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About Smoke signals. (Grand Ronde, Or.) 19??-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 1, 2010)
Smoke Signals 5 AUGUST 1,2010 Tribal staffers contribute at Indigenous Mapping Conference By Ron Karten Smoke SignaU tlaffu nler At the Indigenous Mapping Net work's 2010 Re-Inhabiting the Native Lands conference, the Con federated Tribes of Grand Ronde described the Tribe's public educa tion and outreach efforts regarding the mapping of Tribal lands. Tribal Cultural Resources Man ager David Lewis and Tribal Geographic Information Systems coordinator Volker Mell repre sented the Tribe at the Suquamish hosted conference held in Poulsbo, Wash., June 3-4. Along with as many as 40 indig enous land specialists from Austra lia, Canada and the United States, the Grand Ronde specialists shared information about how Tribes are using GIS technology to regain control of their native lands. "We wanted to show how we are using GIS technology to showcase the loss of Tribal lands over the cen turies," said Mell. "We also showed how we interpreted the treaties to create an accurate area file of the lands ceded in those treaties." "This reverses the paradigm that Tribes were in," said Lewis. "The power for us to claim our lands was devalued because Europeans came in with cartography that they used to document land in a certain way. When the Wilkes expedition came through, that's what they were doing. Now Tribes have the expertise to map our own lands and resources, and we're taking that power away from the state or federal government."' Indigenous and Tribal histories explore an "enormous" amount of information that GIS technology helps arrange and make sense of to meet countless Tribal objectives. Mell described establishing GIS capabilities at the Tribal Natural Resources Department where the staff now is using a central En terprise GIS database to store, manipulate, update and view GIS data important to day-to-day deci sion making. In addition, Mell reported, the Tribe is creating Web services avail able to all Tribal staff through the Tribal intranet site. Included will be information for Tribal Lands and Cultural Resources departments. GIS managers from Grand Ronde and other Oregon Tribes met in Portland last month to form a group that will be represented at the Oregon Geospatial Information Council. "That will give us more voice with the state agencies," said Mell. In a 2008 publication by GIS soft ware company ESRI, Mell, Lewis and Tribal Cultural Protection Coordinator Eirik Thorsgard pro duced a map of Native languages in western Oregon. "The map was constructed from ethnographic material of the late 1800s and early 1900s to under stand the linguistic associations of the Tribes in western Oregon," according to the caption that ac companied the map. Another map showed the Grand Ronde Tribe's "ceded lands usual and accustomed areas in Oregon, Washington and California" with information culled from "oral tradi tions and ethnographic and archae ological sources," and put together with GIS technology. The federal Department of the Interior provides the ESRI software free to federally recognized Tribes, but another function of the confer ence was for Tribes like Grand Ronde to provide information to those indigenous peoples beyond U.S. borders and to Tribes not rec ognized by the federal government that are cobbling together "open source" software to develop maps for similar purposes. At the conference, Mell and Lewis also talked with the new Geospatial executive officer of the Department of Interior. . . "I mentioned to her that Tribal colleges and universities are still struggling with expensive ESRI licenses," said Mell, "and we think it is a good idea to put the Tribal colleges under the same Enterprise license agreement (between DOI and ESRI) that we are using. She was very positive about the request. It looks like with the new adminis tration in D.C., we as a Tribal GIS group have a bigger voice." For many unrecognized Tribes, Lewis offered help, he said, from his own experience in finding records that will help them with their Res toration efforts. B Social Services 201 0 School Clothes Program This is a first-come, first-served program. Child must be an enrolled Grand Ronde Tribal member. Child must be of school age and enrolled in school (pre scho6lt' elementary, middle or high school). Income criteria applies. Please .contact Social Services at 1-800-242-8196 or 503-879-2034 for an application. Deadline for all applications is Wednesday, Sept. 15, 2010. Smoke Signals wins two ONPA awards Tribal publication honored for design and photography Smoke Signals won two awards in the Oregon Newspaper Publish ers Association Better Newspaper Contest for the 2009 publication year. Announced June 15 at the annual convention in Salem, the awards went to Tribal photographer Michelle Alaimo for photography and to Tribal member Justin Phillips and Tribal employees George Valdez, Dean Rhodes and Alaimo for design. Alaimo's third-place photography award was for an entry that in cluded a photo page of a boxing night at Spirit Mountain Casino, a portrait of Tribal Elder Steve Rife on the Trail of Tears and opening ceremonies inside the new Tribal plankhouse during 26th Restora tion celebrations. For the second-place design award, Smoke Signals staff submitted three issues (Feb. 15, July 1 and Oct. 15) for judging. As an Associate member of ONPA, Smoke Signals competed against approximately 30 others newspapers in Oregon, including The Capital Press in Salem, The Portland Tribune and Spilyay Tymoo, the Warm Springs Tribal newspaper. For the second year in a row, Smoke Signals was the only Tribal newspaper to win an award from ONPA. "I believe these awards demonstrate that the quality of the Grand Ronde publication stands up to comparison with other professional newspapers published in Oregon," said Publications Coordinator Dean Rhodes. "Our employees Tribal and nonTribal work very hard to write, photograph and design a quality publication for the Tribal member ship, and it is heartening to see those efforts recognized by the most respected newspaper association in Oregon." B Preservation classes scheduled The Grand Ronde Community Resource Center's Garden House next to the Community Garden is hosting food preservation classes this summer. Glasses accept a maximum of 10 people. The remaining class schedule is: Saturday, Aug. 14 Pickles (dill pickles and jardiniere); Saturday, Sept. 18 - Sausage (chorizo, Italian, breakfast and Portuguese linguiza); Sunday, Oct. 10 - Pears (butter, canned and jam). Everything is provided and attendees can bring any fruit or berries, veg etables or jars they would like to use. Lunch is provided, but attendees should bring a beverage. For more information, call the Grand Ronde Food Bank at 503-879-5731 to sign up. QnwDftatiDOirD ft To-ofoaD mm e mm foe ir eimdldDcrs 2011 Gathering of Oregon's First Nations Annual Powwow The five federally-recognized Western Oregon Tribes the Confederated Tribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians, Coquille Indian Tribe, Cow Creek Band of Umpqua Tribe of Indians, Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde Community of Oregon and Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians will host the third annual Gathering of Oregon's First Nations Powwow at the State Fairgrounds Pavilion in Salem, Ore., on Jan. 29, 2011. Eastern Oregon Tribes also will participate. Tribal members from the five Western Oregon Tribes will have an oppor tunity to secure vendor tables before they are open to the Native American public. Once the tables are open to the Native American public, it is anticipated that they will be completely filled by the next day. The Fabulous Five Committee wanted to make sure vendors from the five Tribes were given this opportunity to secure a table. Tables are $50 per vendor with each vendor being allowed one table. Sorry, no food vendors. The first year's attendance was estimated at 5,000 and last year we had approximately 3,000 people attend. Cutoff for this special offer to Tribal members only is Sept. 15, 2010, at noon. After that any table left will be open to the Native American public. Vendors must provide their own transportation and lodging along with the vendor registration fee. If you do not have enough merchandise or want to split the cost with other Tribal members, that is allowable. However, organizing the combining of re sources will be up to the individuals interested in doing so. If you decide to combine resources, please appoint one person to be in charge of your vendor table. If you are interested, mail or drop by your check for $50 to the Public Af fairs Office, 9615 Grand Ronde Road, Grand Ronde, Oregon 97347 or call 503-879-1418 for more information. Make checks payable to CTGR. Checks are non-refundable and must be delivered by Sept. 15, 2010, by noon.
