[NN-Dialogue] Wotanging Ikche--nanews09.042
Gary Night Owl
gars at speakeasy.org
Tue Apr 27 19:43:41 CDT 2004
+ W O T A N G I N G I K C H E + + Otapi'sin Atsinikiisinaakssin +
+ KANOHEDA ANIYVWIYA + O + It-hah-pe-hah Ah-num pah-le +
+ Ha-Sah-Sliltha + O o O + ni-mah-mi-kwa-zoo-min +
+ Sho-da-ku-we + O o O + Aunchemokauhettittea +
+ Un Chota + O o o o o O
VOLUME 09, ISSUE 042 O o O + Es'te Opunvk'vmucvse +
October 20, 2001 O o O + Ximopanolti tehuatzin,
Mvskokee big chestnut moon O inin Mexika tlahtolli +
Blackfeet sa'aiksi itaomatooyi/moon when ducks leave
( N A T I V E A M E R I C A N N E W S )
==>If you want your Nation represented in the banner of this newsletter<==
email gars at nanews.org with the equivalent of "News of the People"
in your tribal language along with the english translation
+-----------------------------------------------------------+
| Much more happens in Indian Country than is reported |
| in this weekly newsletter. For daily updates check |
| http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm - also events |
+-----------------------------------------------------------+
This issue contains articles from www.pechanga.net; www.owlstar.com;
www.indianz.com; www.indiancountry.com; Frostys AmerIndian, ndn-aim,
LPDC and First Nations mailing Lists; UUCP email
IMPORTANT!!
-----------
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, all material appearing in
this newsletter is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a
prior interest in receiving this information for educational purposes.
<----<<<< >>>>---->
This newsletter is a way of keeping the brothers and sisters who share our
Spirit informed about current events within the lives of those who walk the
Red Road.
++ It may be subscribed to via email by sending a request from your own
internet addressable account to gars at speakeasy.org
++ It is archived at http://www.nanews.org
As historian Patricia Nelson Limerick summarized in The Legacy of Conquest:
The Unbroken Past of the American West,
"Set the blood quantum at one-quarter, hold to it as a rigid definition
of Indians, let intermarriage proceed as it had for centuries, and
eventually Indians will be defined out of existence. When that happens,
the federal government will be freed of its persistent 'Indian problem.'"
"We Indians kept together that time and we avoided the worst. No eagle
came, but we survived."
"Doing my best to keep my brothers safe and out of harm's way bought
me a long stay in the Shoe, of course. Hey, listen, I'm used to paying
for crimes I didn't commit. I can tell you, I don't like being in the
Shoe one bit. You spend twenty-three hours a day in a small cage
inside a larger cage. For exercise you're allowed into the larger
enclosing cage for one hour a day. Its whole intent is to break you.
I'll avoid it if I can. But they'll never break me in there."
"Not a chance."
__ Leonard Peltier "Prison Writings...My Life Is My Sun Dance"
+- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+
| Indian Pledge of Allegiance | The Indian Pledge of Alleg-
| | iance was first presented
| I pledge allegiance to my Tribe,| on 2 December '93 during the
| to the democratic principles | opening address of the Nat-
| of the Republic | ional Congress of American
| and to the individual freedoms | Indian Tribal-States Relat-
| borrowed from the Iroquois and | ions Panel in Reno, NV. NCAI
| Choctaw Confederacies, | plans distribution of the
| as incorporated in the United | Indian Pledge to all Indian
| States Constitution, | Nations.
| so that my forefathers |
| shall not have died in vain | Walk in Beauty! Night Owl
+- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+
+- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+
| Journey | In the summer and early fall
| The Bloodline | of 1998 the Treaty Unity Riders
| | rode a thousand miles on horse-
| For all that live and live by law | back, carrying a staff and
| We Stand, we Call, We Ride | praying each step of the way.
| For All that fear and fear by sight |
| We Hear, we Listen, we Ride | These prayers were offered for
| For all that pray and pray by strength| each of us, and that the Unity
| We Feel, we Move, we Ride | of all Peoples might happen.
| For all that die and die by greed |
| We Hurt, we Cry, we Ride | Tatanka Cante forwarded this
| For all that birth and birth by right | poem on behalf of all the Unity
| We Smile, we Hold, we Ride | Riders that we might stop and
| For all that need and need by heart | ask if the next words we say, the
| We Came, we Went, we Rode. | next act we make is for the good
| | of the People or is it from ego
| Treaty Unity Riders | for self.
+- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+
O'siyo Brothers and Sisters!
This week's editorial is very short; but, as a Vietnam vet, from
my heart.
This past weekend, at a festival, which has become known as a
healing circle for vetarans I talked to a friend...who also
is the Mom of a corporal in the Marine Corps. Her son already
been in one hostile situation about a year ago. Corporal Joe, like
the rest of his Recon Unit, is now on 2 hour alert status...
equipment pack by his rack, ready to jump into enemy territory.
Monday, I talked to another friend, whose cousin, Melvin, is a
Master Sergeant already deployed and doing his job in hostile
territory.
Corporal Joe is a Cherokee. Master Sergeant Melvin is a Navajo.
There are a lot of Joes and Melvins doing what they were trained
to do. They are not all Cherokee or Navajo or even Native.
They - and their families - all do need our prayers. And when
their job is done, those who return must find places and people
who will honor them and their service, and offer gratitude,
support, and a safe place to heal from the harm done to them
while they protected the rest of us.
-- - - -
If you have names and addresses of trustworthy collectors of food, money
and clothing gifts at the various reservations please forward them soon.
The winter winds already have come down from the north.
Dohiyi Ani Oginalii
, , Gary Night Owl gars at nanews.org
(*,*) P. O. Box 672168 gars at speakeasy.org
(`-') Marietta, GA 30006, U.S.A. gars at olagrande.net
===w=w=== gars at sdf.lonestar.org
----------- News of the people featured in this issue ----------
- Cherokee Nation Tribal Councilor - Court to Decide on
Dorothy McIntosh Pumping Water to Everglades
- Crossings - Confederated Tribes
- ICT Editorial: Termination unveil Neighborhood
by Denial/Columbus - Air Force donating Homes to Group
- Anti-drill Ad in Theaters - Pima Indians: A Case Study
- Bush promotes ANWR - Lights still on
as Home Security at Red Cloud Building
- OIN expands Health Center - Seattle Tlingit Potlatch
- HHS Awards Native American - Burnt Church Boat Seized
Elders Caregiver Grants - Excessive Force used
- Program May Pay to stop Fishing Boat
Tribal Healer Costs - Welfare-to-work challenges Tribes
- Algonquins of Barriere Lake - Two Arrested on Charges
- Dissident Crow Council of Demanding Money
passes Agenda Items - Charges against Officer Dropped
- Native American Bank - Alaskan Prisoners
ready to Launch - Standing Deer returns Home
- Acquisition of Browning, Mont. - Leonard Peltier Statement
Bank gains Approval - Native Prisoner
- Sokaogon Chippewa keep -- Pen Pals Needed
Authority to Regulate - Rustywire:
- Navajos/State Engineer For the Love of an Indian Woman
ask for Fed Water Team - Poem: Borrowed Keyboards
- Effort to Provide Water - Verse: Hawaiian Book of Days
for Lower Klamath - Indian Tribes
- Tribe/Water Board pinning Tourism Hopes on Olympics
seal Irrigation Deal - First American Indian
- Tribe regains Ancestral Lands rides to orbit in August
- We want to see Our Land Cleaned Up - Native America Calling
--------- "RE: Cherokee Nation Tribal Councilor Dorothy McIntosh" ---------
Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 08:11:12 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="ELDER"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=2471366&BRD=1825&PAG=461&dept_id=129120&rfi=6
Cherokee Nation Tribal Council member dies
By:Betty Smith
October 09, 2001
Dorothy McIntosh's memorial services will be Saturday.
Cherokee Nation Tribal Councilor Dorothy Jean McIntosh of Ochelata died
Saturday.
"She had a fatal heart attack," said Mike Miller, communications
coordinator for the Cherokee Nation.
Memorial services for McIntosh will be at 2 p.m. Saturday at Ramona High
School gymnasium. Ochelata Methodist Church will hold a fellowship dinner
in her honor.
McIntosh will be missed, Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chad Smith said.
"She was the personification of a free spirit who cared about Cherokee
people," Smith said. "Though we didn't always agree, she always maintained
the highest level of statesmanship. She was extremely diligent in her
duties, and out of all the council members she was probably the most
earnest about her community meetings."
Councilor John Ketcher said McIntosh's death came as a surprise. He
learned of her death upon his return from a trip to North Carolina for the
Eastern Cherokees' Octoberfest.
"I saw her just before I left, never realizing that on my return I would
get this news," he said.
He recalls McIntosh as someone dedicated to her district and to her
tribe - plus someone who could inject a moment of humor into even the most
serious deliberations.
"She was always pleasant, had a dry sense of humor, and was very
dedicated to her position," he said. "She worked hard, kept her people
informed, and was always bringing us information about how people were
thinking in her district."
She also made sure documents produced by the council carried correct
grammar.
"She was always bringing up any incorrect spelling," Ketcher said.
McIntosh was learning the Cherokee language and was dedicated to this
task, he said. She was making contributions as co-chair of the language,
cultural and heritage committee where Ketcher worked along with her.
McIntosh was serving her first term on the tribal council. Ketcher said
it will be up to the council to seek her replacement.
There are several options, he said. Councilors could contact the person
getting the second highest number of votes in the election that placed
McIntosh in office, and see if that person is interested in service. Or
councilors could appoint someone from that district after interviewing
candidates. They also will discuss the matter with Principal Chief Chad
Smith.
Copyright c. Tahlequah Daily Press 2001
--------- "RE: Crossings" ---------
Date: Mon 15 Oct 2001 08:10:50 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="CROSSINGS"
Gallup Independent Obituaries
October 9, 2001
Mae D. Watchman
FORT DEFIANCE, Ariz. - Services for Mae Watchman, 86, will be held at
1 p.m., Wednesday, Oct. 10 at Tohatchi Christian Reformed Church. Rev. Paul
Redhouse will officiate. Burial will follow at Tohatchi Community Cemetery.
Visitation will be held from 2-7 p.m., today at Rollie Mortuary-Memorial
Chapel. Watchman died Oct. 6 in Albuquerque. She was born Sept. 8, 1915
in Crystal into the Folded Arm People for the Red Streak People.
Survivors include her daughter, Shirley Mae Becenti of Fort Defiance;
nine grandchildren; 14 great-grandchildren and two great-great-
grandchildren.
Watchman was preceded in death by her husband, Joe Watchman; parents,
John Bone and Bitnidzizbah Dennison; son, Eugene J. Watchman; sisters,
Casbah Ben, Pauline Chischilly, June Dennison and Elizabeth Howard; and
brothers, Arkie Dennison, Frank Dennison, George Dennison and Tsosie
Dennison.
Pallbearers will be Deb Becenti, Roc Becenti, Samuel Becenti, Harold
Redhouse, Gary Watchman, Kevin Watchman and Christopher Yazzie.
Rollie Mortuary is in charge of arrangements.
Lillie Becenti
MEXICAN SPRINGS - Services for Lillie Becenti, 91, will be held at
10 a.m., Wednesday, Oct. 10 at Rollie Mortuary Palm Chapel. Pastor John
Kostelyk will officiate. Burial will follow at Tohatchi Cemetery.
Becenti died Oct. 5 in Albuquerque. She was born April 10, 1910 into the
Edge Water People for the Hairy People.
Survivors include her daughters, Terri Becenti of Tsaile, Ariz. and
Anita Edsitty of Mexican Springs; 11 grandchildren and 14 great-
grandchildren.
Becenti was preceded in death by her husband, Howard Becenti Sr.;
parents, John and Irene Betsoi, son, Leon Betsoi; and brother, Peter John
Betsoi.
Pallbearers will be Larry Edsitty, Nelson Edsitty Jr, Nelson Edsitty Sr,
Walt Jones, Roland Skeet and Arnold Wilson.
Rollie Mortuary is in charge of arrangements.
October 10, 2001
Helen Notah Benito
GALLUP - Services for Helen Benito, 86, will be held at 10 a.m.,
Thursday, Oct. 11 at Cope Memorial Chapel. Rev. Keith Bulthuis will
officiate. Burial will follow at Rehoboth Cemetery.
Visitation will be held from 3-5 p.m., today at Cope Memorial.
Benito died Oct. 8 in Gallup. She was born April 30, 1916 in Mexican
Springs into the Charcoal Streaked Division of the Red Running into the
Water for the Red House People Clan.
Benito was a rug weaver, homemaker and a sheepherder. She attended First
Indian Baptist Church.
Survivors include her daughters, Lena McKenzie of Shiprock, Dorothy
Yazzie of Gallup; Mary Lee of Ganado, Ariz., Lillian Johnson of Gallup,
Marlene Bitsilly of Tohatchi, Katherine Miles of Fort Defiance, Ariz. and
Brenda Joyce of Albuquerque; sisters, Gladys Notah and Leona Notah both of
Mexcan Springs; 19 grandchildren and 26 great-grandchildren.
Benito was preceded in death by her husband, Lee Kee Benito and son,
Jimmie Herman Benito.
Pallbearers will be Wes Benito, David Yazzie, Billy B. Yazzie, Donny
Carey, Julius Miles and Harold Johnson.
Cope Memorial Chapel is in charge of arrangements.
Marie K. Jim
KLAGETOH, Ariz. - Services for Marie K. Jim, 49, will be held at 11 a.m.,
Thursday, Oct. 11 at St. Anne Catholic Mission. Burial will follow at
Klagetoh Community Cemetery.
Jim died Oct. 7 in Fort Defiance, Ariz. She was born March 6, 1952 in
Ganado into the Big Water People Clan for the Honeycomb People Clan.
Jim attended Greasewood Springs School and Fort Wingate High School.
Survivors include her sons, Albern Jim, Alden Jim and Alvin Jim of
Albuquerque; daughters, Lolita Jim of Fort Defiance, Ariz. and Melissa and
Lisa Jim both of Albuquerque; mother, Ruth K. Tsosie; brothers, Edward K.
Tsosie of Greasewood Springs, Daniel K. Tsosie of Wide Ruins, Ariz. and
Thomas K. Tsosie of Klagetoh, Ariz.; sisters, Lena Holmes of Glendale,
Ariz. and Ceceila K. Lee of Fort Defiance, Ariz. and two grandchildren.
Jim was preceded in death by her father, Ben Tsosie; brother, William K.
Tso.
Pallbearers will be Alvin Jim, Albern Jim, Thomas K. Tsosie, Thomason K.
Tsosie, Nathan K. Tsosie and Danley K. Tsosie.
The family will receive friends and relatives after the burial services
at Klagetoh Chapter House.
Tse Bonito Mortuary is in charge of arrangements.
October 13-14, 2001
Mary Begay Yazzie
BLUEWATER LAKE - Services for Mary Yazzie, 82, will be held at 10 a.m.,
Monday, Oct. 15 at Rollie Mortuary Palm Chapel. Pastor Mark Thomas will
officiate. Burial will follow at Gallup City Cemetery.
Yazzie died Oct. 9 in Albuquerque. She was born Sept. 15, 1919 in Houck,
Ariz. into the People Who Walks Around You Clan for the Bitter Water
People Clan.
Survivors include her son, Tommy Yazzie of Bullhead City, Ariz. and
Jimmy Yazzie of Canoncito; daughters, Marie Singer, Ernestine Yazzie and
Helena Yesslith all of Bluewater Lake; 15 grandchildren and 20 great-
grandchildren.
Yazzie was preceded in death by her husband, Peter Yazzie; daughter,
Louise Yazzie; parents, Charlie and Mary B. Hunter; and brothers, John
Begay and Dan Kee Hunter.
Pallbearers will be Benjamin Begay, Clifford Jarvison, Johnny Singer,
Bennet Smith and Juan Wilson.
Rollie Mortuary is in charge of arrangements.
Copyright c. 2001 Gallup Independent.
-- - - -
Rapid City Journal Obituaries
October 9, 2001
William Joseph Hernandez
KYLE - William Joseph Hernandez, 49, Kyle, died Sunday, Oct. 7, 2001, at
Rapid City Regional Hospital.
