforts mentioned above are just the beginning. We intend to continue to utilize these organizational development techniques such as re-engineering and team building to prepare ourselves to adapt in a continuously changing environ ment. We will continue to keep you updated on the progress of the organization through monthly ar ticles in this publication.
