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About Smoke signals. (Grand Ronde, Or.) 19??-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 15, 2016)
PRESORTED STANDARD MAIL U.S. POSTAGE PAID PORTLAND, OR PERMIT NO. 700 General Council briefed on investments — pg. 6 OCTOBER 15, 2016 Former Tribal leaders discuss irst female majority on Tribal Council Native colors 'The face of leadership is changing' By Brent Merrill Smoke Signals staff writer A s the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde continues to move into the future, one thing is clear – the Tribe is evolving. And now, for the first time in modern Tribal history since 1983’s Restoration and possibly for the irst time since Tribal peoples ar- rived in the Grand Ronde Valley, ive women hold a majority of seats on the nine-member Tribal Council. The glass ceiling-shattering event did not go unnoticed. Denise Harvey, who won her second three-year term on Tribal Council in September, mentioned the fact in her October Tilixam Wawa statement to the member- ship. “The majority of Tribal Council is now comprised of women, a irst since Restoration,” Harvey wrote. “The face of leadership is chang- ing.” There have been many times that women occupied four seats on Tribal Council, but this year marks the irst time women have attained a majority. However, the Tribe is no stranger to women in leadership positions. The irst post-Restoration Tribal Council in 1984 had two women – Kathryn Harrison, who was the Tribal Council chair, and Candy See LEADERSHIP continued on page 8 Photo by Dean Rhodes Tribal Historic Preservation Oice Manager David Harrelson accepts an award from U.S. Attorney for Oregon Billy J. Williams in the sixth loor conference room of the Mark O. Hatield U.S. Courthouse in Portland on Wednesday, Oct. 5. The award commemorated the posting of nine Oregon Tribal lags inside the federal courthouse and the government-to-government relationship between the U.S. Attorney’s Oice and the federally recognized Tribes in the state. Tribal lags now standing in federal courthouse By Dean Rhodes Smoke Signals editor P ORTLAND – The Grand Ronde Tribal flag flutters in front of the Governance Center in Grand Ronde, naturally. It also lies along with the lags of the eight other federally recog- nized Oregon Tribes in Salem at the State Capitol and in Eugene at the University of Oregon. In addition, it also hangs in- side Willamina School District buildings, where approximately a third of the students are Tribal members. And now it is posted in a sixth- floor conference room of the federal courthouse in downtown See FLAGS continued on page 14 Photo by Michelle Alaimo Tribal Historic Preservation Oice Manager David Harrelson shows an award from U.S. Attorney for Oregon Billy J. Williams as he stands outside the Mark O. Hatield U.S. Courthouse in Portland on Wednesday, Oct. 5. Enrollment Board dismisses Tumulth disenrollments By Dean Rhodes Smoke Signals editor T he Tribe’s Enrollment Board voted on Monday, Oct. 3, to dismiss its decision to disenroll 67 descendants of treaty signer Chief Tumulth, concluding a more than three- year process that created sharp differences of opinion about what constitutes being a Grand Ronde member. On Tuesday, Oct. 4, the Tribe’s General Man- ager’s Ofice sent an e-mail stating that the de- scendants were “once again eligible for services.” The Chief Tumulth descendants, who were irst enrolled in the Tribe in 1986, were identiied for disenrollment after an enrollment audit was approved by Tribal Council in June 2011 and started in early 2013. Although Cascades Indian Chief Tumulth is a treaty signer of the Willamette Valley Treaty of 1855, he never made it to the Grand Ronde Reservation to validly appear on an oficial roll or record of Grand Ronde Tribal members created by the Department of the Interior. Tumulth was executed in April 1856 by the U.S. Army before the Grand Ronde Reservation was established. The Tribe argued in its legal briefs that pre- vious Tribal Councils and Enrollment Boards had erroneously enrolled the irst members of the family and then compounded the mistake by enrolling additional family members, sometimes based on lateral and not lineal ties. The Enrollment Board, which determined that the Willamette Valley Treaty is not a roll or re- cord of Grand Ronde Tribal members, forwarded recommendations of disenrollment to Tribal Council in March 2014 after holding approxi- See ENROLLMENT continued on page 12