Survivors include three sons, William Hernandez and Wade Hernandez, both
of Kyle, and Patrick Hernandez, Provo, Utah; four daughters, Yvette
Hernandez and Stella Hernandez, both of Kyle, Lisa Hernandez, Rapid City,
and Patula Hernandez, Provo; four sisters, Ann Montileaux, Eunice Lavado
and Geraldine Lujan, all of Kyle, and Linda Aguilar, McCook, Neb.; one
brother, Steven Hernandez, Kyle; and one grandchild.
A two-night wake will begin at 1 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 10, at Our Lady of
Sorrows Catholic Hall in Kyle.
Services will be at 10 a.m. Friday, Oct. 12, at the hall, with the Rev.
Cordelia Red Owl officiating.
Burial will be at a later date.
Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements.
October 10, 2001
Gerard Wayne Eagle Bull
PORCUPINE - Gerard Wayne Eagle Bull, 37, Porcupine, died Friday, Oct. 5,
2001, in Minneapolis, Minn.
Gerard Wayne Eagle Bull, "Hehaka Mani," was born January 4, 1964, in
Aberdeen, S.D., to Harry Eagle Bull and Donna Eagle Bull-Tuttle.
He attended school in Aberdeen, S.D., and graduated from Roncalli High
School in 1982. He attended Northern State University and the University
of Minnesota. He worked most of his life in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
He is survived by his parents of Porcupine; two younger sisters, Tammy
Eagle Bull-Hesson, Phoenix, Ariz., and Annette Eagle Bull, Porcupine, S.D.
; one brother, Jake Eagle Bull, Minneapolis, Minn.; his brother-in-law,
Todd Hesson; one niece, Isabelle Hesson; two nephews, Charlie Eagle Bull
and Jack Hesson; and numerous aunts, uncles, and cousins.
Gerard was preceded in death by his maternal grandparents, Dave Tuttle
and Lillian Iron Cloud-Tuttle, and his paternal grandparents, Lloyd Eagle
Bull Sr. and Alvina Big Crow-Eagle Bull.
A two-night wake will begin at 4 p.m. Thursday, October 11, at Our Lady
of Lourdes Gymnasium, Porcupine, S.D. Mass of Christian Burial will be at
10 a.m. Saturday, October 13, 2001, at Our Lady of Lourdes Gymnasium,
Porcupine, S.D. Rev. Peter Klink, S.J., and Rev. Jim Ryan, S.J., will be
officiating.
Interment will be at Christ the King Cemetery, Porcupine, S.D. Sioux
Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.
October 11, 2001
Garould Gayle American Horse
GORDON, Neb. - Garould Gayle American Horse, 45, Gordon, died Monday,
Oct. 8, 2001, in Pine Ridge, S.D.
Survivors include two sons, Brandon American Horse and Emil American
Horse, both of Gordon; his mother, Martha American Horse, Gordon; and one
grandchild.
A two-night wake will begin at 2:30 p.m. today at the Martha American
Horse residence in Gordon.
Services will be at 10 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 13, at St. Mark's Episcopal
Church in Gordon, with the Rev. Cordelia Red Owl officiating.
Burial will be at Messiah Episcopal Cemetery in Wounded Knee, S.D.
Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements.
October 13, 2001
Gloria Ann Pettigrew
PINE RIDGE - Gloria Ann Pettigrew, 60, Pine Ridge, died Thursday, Oct.
11, 2001, at Wounded Knee.
Survivors include four sons, James Pettigrew, Michael Pettigrew, John
Pettigrew and Jason Pettigrew, all of Wounded Knee; three daughters,
Michelle Pettigrew, Rapid City, Susan Pettigrew, Pine Ridge, and Sandra
Pettigrew, Wounded Knee; four brothers, Clifton Clifford and Joseph
Clifford, both of Pine Ridge, Patrick Clifford, Manderson, and Phil
Clifford, Wounded Knee; four sisters, Theresa Perkins and Anita Ecoffey,
both of Wounded Knee, Dorothy Lafferty, Pine Ridge, and Mary Wilson,
Payabaya Community Number Four; and 13 grandchildren.
A one-night wake begins at 2 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 14, at Billy Mills Hall
in Pine Ridge.
Mass of Christian Burial will be at 10 a.m. Monday, Oct. 15, at Billy
Mills Hall, with the Rev. Jim Ryan officiating.
Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements.
October 14, 2001
Mary Louise Charge On Him
WOLF CREEK - Mary Louise Charge On Him, 64, Wolf Creek, died Monday,
Sept. 24, 2001, in San Francisco.
Survivors include one son, Daniel Cruz, Yerington, Nev.; one daughter,
Rosalyn Kim, Honolulu, Hawaii; two brothers, Virgil Charge On Him, Fremont,
Calif., and Donroy Charge On Him, Wolf Creek; and two sisters, Theresa
Charge on Him and Annie Charge On Him, both of Rosebud.
Services will be at 2 p.m. today at The House of Jacob Church in Wolf
Creek, with the Rev. Frank Hill and Mr. William Red Bear officiating.
Burial will be at Wolf Creek Cemetery.
Sioux Funeral Home in Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements.
October 15, 2001
Leona F. Limeburner
RAPID CITY - Leona F. Limeburner, 69, Rapid City, died Friday, Oct. 12,
2001, at her home.
Survivors include six daughters, Shauna Redding, Hopkinton, Mass.,
LeeAnn Groves, Albuquerque, N.M., Lori Limeburner, Phoenix, Susan Stull,
Grand Junction, Colo., Ellen Key, Kingman, Ariz., and Beth Brockman, Rapid
City; one sister, Jo-Ann Coyle, Troy, N.Y.; and 11 grandchildren.
Christian wake services will be at 7 p.m. today at Cathedral of Our Lady
of Perpetual Help.
Mass of Christian Burial will be at 10 a.m. Tuesday, Oct. 16, at the
church, with the Rev. Tim Castor as the celebrant.
Services are under the direction of Osheim-Catron Funeral Home in Rapid
City
Copyright c. 2001 Rapid City Journal.
--------- "RE: ICT Editorial: Termination by Denial/Columbus" ---------
Date: Mon 15 Oct 2001 08:10:50 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="ICT: TERMINATION"
http://www.indiancountry.com/?2669
ICT Editorial: Termination by denial and hello Columbus
October 15, 2001 - 07:00am EST
One undeniable effect of the conquest and colonization that Columbus
ushered into the Americas 509 years ago this week has been the
disappearance and assumed extinction of many Indigenous nations. Beaten
down, dispersed, introduced to horrendous diseases, tribes were dissipated,
decimated and some among those who suffered the worst of war and cultural
destruction, were judged to have become extinct.
Nevertheless, culture and genetic continuity are quite resistant. While
chiefs or caciques, and many matriarchs were exterminated under the theory
of "cut the head and the body dies," in fact, among many Native peoples,
the body did not die. The Maya have a saying, "They cut the flower, they
cut our branches, they cut the trunk of our tree, but they could not yank
out our roots."
This past week, when one more wheel in that extinction-making process
moved again to grind over Native American tribal identities, came another
indicator of how extinction can occur by bureaucratic decision, which
often can go this way or that, depending on who weighs them, and are
always likely to leave the broader realities aside.
Reversing decisions that recognized two tribes, issued in the final days
of the Clinton administration, Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Neal
McCaleb last week moved to deny federal recognition to two branches of the
Nipmuc, while also making a final determination against the Duwamish.
As a result of McCaleb's decision, and other factors, these tribal
peoples are allegedly denied, (terminated from?) status as American Indian
governments before U.S. federal law - while, previously - these cases had
been judged by a wide array of opinion, to be deserving of such
recognition.
While perhaps governance may not have been highly visible, enough range
of tribal ethnicity, continuous cultural bases and adaptations over
centuries had been presented to convince serious professional American
Indian legal minds that these peoples did actually exist and had continued
to exist.
Now the factor of continuity of sustained "government-to-government"
relationships takes prominence. One interpretation means, yes, you have a
right to continue to exist as a people; the other moves to put the final
ax to the official identity of a people having the right to govern
themselves.
Sorting out issues of identity, Indigenousness, making a well-documented
case of tribal continuity, reestablishing a sense of peoplehood, these are
not easy efforts. Much has been made in the mainstream press that the
Nipmucs were primarily interested in achieving federal recognition to
establish lucrative gaming enterprises. But their struggles for
recognition began long before the Indian Gaming Rights Act was even
imagined. Nevertheless, any interest in pursuing economic recovery models,
so vital for the rebuilding of Native peoples and nations, should not be
considered a disqualifier of existence.
Many nations were run over by the thrust of western civilization on this
hemisphere. Added to the usual charges of savagery, primitiveness and
barbarism, which nearly always precipitated armed force, came the
declaration against many nations that they had simply ceased to exist. As
historians are wont to repeat the assertions of official documents, the
label of extinction, once applied, takes on a life of its own. As
witnessed by McCaleb's rulings it is a label nearly impossible to overcome.
For example, in the Caribbean, for the Taino, the people who first
greeted Columbus, malice and ignorance have conspired to keep the myth of
extinction alive. Despite a substantial continuity of evidence to the
contrary, from the 1600s to the present, any assertion of Taino survival
can expect to be formally greeted with hostility, derision, even hatred,
by many officials.
While many scholars have accepted the reality of considerable
Indigenous-derived culture among the Greater Caribbean populations and
while recent DNA testing (in Puerto Rico) provides evidence of significant
Amerindian mitochondrial DNA among the island's contemporary population,
and while in Cuba, Dominica and elsewhere communities exist that have
well-documented continuity in place, the efforts by peoples of Indigenous
heritage to reconstitute their societies are more often attacked than
seriously considered.
We know that the term "indio" was purposely dropped from the official
census language by the Spanish sometime in the late 1700s. Instead, the
term "pardo" or "darkie" was employed. The reason: to disallow any
potential claim to lands or goods taken from the Indigenous population.
When outright killing became too difficult and costly, a simple
declaration that the Indigenous had ceased to exist proved just as
effective to the fundamental mission of dispossession and the forceful
taking of Indian lands and resources.
Such it is today, when tribes appear denied the right to existence, at
least in part, because they might use such status to press for economic
recovery options, properly formalized under federal law.
During this past week when so many celebrated Christopher Columbus's
intrepid and ill-fated voyages, it appears peculiarly of interest that the
federal bureaucracy would still move to destroy rather than respect and
assist tribal continuities.
Whatever problems the Nipmucs or Duwamish have had in the course of
their histories, these were largely brought about by the very interests
that now seal their fates. The Nipmucs and Duwamish deserve to be who they
are. We wish them well in their continued legal struggles for federal
recognition.
And we are mindful that during this tragic event, the deadly stroke was
this time delivered by another American Indian, Chickasaw Neal McCaleb.
Copyright c. 2001 Indian Country Today.
--------- "RE: Anti-drill Ad in Theaters" ---------
Date: Fri 12 Oct 2001 18:19:12 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="ANTI-DRILL"
http://www.pechanga.net/
http://www.adn.com/alaska/story/719395p-759274c.html
Anti-drill ad in theaters
By Liz Ruskin
Anchorage Daily News
October 11, 2001
Washington -- President Bush wants to allow drilling rigs in the Arctic
National Wildlife Refuge, but President Josiah Bartlet is campaigning to
keep them out.
Martin Sheen, the actor who plays the fictional president on the TV show
"West Wing," has taped an ad for an environmental group that is showing in
movie theaters in Washington, D.C., and in 12 key states.
"The Arctic Refuge," Sheen intones, as golden-hued footage of musk oxen,
caribou and bears plays on the screen. "Is it worth destroying forever,
for six months of oil? This is Martin Sheen. Please act now. . . .
Together, we can save what's left."
The ad, sponsored by the Alaska Wilderness League, has been running for
several weeks. Campaign director Adam Kolton said 300 theaters have agreed
to run it for free, and Sheen didn't charge for his voice-over.
The oft-repeated "six months of oil" argument drives drilling proponents
crazy. ANWR's oil wouldn't come out all at once and would last 20 years or
more, they say.
By the way, in case you missed the season premiere of "West Wing"
Wednesday night, Bartlet announced he is running for re-election.
Copyright c. 2001 The Anchorage Daily News
--------- "RE: Bush promotes ANWR as Home Security" ---------
Date: Fri 12 Oct 2001 18:19:12 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="BUSH/ANWR"
http://www.indianz.com/
SmokeSignals/Headlines/showfull.asp?ID=pol/10122001-1a
Bush promotes ANWR as home security
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 12, 2001
Opening up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development
is even more necessary to protect homeland security, President Bush said
on Thursday.
"[A]n energy bill is not only good for jobs, it's important for our
national security to have a good energy policy," Bush told reporters after
a Cabinet meeting. "The less dependent we are on foreign sources of crude
oil, the more secure we are at home."
"I urge the Senate to listen to the will of the Senators and move a
bill," he added.
Bush's remarks come after Democratic leaders in the Senate halted
consideration of an energy bill. Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) and
Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) this week pulled the proposal from the Energy and
Natural Resources Committee, causing anger among drilling supporters.
Bingaman, who chairs the committee, said the action was necessary to
avoid caustic debate. The nation doesn't need squabbling to hold up a
national energy policy, he said.
"At a time when Americans all over the world are pulling together with a
sense of oneness and purpose," Bingaman said in a statement, "Congress has
an obligation at the moment to avoid those contentious issues that divide,
rather than unite, us."
But the move to suspend committee consideration and send the matter
directly to Daschle was tied to concerns by Democrats that the panel would
approve drilling in ANWR. Bingaman and most other Democrats oppose
development in the refuge's coastal plain, but two party members on the
committee were prepared to support it.
Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii) had been lobbied to oppose drilling by the
Gwich'in Nation but his spokesperson later noted he would support
development if done in an "environmentally responsible way." Sen. Mary
Landrieu (D-La.) frequently sides with the energy industry, coming from an
oil-friendly state.
Knowing their votes have been cast aside angered Sen. Frank Murkowski
(R-Alaska), the ranking Republican on the committee. He had lashed out at
the Democrat action but yesterday had hopes after Bush made his remarks.
"The President's comments will have a very strong impact in the U.S.
Senate in light of the events of Sept. 11," Murkowski said in a statement.
"I'm optimistic that we are gaining strong ground in this battle."
With Democrats from New England threatening a filibuster if a pro-
drilling amendment is brought to the Senate floor, Murkowski and
supporters would need 60 votes to break it. Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska)
told reporters yesterday the votes might not be there.
The House has already approved an energy bill that will allow for
development 2,000 acres of ANWR's coastal plain. Home to the Native
village of Kaktovik, Inupiat Eskimos widely support drilling, citing
economic benefits, both locally and to Arctic Slope Regional Corp., an
Inupiat-owned corporation with mineral rights.
Opposed to development are the Gwich'in, who live both in Alaska and
Canada. Tribal members depend on the Porcupine caribou herd in the refuge
and fear drilling will disrupt their spiritual, cultural, economic and
food center.
Of the House action, Bush said it was a "good energy bill."
Copyright c. 2000-2001 Noble Savage Media, LLC/Indianz.Com
--------- "RE: OIN expands Health Center" ---------
Date: Mon 15 Oct 2001 08:10:50 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="ONEIDA"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=2469123&BRD=1709
OIN expands health center
October 09, 2001
VERONA - The Oneida Nation Health Center's summer expansion project has
been completed. The finishing touches are being put on the newly renovated,
7,800-square-foot building.
It is more than three times the size of the original facility, built in
1991 to treat Oneida Nation members and other Native American clients. The
expansion was a response to the Nation's growth and increasing need over
the last decade for more space dedicated to medical and dental services.
Nelson Associates, an architecture firm out of Clinton, developed
designs for the new facility. The general contractor was G.M. Crisalli
Associates Inc. of Syracuse. Several other local subcontractors were used.
The structural appearance of the refurbished health center and the
Nation's new cookhouse, including landscaping and roofing, complement each
other, said project manager Michael Murphy.
The expanded area includes increased dental staff space, a nurse's
station and a medical lab. There is enough room for five exam rooms and
four dental operatories. Part of the old 2,400-square-foot building will
serve as a reception area for patient intake. It also will include a
larger waiting area, space for medical records and a conference room,
which will be used for workshops on such topics as diabetes prevention,
prenatal care and child health programs.
The expansion is expected to improve patient flow and employee
productivity and allow for increased on-site services.
In other health news, a new podiatrist recently joined the Nation's
Health Center. Reed Burk joined the medical staff part-time in July,
seeing patients two Fridays a month. Originally from Schoharie, Burk also
works with Indian Health Services (IHS) with the Creek Nation in Oklahoma.
The need for foot specialists is great among Native Americans, who have a
high incidence of diabetes and, as a result, have the highest amputation
rate of any group in the country.
Copyright c. The Oneida Daily Dispatch 2001
--------- "RE: HHS Awards Native American Elders Caregiver Grants" ---------
Date: Thu, 27 Sep 2001 08:53:11 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="HHS AWARDS"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://politics.yahoo.com/politics/features/us_newswire/20019/0925-116.html
HHS Awards Native American Elders Caregiver Grants
WASHINGTON, Sept. 25 /U.S. Newswire/ -- HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson
announced today the award of nearly $5 million in grants to 119 tribal
organizations to implement the new Native American Caregiver Support
Program.
"This new program will make real and lasting differences improving the
quality of life for some of America's most vulnerable citizens, our Native
American elders and their caregivers," said Secretary Thompson.
"Strengthening access to health care and social services to better serve
hard-to-reach and rural communities is a priority of this department."
Grants were awarded to 110 tribal organizations to provide families of
Native American and Native Hawaiian elders with access to information,
respite care, counseling, training, and supplemental services to help them
meet their real-life caregiving challenges. In addition, nine tribal
organizations each received $100,000 demonstration grants in the following
areas:
-- "Starting at the Beginning" grants were awarded to the Central Council,
Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska; the Jamestown S'Klallam Tribal
Center in Washington; and the Blackfeet Tribe of Montana. These grants
will be used to identify and prioritize the most critical needs of family
caregivers, and then develop and demonstrate the benefits of services that
address those needs.
-- "Coordination and Leverage" grants were awarded to four tribal
organizations: the Oneida Tribe of Wisconsin; the Confederated Salish and
Kootenai Tribes of Montana; the South Puget Intertribal Planning Agency
for Chehalis and Nisqually in Washington; and the Hana Community Health
Center in Hawaii. These grants will be used to demonstrate the benefits of
coordinating and leveraging all the family caregiver support programs and
services in these four tribal areas.
-- "Quality Standards and Mechanisms of Accountability" grants were
awarded to Alu Like Inc. in Hawaii and the Rosebud Sioux Tribe of South
Dakota to design and test quality standards and assurance mechanisms for
multifaceted systems of supportive services for family caregivers.
"We have worked with the Tribal leaders to make sure that this vitally
needed program provides the most culturally appropriate and proficient
services that address the needs and expectations of the families and other
caregivers of the Native American elders we serve," said HHS Assistant
Secretary for Aging Josefina G. Carbonell.
The grants are administered by the Administration on Aging, the HHS
agency that administers the Older Americans Act, which provides funding to
states and communities for critical home- and community-based services for
older persons and their caregivers. The new Native American Caregiver
Support Program was created as part of the National Family Caregiver
Support Program, launched earlier this year.
The list of the 110 tribal organizations receiving the formula grants is
available online at:
http://www.aoa.gov/pressroom/pr2001/naecaregivers.html
Copyright c. 2001 Yahoo! Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright c. 2001 U.S. Newswire All Rights Reserved.
--------- "RE: Program May Pay Tribal Healer Costs" ---------
Date: Mon 15 Oct 2001 08:10:50 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="HEALER COSTS"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.sltrib.com/10142001/utah/140179.htm
Victim Compensation Program May Pay Tribal Healer Costs
Sunday, October 14, 2001
BY STEPHEN HUNT
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
When American Indians in New Mexico and Arizona become victims of crime
and want counseling to help them recover, their states will reimburse them
for the cost.
If they instead seek healing ceremonies performed by tribal healers, the
states -- convinced the ceremonies help -- will pay for those expenses as
well.
Now, Utah's Crime Victim Reparations (CVR) program is considering making
the same offer to Utah crime victims.
American Indian healing ceremonies often are cheaper than therapy by
licensed psychologists, primarily because healing ceremonies are usually
one-time events, completed in one to three days.
"A one-time expense might be $300 for a session," said Henry Thompson,
an Apache Indian who is the victim advocate for the Apache County
Attorney's Office in Arizona. "That might seem like a lot of money
compared to Western therapy. But the medicine man doesn't say, 'I'll see
you next week, same time, same place.'
"When people go to these ceremonies, it's usually once or twice, at
most."
Most importantly, Thompson said, he believes the healing ceremonies
work: "I've been approached by victims a year after [the crime], who say
they are very thankful that we have helped them -- and it was just one
ceremony."
Larry Tackman, director of New Mexico's crime victim reparation program,
said healing ceremonies have proven worthwhile and effective. "It's often
the best thing to do for the victim," he said.
Utah's CVR is exploring offering reimbursement to Utah crime victims for
broader, nontraditional treatments, including American Indian healing
ceremonies.
Under current policy, CVR has limit of $2,500 for counseling by licensed
mental-health workers.
Dan Davis, director of Utah's CVR, said the number of requests for such
"nontraditional" counseling methods in Utah are few, but he added: "There
is a need for a policy about what we can and can't do."
The office also is also considering a proposal to cover the cost of
counseling for jurors who sit through traumatic homicide trials.
In the 14 years since it opened, CVR has given more than $42 million to
nearly 25,000 victims of violent crime in Utah.
The bulk of the money -- restitution and fines paid by defendants, plus
federal grants -- covers medical, mental health, funeral and burial
expenses. But the program also pays for lost wages and travel, as well as
rent and relocation costs for victims of domestic violence.
"We're interested in helping crime victims put their lives back together
as best we can financially," Davis said. "It's not the total answer, but
it's a step in the right direction to get people back on their feet."
Larry Cesspooch, public relations director for Utah's Ute Tribe, said
financial assistance with healing ceremonies would probably be welcomed by
American Indian crime victims. However, Cesspooch said government
officials need to be aware that paying for such ceremonies can be "a
touchy issue."
While it is all right to compensate a healer for time, travel and
ceremonial expenses such as fire wood, the actual help he renders is
considered to be free.
"The 'medicine' is free. It's not ours to give. It comes from the
creator," Cesspooch said. "You're not paying for the ceremony. You're
paying for [the healer's] time."
Thompson said his office reimburses according to a predetermined fee
schedule that lists healing ceremonies ranging from $75 for a crystal-
gazing ceremony to $300 dollars for a blessing-way ceremony.
Tribal healers often accept payment in the form of sheep, cattle or
horses, which requires a reparations staff to work out reimbursement in a
culture where invoices are seldom used.
"It's not like a medicine man is going to produce a computer-generated
bill," said Tackman, adding that he must occasionally translate the value
of livestock into dollar amounts in order to reimburse American Indian
crime victims.
"We go through the county extension person to find out what 12 sheep are
worth, and pay that amount," he said.
Forrest Cuch, director of the state Division of Indian Affairs, said the
CVR's willingness to consider healing ceremonies is "a gesture, a step in
the right direction" toward resolving the ongoing strife between whites
and American Indians.
But Cuch suggested that to guard against impostors, the CVR should
reimburse only for ceremonies performed by healers who have been approved
by tribal governing bodies.
Copyright c. 2001, The Salt Lake Tribune.
--------- "RE: Algonquins of Barriere Lake" ---------
Date: October 9 12:58 pm
From: frosty at frostys.qc.ca (Frosty)
Subj: The following item appears on Boyce Richardson's personal web site
Mailing List: Frostys AmerIndian <frostysamerindian at yahoogroups.com>
The following item appears on Boyce Richardson's personal web site
(magma.ca/~brich) today:
October 9 2001
Algonquins of Barriere Lake, ignored by minister, vow to stop all
logging of their lands
The Algonquins of Barriere Lake, a small reserve 280 kilometres north
of Ottawa, who have been in the capital city for the last two weeks
trying to force either the minister or deputy-minister of Indian
Affairs to meet with them, have had to retreat to their home base,
without having gained the meeting they sought.
They have now decided to forbid all logging in 10,000 square
kilometres (3,861 square miles) of their traditional lands, covering
most of the La Verendrye wildlife reserve (which, although it does not
in any way preserve wildlife, is maintained under that name by the
Quebec government).
The issue between the Algonquins and the federal government is the
completion of the so-called Integrated Resource Management Plan
(IRMP), a detailed inventory of the boreal forest in which the
Algonquins have lived, and from which they have obtained their
livelihood, for countless generations. This forest has been
progressively clear-cut over the last 40 years, thus hacking the heart
out of the Algonquin economy, and their way of life.
The Algonquins decided in the late 1980s to protest, blockade and
prevent this process from continuing. At that time their protests were
so effective that they persuaded the Quebec and federal governments to
join them in a so-called Trilateral Agreement, whose object was to
create a plan under which the Algonquin interest in the forest should
be taken into account by other users. Until that time, their interest
had been simply swept aside by hydro use of the Ottawa river (the
heartland river of the Algonquins), and by progressively brutal
clear-cut logging.
Work on the IRMP, which would identify the areas of essential interest
to Algonquin life, has been going on ever since 1991, when the
Trilateral Agreement was signed. It has been a checkered experience,
often interrupted. It began in an atmosphere of hostility and
indifference towards the Algonquins by both governments and the
logging companies. But gradually the atmosphere has improved as the
major players have come to realize the importance of the work being
done. Since work on the plan resumed three years ago, both the Quebec
government and the loggers have become more sympathetic. The IRMP has
been completed and has operated successfully in one area, and what
remains is to complete the work to cover the remaining part of the
10,000 square kilometres.
Suddenly the federal government --- perhaps alive to the implications
for land claims of Algonquin interest having been recognized in the
large area, since their reserve is only 59 acres --- have withdrawn
their support and funding for the finishing of the IRMP. It is
estimated the government has spent $5 million so far, and would be
required to spend another $700,000 to complete the plan. A federal
government release on October 3 has acknowledged the many achievements
of the work so far done:
- developing a database
- studying wildlife and forest
- gathering traditional scientific knowledge
- completing individual maps that identify hunting, fishing, trapping
and land-use, that have been digitized into a Geographic Information
System (GIS).
Other elements are the completion of
- sensitive area study maps
- a major harvesting study,
- a topography study
- a social customs study
- a traditional ecological study
- measures to harmonize processes established to identify, conserve
and protect Algonquin cultural/heritage resources
- a study on the sustainable development of natural resources
- and a first draft IRMP report on the Gull Lake Area.
This is a formidable list, whatever the difficulties that may have
been encountered in achieving it. It is the kind of work that should
be done throughout Canada's boreal forest wherever Aboriginal people
are still living and subsisting on the produce of the land, before
other uses are permitted. And it seems almost inconceivable that the
federal minister should not only withdraw when the work is so nearly
completed, but carry his indifference to the length of refusing to
meet with the Algonquins to discuss his decision.
I was present when the first Algonquin blockades of logging were
mounted in the late eighties and early nineties. (I made an NFB film
on the subject). At that time they were able to prevent work being
done close to the major road that runs north-south through the park;
but they were not able to prevent clear-cut logging that continued in
the far reaches of the park to the east.
Now, the Algonquins, armed with more precise information about the
needs of the logging companies, believe they can shut down the entire
logging operation if called upon to do so. Some of the half dozen
companies involved realize that if this happens, the large mill at
Grand Remous, a nearby town to the south, might be forced to close for
lack of wood.
A group of Montreal architects who have been working with the
Algonquins on housing and other schemes, Wade Eide and Peter Fianu of
Atelier BRAQ, have written to the minister recently begging him to
meet the Algonquins.
"We believe that this plan will prove to be a milestone in Canadian
history and will serve as a model for sustainable resource management
in Canada and around the world," they wrote. "The plan will integrate
traditional indigenous knowledge with modern science and technique and
will benefit not only the Algonquins, but all Canadians, as well."
Their letter noted that "the bush and the rivers were managed under a
system that did not recognise the Algonquins' tenure on the land. The
management system did not recognise that they held a body of
traditional knowledge of how to use the true abundance of the land,
not just how to exploit it for the maximum short-term profit provided
by hydro power, wood and recreational hunting. The tremendous wealth
of the bush that they once enjoyed is no longer there for them and
they do not even share in the profits garnered by its commodity
exploitation."
Indeed, the Algonquins have claimed recently that $100 million of
production is being taken off their traditional lands every year, and
they are getting nothing from it.
Not only is the minister turning his face against one of the most
far-sighted schemes for Aboriginal improvement (not to mention
resource management) ever undertaken in Canada, but he even seems
indifferent to the problems of the logging companies.
The fact that the Algonquins are among the poorest people in the
country appears to count as nothing to him. He has taken refuge in the
old jurisdictional question, so familiar in Canadian issues: "We have
spent 10 years working on forestry issues that are really the Quebec
government's responsibility. We've funded a process we should not even
have been at the table for," Minister Robert Nault has said.
As the Algonquins withdrew from Ottawa Chief Carol McBride, chosen by
the Algonquins to represent them in negotiations with the governments,
commented: "I'm just shocked to see how this minister is putting these
people aside. It's terrible. He's supposed to be here for the native
people. There's a lot of frustration. And the disrespect the minister
has shown the elders of Barriere Lake -- it's not being taken
lightly"
--------- "RE: Dissident Crow Council passes Agenda Items" ---------
Date: Mon 15 Oct 2001 08:10:50 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="DISSIDENT CROW"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.php
Dissident Crow council passes agenda items
Gazette Staff
The 695 Crow Indians who attended an alternate tribal council meeting
Saturday voted to reject the tribe's proposed new constitution and strip
power from the tribe's top elected officials.
Tribal officials have called the meeting illegal, but participants said
they will continue to meet until new elections are held to decide the fate
of a proposed new tribal constitution. The new constitution strips power
from the tribe's council, which was made up of every adult member of the
tribe. Opponents of the document say it was adopted illegally.
Bob Kelly, a spokesman for the opposition and an elected member of the
alternate council's leadership delegation, said he hopes tribal and
federal officials do not ignore the votes.
"They need to take a serious look at those numbers," Kelly said. "It has
to appear to them that the majority of the tribe is not accepting the new
constitution as legal."
Previous tribal council meetings typically had between 600 and 700
participants, Kelly said. Although Saturday's meeting had to be held in an
unheated building, 695 people turned out because of the importance of the
political changes happening with the tribe.
"They came to vote their heart and conscience," he said. "We didn't give
anybody gas money. We didn't promise any jobs. We just asked them to come
and vote by secret ballot."
After numerous recounts, the ballots were in favor of the agenda
presented at the meeting. Although all items passed, the issues with the
least division surrounded the management of the tribe. Members voted 574
to 17 to fire the tribe's attorneys, the Elk River Law Offices; 576 to 13
to ask for a federal audit of tribal funds; 526 to 51 to strip powers from
the tribe's top three officials.
Not all participants voted on every item, Kelly said.
Copyright c. The Billings Gazette, a division of Lee Enterprises.
--------- "RE: Native American Bank ready to Launch" ---------
Date: Sat, 6 Oct 2001 09:20:22 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="NA BANK"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://denver.bcentral.com/denver/stories/2001/10/01/daily50.html
Native American bank ready to launch
Native American Bancorporation of Denver has finally gotten the
regulatory approval and capital it needs to launch the Native American
National Bank.
The bank has been in the works for several years and is designed to help
meet the financial needs of Indian communities around the country.
The first bank, created by a merger with Blackfeet National Bank in
Browning, Mont., will open in a few weeks. The Montana bank is owned by
the Blackfeet tribe.
The holding company's executive offices and national marketing efforts
will be based in Denver.
The bank was created because Indian communities, which are often poor,
have not been able to get the capital they need for development and other
improvement elsewhere. The holding company has already set up a nonprofit
subsidiary, the Native American Community Development Corp., to fund
things such as financial education, special housing and small businesses.
"This is a giant step for Indian Country and for the rest of the United
States," said Tex Hall, Native American Bancorporation's chairman. "Lack
of access to capital continues to plague many tribal people, and having our
own bank will work to alleviate that. This is a form of tribal unity that
will benefit all tribes economically and will ensure our sovereignty."
Copyright c. 2001 American City Business Journals Inc.
--------- "RE: Acquisition of Browning, Mont. Bank gains Approval" ---------
Date: Sat, 13 Oct 2001 14:19:08 -0700
From: "Jess Hansen" <mikola18 at hotmail.com>
Subj: "Acquisition of Browning, Mont., Bank Gains Approval"
Mailing List: ndn-aim <ndn-aim at yahoogroups.com>
<http://quotes.freerealtime.com>
Saturday, October 13, 2001
"Acquisition of Browning, Mont., Bank Gains Approval"
By MARK FOGARTY
Denver, CO. (Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News) -- "The Federal Reserve
Board has approved the application of Native American Bancorporation Co.
here to acquire Blackfeet National Bank of Browning, Mont., giving a green
light to startup of the first nationwide American Indian bank.
NABC, in the process of organizing the operation for several years, will
change the Blackfeet National name to Native American National Bank. Its
office will remain in Browning under the new name and will continue
banking and community development efforts on the Blackfeet reservation.
In acquiring the $18 million asset Blackfeet National, NABC will become
a holding company and is getting a $16.4 million depository base for its
operations, the Federal Reserve reported.
The bancorporation also announced it has raised necessary initial
capital to get the project off the ground, more than $10 million. Through
a community development corporation (CDC) unit, Native American National
Bank plans to focus on financial education, specialized housing and small
business finance, and trust land recovery and utilization. It will
specialize in Indian country finance around the nation but not be limited
to that to avoid reverse discrimination concerns, the Fed said.
Its investors are a consortium of about 15 American Indian tribes and
Alaska Native corporations. Tex Hall, chairman of the Three Affiliated
Tribes of North Dakota, a founding tribe, is chairman of the board.
Other founding tribes are the Mashantucket Pequot of Connecticut, the
Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa, Michigan, the Oneida of
Wisconsin, the Mille Lacs Ojibwe Indians of Minnesota, the Blackfeet, the
Chippewa-Cree of Montana, the Mountain Ute of Colorado, the Arctic Slope
Regional Corp. and Sealaska Corp.
Blackfeet National and NABC are linked by the fact that Blackfeet
activist Elouise Cobell has been a prime mover in starting both of them.
In the late 1980s, she helped found Blackfeet National and served as
chairwoman. She is an interim board member for Native American
Bancorporation.
As tribal treasurer in the late 1980s, Cobell helped Blackfeet National
get its charter after the only local bank in Browning failed. It is
currently the 70th largest depository in Montana.
In late September, she referred questions on the deal to NABC chief
executive John Beirise, except to comment, "We're very delighted" about
the approval. "It couldn't come at a more opportune time."
Cobell is lead plaintiff in the historic lawsuit against the Department
of the Interior over mismanagement of tribal and individual American
Indian trust funds.
Beirise, with 30 years of experience with such firms as Continental Bank,
Chicago, and Mercantile Bank, St. Louis, said his Denver office plans to
employ some 25 people (17 now work for Blackfeet National).
In its approval order, the Federal Reserve "concluded that consummation
of the proposal likely would not have a significantly adverse effect on
competition or on the concentration of banking resources in any relevant
banking market."
It also noted Blackfeet National's "outstanding" rating under the
Community reinvestment Act and its status as a CDFI (community development
financial nstitution) as favorable factors in its approval.
And it said "the financial and managerial resources and future prospects
of ancorporation and Blackfeet Bank are consistent with approval."
The board took note, without adjudication, of objections to the merger
raised in a comment letter signed by Alvin Reevis and other members of the
Blackfeet tribe, and said they did not prevent the approval.
Reevis alleged that Blackfeet National Bank, 94 percent owned by the
Blackfeet tribe, was founded with tribal members' money but controlled by
non-Blackfeet and non-Indians, that fraud may have been committed against
the Blackfeet people, that the tribe could not sell its interest in the
bank without consent of a majority of tribal members, and that the NABC
is being founded to manage money that may be awarded as a result of the
Cobell lawsuit.
Jeanne S. Whiteing, counsel for the Blackfeet Tribe, responded by
writing to the Fed "Mr. Reevis' objections are without merit."
She pointed out that the tribe controls 94 percent of the shares, and
that individual Blackfeet also own stock. She said the overwhelming
majority of shares were voted in favor of the acquisition by NABC.
As to requiring a majority consent on sale of tribal assets worth more
than $10,000, Whiteing said that referred only to cases where the tribe
was acting under its corporate charter. In this case, the tribe was
acting under its governmental capacity and thus did not require the
referendum, she said.
Beirise said NABC was not established to manage trust suit money, but he
didn't rule it out if a favorable ruling brings billions of dollars into
Indian country. "Indian people should have more choices with respect to
how their money is invested."
Data from the Office of Comptroller of the Currency, which regulates
national banks, show Blackfeet, as of June 30, was well capitalized with a
core capital ratio of 7.73 percent and a risk-based capital ratio of 18.93
percent.
It also was showing a favorable net interest margin of 5.98 percent.
This reflects the difference between what it pays for money (3.92 percent)
and what it earns on that money (9.9 percent).
However, it has booked a $1 million loss year to date, meaning it has a
negative return on assets and equity, and for the first half of 2000 it
lost $396,000. It also had $693,000 in noncurrent loans and leases as of
June 30, 2001.
However, that figure was down from $1,399,000 the year before."
Copyright c. 2001 Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->
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Archived on line at: http://www.eScribe.com
FREE LEONARD PELTIER
--------- "RE: Sokaogon Chippewa keep Authority to Regulate" ---------
Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2001 08:32:18 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="WATER RIGHTS"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www2.startribune.com/stOnLine/cgi-bin/article?thisStory=85016975
Published Tuesday, September 25, 2001
Tribe keeps authority to regulate waters on reservation
By The Associated Press / Statewire
A northern Wisconsin American Indian tribe has full authority to regulate
the water quality on its reservation downstream from a proposed zinc and
copper mine, a federal court ruled.
The ruling by the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago could put
another obstacle in the path of the proposed mine south of Crandon.
The court ruled Friday the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency can
allow the Sokaogon Chippewa band to regulate waters on its reservation
because tribal members have shown the waters are essential to their
survival.
"This decision means that this ecosystem, which has sustained the tribe
for all these centuries, will survive," the tribe's attorney, Glenn
Reynolds of Madison, told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel." Any upstream
activity cannot produce change of water quality on tribal lands."
Nicolet Minerals Co. wants to open the zinc and copper mine in Forest
County. Company spokesman Dale Alberts said the company understood the
tribe's high water-quality standards before acquiring mining rights from
Exxon in 1998.
"They have their standards and we're going to meet them," Alberts said.
The tribe's tough rules could strain Nicolet's resources, said Tina Van
Zile, tribal vice chairwoman.
"All we want to do is protect what we have," Van Zile said." Our
resources are everything to us. We're taught to respect them and we want
them to be there for our generations to come."
Nicolet Minerals is a subsidiary of BHP Ltd., headquartered in Australia.
The company wants state, federal and local permits to mine 55 million tons
of zinc and copper ore.
Opponents of the mine argue toxic chemicals from it will damage the
environment, especially Swamp Creek and Rice Lake, which waters the
tribe's wild rice beds.
Those who support the mine say it can operate responsibly and will
create much-needed jobs.
The court rejected the state's appeal that argued only Wisconsin
officials can regulate water quality because the state owns streams and
lakebeds.
The court said the EPA has the power to regard Indian tribes as states
under the Clean Water Act.
The EPA, not the state or the tribe, can issue permits for the mine, the
court said. The state will decide whether to appeal by Oct. 5.
Copyright c. 2001 Associated Press. All rights reserved.
Copyright c. 2001 Minneapolis Star Tribune. All rights reserved.
--------- "RE: Navajos/State Engineer ask for Fed Water Team" ---------
Date: Mon 15 Oct 2001 08:10:50 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="WATER"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.cia-g.com/~gallpind/todaysnews.html#anchor2
Navajos, state engineer ask for fed water team
Larry Di Giovanni
Staff Writer
GALLUP - Two years to the day after their letters requested a federal
assessment team to oversee San Juan River settlement negotiations, the
Navajo Nation and New Mexico State Engineer recently sent letters to
Washington requesting higher assistance through a federal negotiating team.
State Engineer Tom Turney's and Navajo President Kelsey Begaye's Sept.
14 letters are requesting appointment of a federal negotiating team for a
two-year period only. At stake is the Navajo Nation's share of San Juan
River water. The tribe currently does not have any reserved water rights
on the San Juan, but its water rights negotiating team members as well as
Turney acknowledge that its potential rights are huge.
During an interview with the Independent Thursday, Turney was asked if
the Navajos' San Juan River claim was in the vicinity of 300,000 acre-feet.
"I've heard numbers that are many times beyond that magnitude," he
responded...
Copyright c. 2001 Gallup Independent.
--------- "RE: Effort to Provide Water for Lower Klamath" ---------
Date: Thu, 27 Sep 2001 08:53:11 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="KLAMATH"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://politics.yahoo.com/politics/features/us_newswire/20019/0926-129.html
Secretary Norton Announces Cooperative Effort to Provide Water for Lower
Klamath and Tulelake National Wildlife Refuges
WASHINGTON, Sept. 26 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The Department of the Interior
announced today that the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has identified
additional water for the Lower Klamath and Tulelake National Wildlife
Refuges in a cooperative effort with local irrigators to assist migrating
Klamath Basin waterfowl.
The refuges will need about 5,200 acre-feet of water during October in
addition to the 6,300 acre-feet supplied during September. Reclamation has
identified sufficient well water to satisfy October's refuge needs from
area irrigators willing to participate in the effort. Tulelake and Klamath
Irrigation Districts have promised to deliver the additional supplies to
the refuges through their facilities. Also, in late July, Norton made
about 75,000 acre-feet of water available to Klamath farmers in desperate
need.
"I commend the generosity of local irrigators and the assistance of the
Tulelake and Klamath Irrigation Districts in helping provide this critical
water for the refuge," Interior Secretary Gale Norton said. "Their
contributions will be an enormous boost for the refuge water supply and
the bald eagles and other precious wildlife that historically inhabit the
area in the late fall and winter."
Norton also praised the hard work and good faith efforts of those
involved in finding long-term solutions to allow Klamath farmers to
receive much needed irrigation water, to help meet trust responsibilities
to Klamath Basin Tribes and to protect threatened and endangered species.
"It is only by working together that we can reach long-term and fair
solutions to these complex issues. With hard work and good faith, we can
find answers and move beyond suffering and conflict and toward solving the
problems affecting Klamath Basin families," Norton said.
Reclamation is currently working on routing 800 acre-feet of the October
supply through the Ady Canal system to the Lower Klamath National Wildlife
Refuge later this month to make it available to migrating waterfowl that
will soon arrive at the refuge.
Copyright c. 2001 Yahoo! Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright c. 2001 U.S. Newswire. All Rights Reserved.
--------- "RE: Tribe/Water Board seal Irrigation Deal" ---------
Date: Mon, 8 Oct 2001 08:11:07 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="WATER AGREEMENT"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.thedesertsun.com/news/stories/local/1002429231.shtml
Tribe, water board seal irrigation deal
Agua Caliente to water golf course with recycled water
By Benjamin Spillman
The Desert Sun
October 7th, 2001
A deal between the Agua Caliente Development Authority and the Desert
Water Agency will result in recycled water being used to irrigate the
Canyon South Course.
The water recycling project is the first for the Agua Caliente Band of
Cahuilla Indians. If successful, the tribe hopes it will help replenish
the aquifer underneath the tribe's reservation and the city of Palm
Springs.
"We have been in overdraft for a number of years," said Michael Kellner,
the tribe's environmental manager, of the Coachella Valley. "Any amount of
recycling will help."
Dan Ainsworth, general manager of Desert Water Agency, said an
application for a $1 million grant from the state to pay for the pipeline
is pending.
The entire project is expected to cost around $4 million and take as
long as 18 months to build.
It is part of a new effort by the water agency to find new users for
reclaimed water, Ainsworth said.
"For years and years, we have waited for golf courses and developers to
come to ask for reclaimed water," Ainsworth said. Now, "We've made efforts
to market it."
The golf course is due to be remodeled beginning next summer. It is part
of a tribal redevelopment of the Canyon Hotel site. The entire development
will include the new course, a 450-room hotel and 150 to 200 time shares,
according to the development authority.
The tribal group is not paying for installing the pipeline but has
negotiated a contract to buy water from Desert Water Agency.
"It costs a little bit more than pumping it out of the ground," said
Fred Razzar, executive director of the Agua Caliente Development Authority.
"The environmental concerns ... are worth a few extra bucks."
Ainsworth said the tribal group will pay between $100 and $150 per acre-
foot of reclaimed water.
Razzar estimated that the course will use between 1,000 and 1,200 acre-
feet of water annually. He said it costs about $100 per acre foot to pump
directly from the ground.
Kellner reviewed the plan that will involve building a pipeline to send
the reclaimed water from a wastewater treatment plant on Gene Autry Trail
in Palm Springs to the golf course near the mouth of the Indian Canyons.
Ainsworth said about a third of the golf courses in the Desert Water
Agency's district use reclaimed water.
Kellner said a key element of the program is that it involves
distributing the water upstream from Palm Springs so that it will drain
through the soil and back into the aquifer. Much of the existing reclaimed
water from the treatment plant is used downstream and percolates into
wells in Cathedral City and Rancho Mirage, Kellner said.
"The idea is to get the water back up toward Mount San Jacinto," he said.
Reclaimed water is preferable to well water for uses such as irrigation,
according to water managers. By using lower-quality water discharged from
sewer plants after being treated, high quality ground water is preserved
for other uses. The water is also high in nitrates that are then filtered
out by grass instead of manual methods required if the water is simply
discharged from the sewer plant.
"That is one of the things we want to do with reclaimed water,"
Ainsworth said. "Replenish people's ground water."
In addition to Canyon South, Ainsworth said Desert Water Agency hopes to
add other users to the new pipeline.
Benjamin Spillman can be reached at 778-4643
or by e-mail at Benjamin.Spillman at thedesertsun.com
Copyright c. 2001 The Desert Sun.
--------- "RE: Tribe regains Ancestral Lands" ---------
Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 08:11:12 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="TIMBISHA"
http://www.pechanga.net/
http://www.sacbee.com/news/projects/reparations/20011009_main.html
Ancestral lands
Tribe regains some treasured soil
By Stephen Magagnini, Bee Staff Writer
Oct. 9, 2001
FURNACE CREEK -- To the casual observer, Death Valley is a desolate
tundra of mauve rocks and mirages, salt flats and sandstone. Summer
temperatures routinely break 120 degrees, turning the valley into a blast
furnace that saps the will of all but the hardiest European tourists.
To Pauline Esteves, it is the most beautiful hell on earth. Where others
see only sunburnt mountains, she sees a treasure trove of pine nuts. Where
others see endless mesas stubbled with parched desert plants, she inhales
the sacred scent of purple sage.
In this place seemingly devoid of life, Esteves, the 76-year-old
spiritual leader of the Timbisha Shoshone Indians, sees everything she
holds dear: the land and the legends that nourished her people for
centuries before the first Europeans came.
"Everything comes from the land," she says. "Nearly every word in our
language is related to nature."
Even the tribe's name "Timbisha," which is what the Indians call the
valley itself, comes from the red ore found in the Black Mountains above
Furnace Creek.
In 1933, when Death Valley became a national monument, the National Park
Service tried to drive the Indians out. But Esteves and a handful of
others stubbornly hung on in sand-swept trailers and adobe cabins that had
no air conditioning or indoor plumbing until the 1970s.
Her 279-member tribe won a dramatic victory last fall when Congress
approved the unprecedented giveback of 314 acres near the Death Valley
National Park headquarters and an additional 7,200 acres on the outskirts
of the park. The Indians also won the right to co-manage 300,000 other
acres within the 3.4 million-acre park.
John Reynolds, the Park Service's Pacific-West regional director who
brokered the Timbisha deal, said he was delighted to "right a 65-year-old
wrong."
The Park Service decision is part of a sea change in federal Indian
policy, as more tribes are given a say in how to manage forests, rivers
and wilderness. Many see it as a way to make reparations to American
Indians who were forced off their land by bullets or broken treaties.
But some conservationists question the wisdom of turning over national
park lands to Indians who, they say, often put economic and cultural
survival ahead of natural preservation.
And it may be too little, too late to help the Timbisha, an impoverished
band scattered across hundreds of miles of mountains and desert.
Only 45 hardy members remain at the Timbisha tribal headquarters, a
trailer village a mile from the visitor center. It's 60 miles to the
nearest high school, 53 miles to the supermarket.
Furnace Creek has long since dried up, and much of the water in nearby
Travertine Springs is sucked up by the privately owned Furnace Creek Inn
and Ranch resort with its two swimming pools and golf course.
And the mountain spring that fed the tribe's pinyon pine groves in the
Panamint Mountains now is barely a trickle.
"It's been overgrown by willows, and when Pauline tried to clean it out,
she was nearly arrested by a Park Service ranger," said anthropologist Kay
Fowler, who has worked with the tribe since 1990. "By law, you're only
supposed to take photographs and leave footprints -- you don't take or cut
or pick anything. It's a good philosophy, but landscapes that have evolved
with a human presence often need more than that."
The tribe is trying to restore a stand of honey mesquite bushes once
pregnant with beans used to make sweet flour, but this year's crop is
almost as barren as the terrain around it. Death Valley Park
Superintendent J.T. Reynolds (no relation to John Reynolds) says
hydrologists believe water that once fed the mesquite has been diverted by
a trench dug by the Pacific Borax Co. -- which built the Furnace Creek
Inn -- "to keep the water from flooding the road as well as their
property."
Indian gaming was sold to California voters as a way to right past
wrongs. But to get the Furnace Creek land, the Timbisha Shoshone had to
waive their right to build a casino, and so far, no one has come forth
with an offer to develop other tribal acreage at Scotty's Junction and
Death Valley Junction.
Perhaps most disheartening of all, the return of ancestral land, rather
than pulling the tribe together, has torn it apart. In June, several
tribal council members based in Bishop -- 190 miles from Timbisha --
wrested control of the council and ousted the feisty Esteves as chairman.
She was officially deposed for opposing a $50,000 home loan to Spike
Jackson, now the acting chairman. But Jackson, who works for an Indian
social service agency in Bishop, says the rift was really about a
fundamental difference in tribal philosophy.
Esteves often spoke Shoshone with other tribal elders, excluding Jackson
and some of the younger council members. Jackson says she refused to teach
them: "If she'd taught me one word each council meeting, I'd be fluent by
now."
And Jackson would like to see tribal membership based on descendancy,
rather than blood -- now, only those who are one-quarter Indian can become
members, which means that Jackson's six nieces and nephews, who are one-
eighth Indian, don't qualify. Federally recognized tribes, as sovereign
nations, determine their own membership criteria.
"At one-quarter Indian, I'm the last of my tribe," he says. "It's the
stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life and they want to keep it that
way. I've got blue eyes, but my heart's Timbisha."
Esteves responds, "I can't help it if they turned white."
American Indian nations -- including the eight tribes in the Grand
Canyon, the Yosemite Valley Miwok, and the Miccosukee in the Florida
Everglades -- are following the Timbisha deal intently, hoping they, too,
will get more control of ancestral lands in public parks. Superintendent
Reynolds says he's even spoken with aboriginal park managers from
Australia about how park rangers and indigenous peoples "can benefit from
each other's knowledge."
Park Service official John Reynolds, who pioneered the Timbisha
agreement, understands native peoples' sacred connection with their
ancestral lands. Though the Timbisha didn't gain title to all the acreage
they claimed was theirs, "they got recognition that they had a cultural
relationship to the land, not just a legislative relationship -- that's
unique anywhere," he says, and adds that he hopes the Timbisha deal can be
a model.
But even Jackson wonders whether the Timbisha Shoshone, after decades of
having their culture suppressed, are equal to the task.
"To take us back to our homeland now is as devastating as removing us to
begin with, because we're so far behind," Jackson says. "There's no
infrastructure, no water, no electric, no jobs. It's just barren land."
It doesn't help that the newly reacquired tribal land is virtually in
the shadow of Yucca Mountain, the proposed site of a high-level nuclear
waste dump the Indians fear could leach radioactivity into the groundwater.
"Although," Jackson says, "we'll do the best with what we got -- it beats
nothing."
The tribe would like to build 50 homes, along with its own desert inn,
cultural center, restaurant and shops featuring genuine Indian handicrafts.
The shops at the Furnace Creek resort sell fake Indian trinkets made
overseas, and the visitor center barely mentions Indians.
But Frank Buono, a retired Park Service official who opposes the
transfer of public park lands to Indians, says any new resort would
further deplete the underground water supply at Furnace Creek.
"The Timbisha ... will now become part of the problem," Buono said.
"That doesn't sound like good stewardship to me. At what point do we wrong
the future by trying to correct the wrongs of the past?"
Buono says the Park Service instead should have bought the Furnace Creek
Ranch and Inn and turned it over to the Indians.
Driven from homes
Historians say indigenous peoples have lived in Death Valley for at
least 10,000 years, starting when a lake filled the valley. It got its
morbid name when the Gold Rush-era forty-niners ventured in and nearly
perished from hunger and thirst.
The Indians loathe the name Death Valley -- "We're not supposed to talk
about death," Esteves says -- and instead call it Timbisha. Their
ancestors would paint their faces with "timbisha," the local red iron ore
they believed had magic healing powers.
The National Park Service gradually took over American Indian lands and
used a variety of methods to drive the Indians out, says J.T. Reynolds.
"In the Grand Canyon, they were burned out; here, when they used to leave
for the mountains in the summer, the government hosed down their adobe
structures. But these people were persistent. They stuck it out."
In 1983 the government finally recognized the Timbisha Shoshone as an
official tribe, giving them sovereign nation status, but no land to go
with it.
The tribe's first real break came in 1994. The federal Desert Protection
Act transferred millions of acres of desert to the Park Service on the
condition that the Timbisha Shoshone be consulted on the creation of a
reservation.
The tribe hired Steve Haberfeld and Jon Townsend of the Sacramento-based
Indian Dispute Resolution Services to train Esteves and 14 others in the
art of negotiation.
At first, the gap between the tribe and the Park Service could have
filled Death Valley -- the Indians wanted 750,000 acres in the park; the
federal government wanted the Indians out of the park altogether, and
offered them a few acres of desert "homeland" 30 miles away. One of the
first negotiating sessions took place in a room without air conditioning
in 127-degree heat, Haberfeld said, and Esteves and other Indian leaders
were forced to sit on buckets.
By the spring of 1996 the Indians -- fed up with being treated worse
than tourists on land they believed belonged to them -- joined forces with
the Navajo, native Hawaiians, the Miccosukee and several other nations,
who publicly accused the Park Service of "ethnic cleansing."
In 1997, Haberfeld went to Washington, D.C., to meet with John Reynolds,
the new Western regional director for the Park Service. Reynolds became
the first U.S. official to treat Esteves with the respect befitting her
status as the head of a nation.
They reached a historic "nation-to-nation" agreement that became law
last November.
Land sustains life
At 7 a.m., Pauline Esteves meets some visitors outside a trailer that
serves as the tribal office. "Let's go," she growls. "It's too darn warm."
She stops at the mesquite grove near the tribal village. It seems
nothing moves here after sunup except the flies, but Ken Waterson, the
tribe's environmental technician, says the land still sustains jack
rabbits, pack rats, gray kit foxes, sidewinders and red racers.
When Esteves' mother was a girl, she says, the spring above the Furnace
Creek Inn flowed in all directions, creating ponds green with arrowweed
and mesquite and flush with migrating birds.
Before Esteves was 10, the Park Service moved the Indians several times,
first to a dried-up ditch near the borax company, then to what is now the
visitor center, and then finally to the present tribal headquarters,
"where all the sand was blowing in our direction."
Esteves lives alone, always has. "I've never been married, never shacked
up, either -- they couldn't corrupt me," she says. Indian men were in
short supply, and none lived up to her standards.
Except for the decade she spent as an electronics assembler in Pasadena,
Esteves has lived here, often as an employee of the resort. She cleaned
bathrooms, made beds, prepared the salad bar, cleared tables and worked as
a cultural interpreter until, she says, her tales of Indian mistreatment
became too controversial for the Park Service.
She was born in what is now the post office at the Furnace Creek Ranch.
Her grandfather worked for the Pacific Borax Co., mining the "white gold"
used in cleaning and later to make fiberglass. Her father, a Basque from
Spain, mined gold at nearby Skiddoo. He died of lung disease.
Esteves says that as children she and her friends would climb the Black
Mountains that frame the village, digging clay they'd shape into dolls.
In the old days, she would occasionally dine on 2-foot-long chuckwalla
lizards. "They were a food source, a medicine source. All the goodness was
in the tail."
Today, Waterson, the tribe technician, finds a rare mesquite pod and
chews on the sweet beans, which the Indians believe have a calming effect.
"He's tranquilized now," says Esteves.
Cool mountain respite
When Esteves was a girl, she says, as many as 200 people would harvest
mesquite beans, but there hasn't been a nice, fat crop since the late
1980s.
"So much for the mesquite," she says. She herds the party into her '99
Ford SUV, for which she "saved, saved, saved," she says, "I sat on boxes
and slept on the floor with no mattress."
They drive north past Stovepipe Wells, a watering hole immortalized in
the 1950s television show "Death Valley Days."
The desert highway is lined with scraggly creosote bushes. Esteves says
she knows three elderly sisters who still drink a spoonful of creosote tea
every day -- even though it tastes like turpentine -- because they believe
it will ward off old age.
Esteves heads into the Panamint Mountains above Skiddoo and Wildrose
stations on the western edge of the park. Here, it's 40 degrees cooler
than the valley floor.
Before the mountain spring began to shrink in the 1960s, several hundred
Indians would camp here from May through September, living on squirrel,
quail, berries, wild spinach, cabbage, roasted cactus and the staple, pine
nuts.
"A handful was sufficient for one meal," she says.
But in the 1950s, the Park Service began cracking down on mountain
camping, making it illegal for the Indians to stay for more than two weeks
at a time.
In the 1970s, while Esteves was gone for the summer, her adobe home
burned. The basic structure was still standing, but the Park Service hosed
what was left into a river of mud.
Such callous treatment "made our people stop going up to the mountains,"
says tribal administrator Barbara Durham. "We had a role in the ecosystem
up there -- when our way of life ended, so did our role in the circle of
life."
As part of the new giveback agreement, the Timbisha Shoshone have won
the right to camp in the mountains again and collect their native herbs.
Durham is 45 -- old enough to remember the days when air conditioning
consisted of a burlap bag her grandmother hung in the yard and hosed down.
And she remembers that day when everybody in the trailer village crowded
around TVs to watch C-Span as the bill approving the land transfer reached
the Senate floor. President Clinton signed the bill into law last November.
"It's a new beginning," says Durham. "We fought the U.S. government and
won. It was a great victory, not only for the Timbisha, but other tribes
who have lived and owned land in national parks."
Durham wants the Park Service to get rid of the salt cedar, tamarisk
trees, palms and other "exotics" that are consuming the water supply. The
deal includes plans for 50 homes, and now that the tribe has land, it
qualifies for a variety of federal funding.
Durham already has secured a $250,000 grant to establish laws and a
tribal court system. The tribe has applied for grants for a senior
building, a family resource center and a bigger library where Esteves and
other elders could teach Shoshone to the children.
"A lot of our people are taking an intense interest in the council -- we
have six people running for one position," she says. "But it has to happen
here" -- not 190 miles away in Bishop. "If it wasn't for the people
staying here, there wouldn't be a Timbisha tribe, we wouldn't have 7,500
acres, we wouldn't be a thorn in the Park Service's side."
Hoping for water
Esteves finds a walking stick and hikes up to the old Indian camp, now
littered with rusty cans. "That's Indian artifacts," she deadpans.
She closes her eyes and inhales air rich with the scent of pine,
sagebrush and purple mountain mint. "You need to gather your senses before
you can be aware of what's around you," she says.
She picks a bunch of purple mountain tea shoots. "These are nice big
ones," she says happily.
As part of the agreement, she hopes the Park Service will help restore
this mountain camp's spring-fed glory.
On the drive back, as the mercury climbs to 117, Esteves weaves around
six wild burros, descendants of those brought by the forty-niners -- then
stops alongside a sandstone cliff and hikes to a native rock etching of
bighorn sheep, thought to be more than 2,000 years old.
She points in the direction the sheep are facing. "It could be a sign
that there's water over there. They say everything's related to water."
Trouble is, the wild burros are gulping up the water supplies of the
remaining bighorn sheep.
At home in the valley
That evening, Esteves sits in her swamp-cooled trailer, sipping
naturally sweet purple mountain mint tea and contemplating which of her
stash of videos she'll watch again.
A dog wails somewhere in the village, and Esteves declares, "The coyotes
will do their song and dance soon." She tells the story of how a coyote
brought the Indian people here in a basket on his back, and named all the
places in the valley.
The land giveback came "almost too late," she says. "Almost, because I'm
still alive. It could be a real good thing if the people would only do the
right thing."
The Bee's Stephen Magagnini can be reached at (916) 321-1072
or smagagnini at sacbee.com.
Copyright c. 2001 The Sacramento Bee.
--------- "RE: We want to see Our Land Cleaned Up" ---------
Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2001 08:10:38 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="CLEAN THE LAND"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/local/41093_indians02.shtml
'We want to see our land cleaned up'
72 million tons of toxic goop are at bottom of lake revered by the
Coeur d'Alene tribe
Tuesday, October 2, 2001
By ROBERT McCLURE
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER
PLUMMER, Idaho -- Cliff SiJohn gazes out on the water before him with
obvious reverence.
"The lake was considered the mother, because everything would come from
there," says SiJohn, an elderly member of the Coeur d'Alene tribe. "That
is what nursed us, nourished us. It kept us alive. It kept us in balance."
Today the Coeur d'Alenes feel their world is out of balance because of
the 72 million tons of toxic goop that washed into Lake Coeur d'Alene from
upstream lead and silver mines.
For 10,000 years, the lake was central to the tribe's life. Newborns
were bathed here, and the bodies of deceased elders were washed in the
lake, wrapped in mats made from the lake's cattails and then buried in the
hills overlooking these waters.
Things changed when outsiders arrived and pushed the tribe onto a
reservation around a lake that became a dump.
Cliff SiJohn's son, Frenchy, once recounted his grandfather's stories of
eating water potatoes, then a staple of the tribe's autumn diet, that were
bigger than a baseball.
In modern times, water potatoes harvested from the lake look more like
stunted carrots, he said.
"Something isn't right," SiJohn told an anthropologist during an
interview. "...As messengers they're telling us, 'Hey, I'm hurting.
There's something wrong here. I'm sick.'"
In 1991, the 1,800-member tribe struck back, taking Idaho and the mining
companies by surprise with a lawsuit seeking to force a cleanup of the
lake.
"You had a small tribe in North Idaho taking on all the heavyweights,
unflinching," said tribal spokesman Bob Bostwick.
It took five years, but eventually the federal government joined the
tribe.
In January, the lawsuit became the largest of its kind ever to go to
trial. Last month lawyers wrapped up their case before Judge Edward Lodge,
who will determine if the mining companies can be held liable and, if so,
will later decide how much they should pay.
"The tribe has lived at the bottom of a sewer pipe for 100 years,"
tribal attorney Brian Cleary told Lodge during the trial.
In preparation for the case, which cost the federal government at least
$32 million to prosecute, government-hired scientists documented
widespread damage:
Hundreds of tundra swans have died from lead poisoning. Among other
effects on the birds, lead closes off their windpipes, causing them to
starve to death because they can't swallow. Eagles, kestrels, trumpeter
swans, mallards, Canada geese and other birds also have been harmed.
Mink, muskrat, raccoon, beaver, deer and mice have been poisoned.
Plants also are killed off. At the most polluted creek in the region,
only two kinds are found where 39 would be expected.
Sections of the Coeur d'Alene River and several creeks cannot support
fish or most other aquatic life.
Yet when the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed making the
lake a massive Superfund toxic-waste site, the plan was blasted by
business leaders across the lake from the reservation, in the resort town
of Coeur d'Alene.
Now the agency is prepared to endorse a plan that leaves the 72 million
tons of mining waste on the lake floor. By keeping additional pollution
out of the lake, authorities believe they can neutralize a chemical
reaction that releases toxins into the water.
Federal officials have pegged the total cleanup cost in court documents
at $1.3 billion to $3.8 billion, and the lawsuit that went to trial in
January sought damages from four mining companies.
One, Sunshine Mining and Refining Co., had filed for bankruptcy and
settled the case before trial, agreeing to give the government and the
tribe partial ownership of the company once it is reorganized. Partway
through the trial, Coeur d'Alene Mines settled out of court, agreeing to
pay about $3.9 million. Both Coeur d'Alene and Sunshine might have to make
some additional future payments if metals prices rise high enough.
In August, Hecla and the government announced another out-of-court
settlement: Hecla would pay $138 million over the next 30 years. The tribe
objected, in part because much of Hecla's money would be spent cleaning up
two Hecla mines in Southern Idaho, not the lake. The matter is not
resolved.
That leaves only Asarco Inc., actively fighting the tribe and the
government in court.
Although the Indians have been portrayed as unyielding, they say they
don't want to put the mining companies out of business.
And the tribe backs Idaho Sen. Mike Crapo's efforts to obtain $250
million in federal money for the cleanup job, saying it's only right that
the government share some of the burden. In that, it agrees with a key
contention of the mining companies: The government is partly to blame for
the mess because it pushed the mining companies to produce lead and zinc,
no matter the environmental cost, during World War II.
"We want to see our homeland cleaned up. Very simply, that's what we
want," said Chuck Matheson, vice chairman of the tribal council. "We're
not extremely picky about how that happens. ... Get it done in a practical
way, but get it done."
P-I reporter Robert McClure can be reached at 206-448-8092
or robertmcclure at seattlepi.com
Copyright c. 1999-2001 Seattle Post-Intelligencer
--------- "RE: Court to Decide on Pumping Water to Everglades" ---------
Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2001 08:10:38 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="EVERGLADES WATER"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.naplesnews.com/01/10/florida/d682053a.htm
Court to decide on pumping suburban water to Everglades
Tuesday, October 2, 2001
By CATHERINE WILSON, Associated Press
MIAMI - An appellate judge told South Florida water managers Monday that
they had an uphill battle trying to avoid getting a federal permit to pump
polluted water from Broward County suburbs into the endangered Everglades.
J.L. Edmondson, one of three federal judges hearing an appeal by the
South Florida Water Management District, indicated he was swayed by the
other side's arguments in favor of the discharge permit.
"Your water is more polluted than the receiving body of water," said
Edmondson, who presided at the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals hearing.
"Tell me why you're not covered by these regulations?"
James Nutt, representing the district, responded that the U.S. Clean
Water Act does not apply to flood-protection facilities like the
district's pump station, which sends canal water from sprawling bedroom
communities west into the Everglades.
The Miccosukee Indian tribe, which lives in the Everglades, and the
conservation group Friends of the Everglades have been battling the
district for years over water policies that hurt the River of Grass.
Other disputes have focused on water quality in Lake Okeechobee, which
feeds the Everglades. This unrelated appeal challenges a pumping system
that reroutes drainage water west rather than into the Atlantic Ocean, the
traditional dumping ground.
In the appeal, the tribe and conservation group want the judges to
support a lower court decision requiring the district to get a permit for
westward discharges from the S-9 pump station.
A $7.8 billion Everglades restoration law enacted last year authorized a
25-year project to restore the natural flow of water by changing water
policies for the lower third of the Florida peninsula and backtracking on
a century of drainage work.
The S-9 discharges are a small part of the planned reengineering. More
than $100 million already has been spent by the district on a pollution
control plan for the canal water from 52,000 acres of western Broward
County, but the district does not want to be covered by federal permit
requirements.
"Expense is not really the issue here," John Fumero, the district's lead
attorney, said outside court. A ruling against the district "will have an
adverse impact affecting any and all forms of government involved in flood
control for people."
But Edmondson said he tends to rule on narrow grounds even though
attorneys prefer wide-ranging decisions for their value as precedents.
Dexter Lehtinen, who represents the tribe, said outside the court that
he was pleased with the hearing. He sued the district over its Everglades
management practices while serving as U.S. attorney.
He said the state water district, which is based in West Palm Beach, has
taken the position that it's easier to pollute the Everglades than enforce
anti-pollution laws against high-powered Broward developers.
"It's the reason why the Clean Water Act was passed - because states
were sitting around and not doing anything," Lehtinen said. "Politically,
what you're talking about is you take on the urban developers or you take
on the Miccosukees and Friends of the Everglades."
The most dangerous pollutant to the Everglades is phosphorus. The common
ingredient in fertilizer feeds exotic plant life that displaces the low-
nutrient natural prairie, hardwood hammocks, cypress swamps and mangrove
shorelines of the Everglades, including Everglades National Park.
Phosphorus levels in the canal water sometimes hit 173 parts per billion,
compared to the 10 ppb level that Lehtinen says the Everglades can
tolerate.
Copyright c. 2001 Naples Daily News. All rights reserved.
--------- "RE: Confederated Tribes unveil Neighborhood" ---------
Date: Mon 15 Oct 2001 08:10:50 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="Q'AHAS HOUSING"
http://www.pechanga.net/
http://www.theworldlink.com/display/inn_news/news05.txt
Confederated tribes unveil neighborhood
Friday, October 12, 2001
By Josh Belzman, Staff Writer
Many of the pastel colored homes in a quiet North Bend neighborhood on
Pine Street have been occupied for months, but that's not stopping the
Confederated Tribes of the Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians from
celebrating the grand opening of the first housing development on Saturday.
Proud residents of Q'axas Heights (pronounced ka-has) plan to open their
homes to fellow tribe members and the public during a ceremony at 11 a.m.
The open house coincides with the week-long commemoration of the federal
government's recognition of the Confederated Tribes and will feature
cultural displays, a blessing of the community by Chief James Lott Sr. and
fry bread and tacos prepared by residents. Huckleberry bushes will be
planted at each of the neighborhood's 12 homes, in keeping with "Q'axas,"
which means huckleberry.
"I'm pretty proud of our neighborhood here," said Kimberly Mathew, a
single mother of four who moved into a three-bedroom home in Q'axas
Heights in April. "I think people will enjoy (the open house)."
The $2.5 million development marks the tribe's first foray into low- to
moderate-income housing, said Laurie Voshell, Housing Director at the
Clusha Indian Housing Authority.
Construction of the neighborhood began a year ago and Q'axas Heights is
now home to 14 families. The project was funded through a 1997 grant from
the Department of Housing and Urban Development, one of the last sources
of funding for traditional Indian housing developments, Voshell said.
"There's a preference for tribal members, then other Native Americans,
then the public," she said of the neighborhood's residency criteria.
Residents pay rent based on their income and may be eligible for low-
interest mortgages and down-payment assistance through other programs.
"We don't want to make a profit, but want to make enough that we can
explore other developments in areas of need," she said.
In addition to the Bay Area, the tribes have identified a need for
housing developments in Florence and Eugene, said Lott.
"Our goal is for every tribal member to own a home," he said. "In our
tribes it took a village to raise a family. That's the kind of thing we're
trying to get up there ... to be like a village again."
The two duplexes and 12 single-family homes at Q'axas Heights are
occupied by senior citizens, young working families and those in the
middle of the spectrum.
Debra Hall has seen her own children grow up to raise their own families.
She moved from Portland into a three-bedroom home at Q'axas Heights in
February and is now raising a 6-year-old boy. The neighborhood is great
for kids, she said.
"We have 27 children in the housing, so there's always someone to play
with," Hall said.
In addition to the low-cost housing opportunity, Q'axas Heights is
allowing residents to develop closer ties with the tribe. Hall grew up in
the Bay Area but moved away and was involved in tribal activities only
"sporadically" over the years. The move back to North Bend changed that.
"It just allows us to be closer to the tribe," she said. "It wasn't
happening in Portland, but here, it happens a lot."
Lott said the development is not only a source of pride, but an ideal
way to build and sustain the tribal community.
"It not only keeps them in the area, but it brings them back," he said.
"We're real proud of it."
Q'axas Heights is located at the corner of Connecticut Avenue and Pine
Street in North Bend. For more information about the grand opening
ceremony, those interested can call the Confederated Tribes at 888-9577.
Copyright c. 2001 - Southwestern Oregon Publishing Company - Coos Bay, OR
--------- "RE: Air Force donating Homes to Group" ---------
Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 08:11:12 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="HOUSING"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-black-mold
Air Force Donating Homes to Group
By BRIAN WITTE, Associated Press Writer
BISMARCK, N.D. -- The Air Force is donating 100 homes to a nonprofit
group that will use them to replace mold-infested housing on an American
Indian reservation.
The Tustin, Calif.-based Walking Shield American Indian Society hopes to
get the first 50 homes to the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation in north-
central North Dakota before Christmas.
"We will then close down because of the weather, and then next spring
we'll install the next 50 units," said Phil Stevens, the group's founder.
He wants to start moving the homes from the base near Minot, N.D., this
month.
Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa officials estimate at least 320
federally subsidized homes on the reservation are infested with mold. The
tribe estimates that about 220 homes must be destroyed.
"This will be a tremendous help," said Charles Trottier, a planner for
the tribe. "We do have a great need."
The tribe also hopes to build 40 modular units by Christmas, he said.
Tribal officials say at least seven deaths are related to the mold, and
that scores of people have been sickened by it. The infestation is blamed
on the flooding of crawl spaces under the houses.
The Department of Housing and Urban Development will help pay to
transport the homes, Stevens said. It will cost about $12,000 to move each
duplex and Stevens hopes to move about five a week, he said.
Minot Air Force Base is also donating 197 homes to other reservations
with housing problems.
Each of the homes are 1,200 square feet with three bedrooms, two baths
and new roofs, windows and steel siding. They are being replaced with
housing that meets new Air Force standards. The homes were built in the
1960s and are still in good shape, said Kevin Nelson, deputy civil
engineer of Minot Air Force Base.
"We're either moving out these homes or tearing them down and then
building new ones in their place," Nelson said.
In July, Congress approved $5 million to help with housing.
Two reports commissioned by the tribe found high numbers of toxic molds,
including black stachybotrys mold, which can cause skin rashes,
inflammation of the respiratory tract and suppression of the immune system.
A U.S. Army Corps of Engineers report also found toxic molds.
The relief effort is part of Operation Walking Shield, a civil-military
program established in 1994 that has provided more than 550 housing units
to more than 3,300 homeless American Indians on 14 reservations in North
Dakota, South Dakota, Montana and Minnesota.
Copyright c. 2001 Associated Press.
Copyright c. 2001 Los Angeles Times.
--------- "RE: Pima Indians: A Case Study" ---------
Date: Wed, 19 Sep 2001 06:56:41 -0700
From: "Jess Hansen" <mikola18 at hotmail.com>
Subj: "Pima Indians: A Case Study"
Mailing List: ndn-aim <ndn-aim at yahoogroups.com>
http://www.ctnow.com
September 18, 2001
"Pima Indians: A Case Study"
By GREG MORAGO
The Hartford Courant
"It's in the blood. The blood of ancestors that carries a time bomb.
The blood of my mother, both my grandmothers, my sister and dozens of
relatives bound by an inherited disease.
It's in my blood, too - a genetic predisposition to obesity, which is a
major risk factor for diabetes. Diabetes has marked generations of my
family and my tribe, the Pima Indians of southern Arizona. We Pimas -
cruelly targeted by a genetic quirk that has caused us to have the
highest rate of diabetes in the world - have long lived with the kidney
disease, blindness and amputations that attend diabetes. And, of course,
the death.
For decades, researchers have focused on our tribe to understand why the
Pimas are at such an alarmingly high risk of getting diabetes.
With the help of Pima volunteers, scientists have learned that diabetes
develops when a person's body doesn't use insulin effectively. Volunteers
from our tribe continue to help support research not unlike the recent
clinical trials that linked lifestyle changes to preventing diabetes.
The very people living through, and dying from, diabetes have been in
the forefront of diabetes prevention - willing subjects for scientists
studying a disease that is blossoming into a health epidemic.
I'm proud of my people. People like my aunt, Viola Johnson, head of
health services on our reservation, who has worked with hundreds of
researchers who have descended on our tribe to learn more about the
disease. People like friends and relatives on our reservation who have
been poked, prodded, weighed and measured in an effort not only to stave
off health complications of their own disease but to help others who
might get diabetes.
Then again, the Pimas - who have lived in the Sonoran Desert near the
Gila River for at least 2,000 years - have always been helpful. They were
trusted scouts for the U.S. Cavalry. Expert farmers, they shared their
bounty with travelers and neighboring tribes long before we had
reservations. Today, they are sharing the knowledge of living with
diabetes in order to prevent it.
And yet, despite all we know about diabetes, we continue to court
disaster. Inactivity and bad diet continue to deliver Pimas to the disease.
I am a glaring example: an overweight, out-of-shape smoker who wines and
dines recklessly. I am the perfect candidate for adult-onset diabetes.
Although my mother constantly asks that I be tested, I have yet to let a
doctor draw blood. As far as I know, I don't have diabetes, but I'm
constantly on the watch for the warning signs - the genetic smoke signals
of my ancestors.
I have many inducements to be more careful. There's my grandmother, who
lost toes on both feet last year after an infection. There's my mother,
who pricks her fingers every day to test her blood sugar levels. There's
my younger sister, who last year got diabetes and whose teenage son only
recently learned he's borderline diabetic.
At least a dozen of my childhood friends are already dead. I've watched
people who were overweight waste away. My uncle is on dialysis because
diabetes has wrecked his kidneys.
But after years of attempting diets and making vows to get more exercise,
I remain overweight - the highest risk factor for diabetes. One-half of
Pima adults have diabetes and 95 percent of those with diabetes are
overweight.
Why are so many Pimas overweight? In the '60s, the "thrifty gene" theory
helped explain. For thousands of years the Pimas, who relied on farming,
hunting and fishing for food, experienced alternating periods of feast and
famine. To adapt to these extreme changes in caloric needs, the Pimas
developed a thrifty gene that allowed them to store fat in times of plenty
in order to survive in times of famine. The gene was helpful as long as
there were periods of famine. But when the Pimas adopted a Western
lifestyle - a higher-fat diet and physical inactivity - the gene began to
work against them.
Scientists believe the gene that protected Pimas from starvation now
also contributes to retaining unhealthy amounts of fat. Scientists
studying Pimas have determined that diabetes runs in families, along with
insulin resistance and obesity. In other words, diabetes, for Pimas, is
an inherited disease.
Today, our tribe prefers to see the positive side of living with the
disease. Casino revenue pouring into our reservation is paying for
wellness centers that promote exercise and health care education. It has
already paid for a new hospital and more doctors not only treating Pimas
but members of far-flung tribes without the medical care and facilities
we enjoy.
It has paid for sophisticated treatment off the reservation, as well.
And maybe, if I'm not careful, it will end up paying for my diabetic
health care. I hope not."
Copyright c. 2001 Hartford Courant
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->
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Archived on line at: http://www.eScribe.com
FREE LEONARD PELTIER
--------- "RE: Lights still on at Red Cloud Building" ---------
Date: Thu, 4 Oct 2001 08:10:38 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="OST POWER"
http://www.pechanga.net/
http://indiancountry.com/?article=2030
Despite notices, lights still on at Red Cloud Building
October 03, 2001 - 15:57 est
by: David Rooks / Today Staff / Indian Country Today
PINE RIDGE, S.D. - Another deadline to pay the Oglala Sioux Tribe's
electric bill for the Red Cloud building passed in early June. Still, the
lights continued to work.
The building, subject to a Jan. 16 takeover by a group that calls itself
the Grassroots Oyate, remains occupied. Tribal government services have
been moved to various offices around the town of Pine Ridge. Marlene
Heiting, customer service representative for the power company, said the
tribe's other accounts are paid in full.
The disconnect notice is the fourth issued by the Nebraska Public Power
District in as many months. The notice stated payment was past due on May
30, with a final due date of June 4. The billing also asserted, in bold
letters, that it was a "final notice" and promised, that if ignored,
service would be disconnected.
As of June 14, the notice had been ignored with apparent impunity, like
those that preceded it. All the switches produce light in the building.
The unpaid balance for service to the building since the takeover is $4,
899.23.
OST Vice Chairman Wilbur Between Lodges declined comment on the unpaid
bills except to say he referred the matter to Finance Committee Chairman
Mike Her Many Horses.
Heiting also declined comment, referring the matter to Between Lodges.
"Nebraska Public Power did come here, and they inquired about who was
going to pay for the bill," Grassroots Oyate spokesman Dale Looks Twice
said. "So then we addressed the issue to the BIA superintendent since (he)
does have a trust responsibility to the membership of the tribe."
Looks Twice said the matter was referred to a group of elders called the
General Counsel which the Grassroots Oyate asserts is the legitimate
governing body of the tribe. Looks Twice said the General Counsel met with
Superintendent Bob Ecoffey in late May about the questions posed by
Nebraska Public Power.
"The BIA superintendent told (the General Counsel) that no one is going
to turn the lights off and that he will take care of this situation,"
Looks Twice said.
In a related matter Golden West Telephone Co. spokesman Dwight Flatt
said phone service would continue to the Red Cloud Building in light of a
tribal court order Jan. 21. The order enjoins the phone company to
continue to provide service to the building.
Ecoffey said he met with the Grassroots Oyate a few weeks ago, but
denied saying he would take care of it. "That's not true. I did meet with
them, but I did not make a commitment. They called me over there. They
were all excited, saying Nebraska Public Power came. And they wanted to
know who was going to pay the bill, were they going to shut the lights
off?" Ecoffey said."Basically, it was Dale (Looks Twice) kind of creating
an uproar.
"What I committed to was to check on it to see what was going on,
because I hadn't heard that either the tribe or Nebraska Public Power had
made any motion or done anything to shut the lights off.
In the end,the superintendent said he assumed it was a rumor. "You know,
it's been a couple of weeks now and they haven't turned the lights off.
Really, it's going to be more of a civil dispute between the tribe, the
Grassroots Oyate and the power and phone companies when it comes time to
pay the bill."
Copyright c. 2001 Indian Country Today.
--------- "RE: Seattle Tlingit Potlatch" ---------
Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 20:04:51 -0700
From: "Ray Levesque" <tellray at onebox.com>
Subj: Seattle Tlingit Potlatch Brings Native Elders
and Church Leaders Together
>To: gars at nanews.org
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/134351775_potlatch10m.html
Wednesday, October 10, 2001 - 12:00 a.m. Pacific
'A new way of doing church'
By Sara Jean Green
Seattle Times staff reporter
ANDREA J. WRIGHT / THE SEATTLE TIMES
Richard Jack Strong of the Tlingit Tribe performs yesterday with the
Kuteeya Dancers, a Seattle-based Tlingit troupe, at a potlatch at
Seattle's First Presbyterian Church. The gathering was intended to
foster unity and call for greater recognition of Native American
rights and sovereignty.
They fed their guests salmon and fry bread, honored them with songs
of welcome, gave each of the 150 people who gathered in the basement
of Seattle's First Presbyterian Church gifts of tobacco and sage,
bundled in red felt.
A potlatch hosted yesterday by the Tlingit Tribe - originally from
Alaska and now dispersed throughout the Seattle area - brought
together Northwest Indian elders and church leaders from across the
country.
It was the first time area Native Americans who follow the teachings
of Christ were able to address congregants of "the majority church"
through their own cultural traditions, said Ray Levesque.
"These people don't have people inviting them except in token, white
situations like, 'Oh, come to our church on Native American
Sunday,' " said Levesque, a Tlingit who belongs to 1,000 Tipis, a
group of Indian cultural pastors in the U.S. and Canada.
"This was the first Native environment where we could do it in a
Native way."
More than 500 Christians from across the country are in Seattle for a
four-day interdenominational conference, "Soularize: A Learning
Party," sponsored by The Ooze, a ministry based in California.
The point of the conference is "to connect people who have a dream of
a new way of doing church" so that it is more inclusive and tolerant,
said Neil Tibbott, who trains pastors through the Church Resource
Ministries and teaches theology classes at the Northwest Graduate
School of Ministry, both based in Kirkland.
The potlatch was held so Christian Native Americans could talk about
similarities between the gospel and traditional beliefs and the need
for Native American churches free of Eurocentric biases. But the
potlatch also helped bridge factions within the Indian community.
Carol Williams Hunter, a judge for the Tulalip Tribes, apologized on
behalf of her people to Cecile Hansen, chairman of the Duwamish
Tribe, and Mary Ann Hinzman, the Snoqualmie Tribe's vice chairwoman,
for opposing their bids for federal recognition.
The Snoqualmies were recognized as a tribe two years ago. Less than
two weeks ago, Hansen learned the Bush administration was denying
recognition for the Duwamish, the indigenous people of Seattle.
"It just moved me to tears," said Hansen, a Catholic, who gave
permission to hold the potlatch on Duwamish territory. "The Tulalips
have been opposing us for years, and to have one of their people come
and say 'sorry' ... "
A potlatch is a ceremony traditional to Northwest tribes in which
hosts honor their guests with food and gifts. Potlatches are meant to
establish relationships but can be a call to action - in this case,
asking for church support in fighting for rights and sovereignty.
When Europeans brought Christianity to North America, missionaries
were told to "civilize these savages, to Christianize these heathens
and to do it through famine and cultural repression," said Tsani
GroseVnor, an Echota-Cherokee and director of the Native ministry for
the Northwest district of the Church of the Nazarene, based in
Spokane.
He apologized for his anger, his voice trembling as he spoke of
Indian children beaten in Christian boarding schools for speaking
their languages and laws forbidding Indian ceremonies that were
enforced until 1965.
"Since Christianity came to these shores," GroseVnor said, "there was
collusion between the church and government to take Indian land, to
rob indigenous people of their identity.
"I urge you to learn about our issues, to learn about treaties and
land rights. Don't get in the way, and don't try and speak for us,
but stand beside us."
Responding to GroseVnor's words, Phil Graf apologized for his
church's legacy of oppression.
"I only know of some of the injustices we participated in, and I know
many of the injustices we look away from intentionally," said Graf, a
member of The Bridge, a multidenominational church in Oxnard,
Calif. "I ask for your forgiveness and offer a singular effort to rid
myself of blissful ignorance and act proactively to do something for
your children and my children that wasn't done for you."
Later, Graf pulled a ribbon shirt over his black T-shirt. The ribbon
shirt, traditionally worn by Native men during ceremonies, was a gift
from a Swinomish woman. He and others who spoke in behalf of church
leaders were also given eagle feathers - the highest honor in Native
culture.
"I'm overwhelmed," Graf said. "It's humbling, and there's a
responsibility now to grow into this garment."
Copyright c. 2001 The Seattle Times Company
--
Ray Levesque
(206)362-6461
Seattle/Vancouver
--------- "RE: Burnt Church Boat Seized" ---------
Date: Fri 12 Oct 2001 18:19:12 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="BURNT CHURCH SEIZURE"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.canoe.ca/NationalTicker/CANOE-wire.Native-Fishing.html
October 11, 2001
Seizure of native boat raises fears in final days of Burnt Church fishery
BURNT CHURCH, N.B. (CP) -- Federal fisheries officers seized a native
boat off this reserve in northeastern New Brunswick, raising fears of more
confrontations in the final days of the Mi'kmaq lobster fishing season.
Officials with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans said Thursday the
native boat was seized Wednesday night after it was spotted outside a
Mi'kmaq food fishery zone in Miramichi Bay.
"They were observed fishing outside the fishing zone," said Wayne
Thompson, a supervisor with the department. "At some point, you have to
take action to stop this type of activity."
However, a spokesman for the Burnt Church reserve said the boat was
within the fishing limit decreed by the federal government.
"They weren't outside the boundary," said band Coun. Leo Bartibogue,
adding the native boat was rammed by two high-speed fisheries patrol
vessels.
He said no one was injured during the incident and the two native men on
the boat were taken to a nearby wharf and released.
Thompson said an investigation was underway and the two native men could
be charged.
Bartibogue said the seizure has increased tensions at Burnt Church, the
flashpoint in the dispute over native treaty rights and federal control of
the lobster fishery.
"Everybody was starting to pull out their traps; we were getting ready
to end the season," he said. "But when people witnessed this, it opened a
lot of wounds."
The federal government has issued a food fishery licence for Burnt
Church, allowing for an unlimited amount of traps to be set within a
narrowly defined zone close to the reserve shoreline.
The licence expires Oct. 20.
Bartibogue said people on the reserve were already annoyed this week
over the acquittal of a local commercial fisherman on assault charges
arising out of confrontations at Burnt Church in 1999.
Leigh Morrison was found not guilty of assaulting six native men from
Burnt Church. The jury agreed with defence arguments that Morrison acted
reasonably and out of fear when he rammed a truck carrying the native men
and attacked two with a baseball bat.
Morrison believed the native men intended to steal his lobster traps to
replace those which non-native fishermen had destroyed.
Bartibogue said the jury verdict has reserve residents believing there
are two levels of justice in Canada, one for non-natives and a harsher
version for natives.
"It doesn't look good for us," said Bartibogue. "I just got fined $1,000
and given a year's probation for obstruction. But apparently it's OK in
Canada to beat First Nations' people on the head with baseball bats."
Copyright c. 2001, Canoe Limited Partnership. All rights reserved.
--------- "RE: Excessive Force used to stop Fishing Boat" ---------
Date: Tue 16 Oct 2001 07:44:19 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="EXCESSIVE SHORT"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://nb.cbc.ca/editorServlets/View?filename=dfo011012
Excessive force used to stop fishing boat, says band
Melissa Friedman reports for CBC radio
People in Burnt Church are claiming Department of Fisheries Officers used
excessive force to stop a native fishing boat in the waters off the
reserve. D.F.O. seized the boat Wednesday and briefly held two men on
board.
Wayne Thomson, an official with D.F.O., says his officers had every
right to stop the native fishing boat.
"We observed the vessel from Burnt Church fishing outside the designated
lobster zone," he says.
Band councillor Leo Bartibogue disagrees. Bartibogue says he watched the
entire incident and says the boat was well within the zone. He says the
men were only fishing for traps cut from their lines several weeks ago.
But regardless of why the boat was stopped, Bartibogue calls the
encounter violent and dangerous.
"Two D.F.O. Zodiacs pursued them and they had no way of getting away
because they kept getting rammed over and over repeatedly," he says. "They
kept getting tossed around in their boats and the boat took some damage."
But Wayne Thomson tells a different story. "The boats have to come
together for the officers to get aboard," he says. "It was really without
incident."
When the native boat was seized, Thomson says there was one trap on
board. He says six other traps were also seized from the water outside the
zone. But he says it's not clear who they belong too.
No charges have been laid so far against the two men on board the
fishing boat.
Copyright c. 2001 CBC. All Rights Reserved.
--------- "RE: Welfare-to-work challenges Tribes" ---------
Date: Mon 15 Oct 2001 08:10:50 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="WELFARE"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/breaking/1012welfare12.html
Welfare-to-work challenges tribes
Tom Zoellner
The Arizona Republic
Oct. 12, 2001
Indian tribes who want to administer their own federal welfare-to-work
programs should think creatively about ways to restructure their internal
administrative functions, a nationally known expert told a convention of
tribal officials in Tempe on Thursday.
Five years after Congress reformed the welfare system, about a third of
the nation's Indian reservations now have their own federally funded
versions of the Temporary Aid to Needy Families program. But tribal
governments need to tailor their needy families programs to fit the needs
of their respective populations, said Eddie Brown, a professor of social
work at Washington University in St. Louis.
"We've got to have dialogue and discussion on this... We have got to
think broader than we ever have before," Brown said to a group of Arizona
tribal leaders at the 17th annual Indian Child and Family Conference at
the Tempe Mission Palms Hotel.
Five of Arizona's 21 tribes now run their own needy families programs:
Pascua Yaqui, Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community, White Mountain
Apache, the Navajo Nation and the Hopi Tribe.
One mechanism to streamline welfare distributions is called Public Law
102-477, known in bureaucratic parlance as "477." It permits tribal
governments to comingle federal employment or work grants in a single
budget and accounting system. But merging the funds can lead to political
challenges and turf battles, Brown said.
"If you've got eight departments with eight directors and you only need
one, who is going to be the director, and who are going to be the
lieutenants?" he said.
On the other hand, keeping federal funding sources separate also has its
problems: "What we create is a bureaucracy where every funding source
becomes a program," he said.
One of the biggest challenges for tribes with needy families programs is
finding enough jobs on the reservations to satisfy the work requirements
laid out in the 1996 welfare reform act. Single mothers often are unable
to find adequate work without leaving home, particularly in rural areas.
Brown said job creation needs to be a priority.
Copyright c. 2001, azcentral.com. All rights reserved.
--------- "RE: Two Arrested on Charges of Demanding Money" ---------
Date: Thu 11 Oct 2001 08:18:53 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="EXTORTION ATTEMPT"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.rgtonline.com/root_index.asp?BodyLoc=/newspage2/
Two Arrested on Charges of Demanding Money from Oregon Tribe
ROSEBURG, Oregon -- As reported by the Associated Press: Two people were
arrested for allegedly sending a letter to the Cow Creek Band of the
Umpqua Tribe of Indians, demanding $1 million to keep quiet about `bad
things' the tribe was doing.
Investigators left several backpacks in several places around Roseburg
to lure the extortionist Saturday. Lucas Walter Register, 20, was arrested
after he tried to take possession of the backpacks and then fled the area,
police said. He was charged with suspicion of theft by extortion.
An alleged accomplice, a 17-year-old girl whose name was not released,
was later arrested, the Douglas County sheriff's office said.
The tribe, which operates the Seven Feathers Hotel & Casino Resort in
Canyonville, received a typed letter demanding money about two weeks ago,
according to Wayne Shammel, the tribe's attorney.
Shammel said the letter said something like: `We know that you're
involved in these bad things, but we support what the tribe is doing and
we don't want to go public. So give us $1 million.'
Shammel said the letter was poorly written, with misspellings and bad
grammar, and claimed the tribe was involved in money laundering and
counterfeiting...
Copyright c. 1995-2001: Rolling Good Times OnLine, Inc
--------- "RE: Charges against Officer Dropped" ---------
Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 08:11:12 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="COP FREED"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.spokesmanreview.com/news-story.asp?date=100901&ID
Tuesday, October 9, 2001
Crime Section
Charges against officer dropped
Lewiston _ Eyewitness evidence led to dismissal of a misdemeanor drunken
driving charge against a Nez Perce tribal police officer.
Prosecutors said a witness supported the position that Michael A. Bisbee
had not been driving.
Nez Perce County sheriff's deputies allegedly spotted Bisbee, 37, of
Lapwai, parked along U.S. Highway 95 early on the morning on May 14. The
vehicle was not running, and Bisbee refused to take a sobriety test or
submit to a blood-alcohol test, Deputy Paul McNish reported.
McNish said Bisbee acted in a manner that made McNish believe he had
been drinking. But there was someone else in the vehicle, according to
police reports, who later allegedly told sheriff's deputies he was the one
driving.
Wilson Powaukee told Cpl. Doug McPherson he had been behind the wheel
that night and that he drove the off-duty Bisbee from a bar in Craigmont
and wrecked the truck they were in along the way.
As prosecutors investigated his claim, they found an eyewitness who
confirmed the story.
Deputy Prosecutor Sonyalee Nutsch said the fact that Bisbee is in law
enforcement had nothing to do with the decision not to prosecute.
"As a prosecutor, I have to look at the facts of the case and I don't
take their professions into consideration," Nutsch said. "If he was just
Joe Schmoe, I would have done the same thing."
Copyright c. 2001, The Spokesman-Review.
--------- "RE: Alaskan Prisoners" ---------
Date: Tue, 9 Oct 2001 17:13:59 +0300
From: "Brigitte Thimiakis" <thimiakischool at the.forthnet.gr>
Subj: Alaskan Prisoners
[From NAPS - Please read and forward to your lists - thank you]
Opportunity to Help Native Alaskan Prisoners
For those of you who have had first-hand dealings with Native Alaskan
prisoners, particularly regarding issues such as, denial of their
religious and civil rights, inappropriate DNA testing, insufficient
medical care and neglect, racial profiling, mass out-of-state transfers,
and racial discrimination, etc., the following investigation and hearing
may be of great interest to both you and the prisoners you support.
Mr. Paul A.L. Nelson (Pro Se), a resident of Alaska, is currently in the
process of requesting a Grand Jury investigation regarding discrimination
in Alaska, and is inviting interested parties to now submit their
complaints and requests for an investigation. (Please note that this
request is for an investigation, and not a hearing.) The purpose of this
investigation is to have a Grand Jury look into the broad range of state
law violations, not limited only to these prisoners, but many of which
have affected them. In addition, the investigation would look into the
rampant corruption of state officials, as well as their interference with
requests for Grand Jury investigations.
If you reside outside of Alaska, Mr. Nelson suggests you send your
complaints directly to:
"Foreperson of Grand Jury" Superior Court, 1st Judicial District P.O. Box
114100 Juneau, Alaska 99811-4100
Mr. Nelson recommends that you do not provide your list (or names) of
witnesses with your initial complaint. He states that the Grand Jury is
supposed to respond to all letters, and that you do not have to provide
the above names unless the Grand Jury agrees to an investigation. It may
come as no surprise, that state officials will attempt to block this
investigation, while harassing those named in letters of complaint, more
especially prisoners and former prisoners. Please make sure that you
obtain the permission of all prisoners first, before submitting their
names.
Mr. Nelson asks that you serve your request for a Grand Jury
investigation by certified mail, return receipt - and send him a copy of
your return receipt (green card), once you receive it. It is essential
that Mr. Nelson receive copies of your receipts, to use as evidence, in
the event that officials block the request for an investigation or tamper
with mail.
Please ensure that you have documentary evidence of your claims, letters
sent directly by the prisoner(s) to you, or letters sent to or provided by
NAPS. NAPS will be arguing the religious rights violations under the
RLUIP Act of 2000 (Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act).
Another event, which may assist Native Alaskan prisoners, is the
upcoming hearing in Anchorage on 25 October 2001, being conducted by the
Civil Rights Commission. You are advised to contact Tom Pilla, from the
Commission, with any inquiries or questions pertaining to documentation
you might be able to provide.
Mr. Pilla can be contacted at: 213-894-3437.
Below you will find the introductory letter from Mr. Nelson, explaining
in detail what he hopes to gain from the investigation. Mr. Nelson has
also provided NAPS with a model letter for the Request for Investigation,
as well as copies of the 2000 Census for Alaska, Alaska DOC Ethnicity
charts and affidavits from a partial list of prisoners, which NAPS will
forward to those who wish to submit complaints, via e-mail or fax. Mr.
Nelson is more than happy to answer any further questions and can be
reached at the address/phone number below.
Mr. Nelson has pointed out that the Grand Jury meets quarterly, so if we
do not make the deadline for this session, we will be aiming for the next
session.
NAPS will be pursuing this action in response to requests for assistance
by the Native Alaskan prisoners it deals with.
Valerie Scott, Director
NAPS
Paul A.L. Nelson Pro Se
P.O. Box 858
Haines, Alaska 99827
E-mail: rhona.paul at wytbear.com
1-800-766-5406
September 4, 2001
To all Alaskans,
I am in the process of requesting a Grand Jury investigation regarding
discrimination in Alaska.
I have been fighting the violation of Alaska State law by the State of
Alaska for years.
I am not a lawyer and I cannot give you legal advice.
However, myself and hundreds of other Alaskans are coming together to
fight the violation of our Constitutional and Civil rights.
Our current plan of action is to request a Grand Jury investigation into
the violation of Alaska State law by the State of Alaska. I have attached
the first draft of the Request for Investigation that I will personally
file in the 1st Judicial District at Juneau. At the same time (within 30
days) people over the state will file requests for a Grand Jury
investigation in all of the Judicial Districts of Alaska.
Mt suggestion to you is to make a request for a Grand Jury investigation
in the Judicial District where you live or have had trouble with the State
of Alaska.
There is specific legal authority for the Grand Jury to investigate the
government, for example the Constitution of the State of Alaska:
Article 1, Section 8;
"..The power of grand juries to investigate and make
recommendations concerning the public welfare
or safety shall never be suspended"
See also Alaska Statutes: 12.40.010 thru 12.40.100, and The
Investigative Grand Jury in Alaska February 1987, available at the Juneau
Law library; KFA 1777 I58 1987, written by the Alaska Judicial Council.
The attached Request for Investigation is the format that I will use
because of the denial and blocking that I have encountered in my previous
requests to the Grand Jury. Requests that were blocked by Judges and
District Attorneys. I suggest that you file a request for investigation
using your own case specifically or other cases that you are aware of.
Make your request look and read differently than mine, even if you wish to
use some of the same exhibits and the same complaints. Also it is
important to find a specific law or Constitutional Right that is violated
in your case, cite the law and document how the law was broken in your
case if possible. For example, the Constitution of the State of Alaska,
January 3, 1959, at Article 1. Section 1, proclaims in part;
"..that all persons are equal and entitled to equal rights.."
It is clear that this is not happening in Alaska because of the
percentage of Natives and other minorities in prison compared to the
percentage of Natives and other minorities in the population at large.
See exhibit 1 and 2.
We will be sending our requests to the Grand Jury in the next 30 to 45
days. If you wish to join with us, please file a request for a Grand Jury
investigation within the next 30 to 45 days. Serve your request for a
Grand Jury investigation by certified mail, return receipt, on the
Superior Court in the Judicial District that you are in. Address your
request to "Foreperson of the Grand Jury".
If we are not granted Grand Jury investigations, the next step will be a
class action suit in federal court for denial of access to the Grand Jury
and violation of Constitutional Rights. Keep a copy of everything you
file. Send me a copy of the return receipt (green card) when you get it
back.
Call, write or e-mail me if you have any questions.
Keep fighting!
Paul A.L. Nelson Pro Se
=====
NAPS (Native American Prisoner Support)
http://www.hri.ca/partners/naps/
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Please sign our petition at "Justice for Manuel Redwoman"
http://www.PetitionOnline.com/jfmr2001/
--------- "RE: Standing Deer returns Home" ---------
Date: Thu, 11 Oct 2001 19:44:16 +0000
From: kiden at STARPOWER.NET
Subj: Standing Deer
Mailing List: First Nations <First_Nations at home.ease.lsoft.com>
Forwarded with permission...
moon
****************
To many of my friends and family,
I have the honor and privilege to tell you that one of our respected
Elders was returned home to us, ALIVE. Standing Deer entered the Oklahoma
Prison System in 1971, escaped in 1975 around the fall of Saigon, and was
captured in 1976. He received a federal sentence for expropriating funds
and assigned to Marion, Illinois. Marion replaced the antiquated Alcatraz
prison, and also had the experimental control units designed to break down
the spirit of a human being. Marion was also the place where members of
the American Indian Movement, Black Panther Party, notorious spies and
Mafia families were kept. One prisoner held there was Leonard Peltier,
whom the government wanted neutralized.
The government contracted Standing Deer to "neutralize" Peltier. However,
Standing Deer relayed the assassination plot to Peltier. Later at the risk
of losing his own life, he attempted to testify at Leonard's escape trial
in Los Angeles. He did enter the plot into his testimony during another
court hearing to prevent prison officials from force-feeding him. This was
after the Marion prison was placed on a permanent lockdown stemming from
the deaths of three prison guards in October of 1983. Prisoners were
indiscriminately beaten and their personal effects destroyed as a
retaliatory action by the Justice Departments FBI Special Operations
Groups, SWAT, and the JD's Bureau of Prisons Emergency Response Team. By
the way, did I mention that these killings occurred in the Behavioral
Modification Unit(BMU) in two separate incidents by two white male
prisoners?
Due to the serious nature of the lockdown and the restriction on the
practice of religion, Peltier, Standing Deer, and Jewish inmate ALbert
Garza went on a spiritual fast. Since they had no other means of
practicing their faith they each decided to fast. After a two month fast,
all three men resumed eating after the United States State Department
intervened. Letters from world religious and political leaders bombarded
the white house and Justice Department, assurances were made that certain
forms of religious freedom would be restored at Marion - the black hole of
the federal prison system.
Peltier was transferred to Leavenworth, where he remains today, Albert
Garza was sent to Lewisburg, his location is unknown to me presently.
Standing Deer was sent to Lompoc where after a few weeks, the prison was
preparing to return him to Marion and to the BMU. However, the BOP
restored all of his earned credits (time off for good behavior),
transferred him to the federal reformatory in El Reno, OK, whereupon he
was discharged and released into the custody of the Oklahoma Department of
Corruptions (Corrections)in October 1985.
When I realized that Standing Deer was there, I went to see him since I
was what they call a Legal Research Assistant (Jailhouse Lawyer) and had
access to the restricted units. I visited with him and smuggled sage and
cedar to him. He was eventually assigned to C-Block where I was and we
talked extensively about what was happening in Indian Country. We had
recently gone through a major prison uprising and were on the verge of
severe restriction being implemented. I was provided with the Oklahoma
State Penitentiary (OSP)Plan of Action by an anonymous person. The details
of the plan reminded Standing Deer of what had happened at Marion. The OSP
was to become the second maximum security to be transformed into a
lockdown facility after the Marion model.
One of the restrictions imposed was the grooming code banning long hair.
I filed a civil rights suit against the warden and within a few months my
mouth got me into trouble. I was pretty blunt and was not concerned as to
what my prison record looked like. However, after I was doing some time in
the hole for saying what I felt needed to be said to a guard. Then there
was an altercation I had over a pair of handcuffs and some typing paper
(it's a long story), to which I received additional time in the hole.
Whereupon Standing Deer sent me a note telling me that if those were the
actions I felt I needed to take then I should, but I should consider that
everything I do, the prison would use against me in Court and it would be
a reflection upon everyone else. I seriously thought about what he said,
from that point on, I received no more misconducts until I was paroled in
1988.
Standing Deer was released from Oklahoma in 1993, and transferred to
Texas to begin serving three life sentences for a quarter million dollar
jewel robbery while he was on escape in 1975-76. He was finally paroled
last month, and he is almost in his Eighties. He has been written about in
Peter Matthiessens'' In the Spirit of Crazy Horse and Rex Wylers' "Blood
of the Land: The Corporate and Government War against the American Indian
Movement" among others.
So I am asking everyone to welcome one of our people back home after his
odyssey through the state and federal prisons. Write to Standing Deer at:
Standing Deer Wilson
977 Bunker Hill Rd. #113
Houston, TX 77024
Thank you everyone for not forgetting this man.
In the Spirit of Crazy Horse,
Ben
--------- "RE: Leonard Peltier Statement" ---------
Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2001 09:52:21 -0500
From: "LPDC" <lpdc at idir.net>
Subj: LEONARD PELTIER STATEMENT
Mailing List: LPDC <lpdc at mail-list.com>
STATEMENT OF LEONARD PELTIER
OCTOBER 12
Brothers, Sisters, Friends, and Supporters,
Today marks 509 years since Columbus arrived on the shores of Turtle
Island, where he first staked claim to the cherished lands of our ancestors.
Although Columbus is long dead, the legacy of injustice that he began
continues. Whether it be relocation of the Dine at Big Mountain, the
persecution of Indigenous Peoples throughout Latin America, the fishing
struggles in Canada, or the dumping of toxic waste on reservations, the
dehumanization of Indigenous Peoples remains pervasive throughout the
Americas. As we see in the spirits of the grandmothers of Big Mountain, the
Mi'Kmaqs of Burnt Church, or the Zapatistas of Chiapas, Indigenous
resistance also remains alive. It is in this spirit of resistance that I am
inspired to continue fighting for my own freedom after 25 years of unjust
imprisonment.
I want to thank you all for your concern and continued support. I know
that these are very difficult and unpredictable times for us all. Although
the LPDC has expressed condolences and sympathy on my behalf, I would like a
chance to personally say how sorry I am to any of you who lost loved ones on
September 11. Please know that I have been praying for you and for peace
ever since.
Despite the difficult times we are faced with, and despite this year's
clemency defeat, I am feeling blessed. I have to admit that I feared being
forgotten after I did not receive clemency. But instead of finding myself
alone, I have been surrounded by more compassionate and talented people than
ever before - and they have all expressed their determination to continue
the struggle for my release. People who I greatly respect like Dr. Michael
Yellow Bird, Nilak Butler, Thom White Wolf Fassett, Debra Peebles and Debra
White Plume, to name only a small few, have joined the LPDC. I want to
thank Jennifer Harbury, Pat Benabe, Gina Chiala, Jean Day, and Sylvain
Duez-Alesandrini for bringing our new team together and sticking with me. I
also want to thank all of you - I received hundreds of birthday cards last
month and my spirits were greatly lifted knowing that you are still with us.
Without you, I could have no hope.
I am also very encouraged by the new strategies the LPDC plans to pursue on
my behalf. We have three new, very important cases to file and the lawyers
in charge of them are very dedicated and talented. But I must say that
without your active participation, these cases will mean very little.
Public pressure is the key to fairness and justice.
In closing, I would like to wish you all a happy "Indigenous Day" and
encourage you to continue advocating for the rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Although prison life becomes more and more difficult with age, my spirit
remains unbroken, and I still dream of rejoining my people in freedom and
continuing our work for human rights and justice.
In the Spirit of Crazy Horse,
Leonard Peltier
Until Freedom Is Won!
The New Peltier Justice Campaign
Leonard Peltier Defense Committee
PO Box 583
Lawrence, KS 66044
785-842-5774
www.freepeltier.org
=====
To subscribe, send a blank message to lpdc-on at mail-list.com
--------- "RE: Native Prisoner" ---------
Date: Tuesday, October 16, 2001 7:48 PM
From: "Janet Smith" <owlstar at speakeasy.org>
Subj: Native Prisoner News
Tell a Native American Prisoner someone cares!
-- - - -
Peltier, Leonard
#89637-132
Box 1000
Leavenworth, KS 66053
Birthday: 9/12/44
Ancestry: Ojibwa-Lakota
-- - - -
Date: Thursday, October 04, 2001 11:35 PM
From: "Catrel" <catrel at rapidnet.com>
Subj: Please add to WI - Pen Pals Needed
>To: "Janet Smith" <owlstar at speakeasy.org>
Would you please post the following inmates in the Prisoner section of
WI again? I know a few especially are NOT getting mail and are really
needing some.
Jeff Jones Greg Parker
# 970347 B-1 #982702
15314 Dole Valley Rd. Elk Horn-C-18
Yacolt, Wa. 98675-9531 15314 N.E. Dole Valley Rd.
Tribe:Cherokee (40 yrs old) Yacolt, Wa. 93675-9531
Patrick Lindsay Tom Christian
A195172 I.D.O.C. Westville Corr. Facility
P.O. Box 511 Westville, Indiana 46391
Columbus, Oh. 43216
-----------------------------------
If you know of a Native American inmate who would like to correspond with
brothers or sisters on the outside - please drop me a line with whatever
information about them they'd like shared.
Janet Smith
Owlstar Trading Post
http://www.owlstar.com
owlstar at speakeasy.org
--------- "RE: Rustywire: For the Love of an Indian Woman" ---------
Date: Tue, 17 Jul 2001 08:09:44 -0500
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="RUSTYWIRE-LOVE of INDIAN WOMAN"
For the Love of an Indian Woman
by Johnny Rustywire
For the love of an Indian woman...... Oh take me back through falling
leaves and heavy snows to a summer day when there was a quiet moment as a
soft touch of white down of the young eagle. Streams move lazily and birds
sing for us and see how the eagle rests her head. We walk with the
gentleness of soft rain and as I turn slowly I see in the look of an eye,
a caress of the hand, the breeze in your hair no words can speak in the
way you say without a voice silently lay quietly with me and roll around
and find the starlight and travelling on rainbows. We are children of dawn
and evening light. Come as a sweet breeze and cool water to change the
earth forever. I can remember you didn't say a word, but yet you did slay
me with your eyes and took my heart forever, let me touch but a small part
and the lightening of a thunderous and cold day come to my heart and
become soft, warm and know that it is you that are my maiden forever. Walk
with me and let us travel this land of our people and he re with me you
shall remain beyond the moons when mountain heights crumble and wash away.
I hear your the beating of your heart as a soft drum forever.
Copyright c. 1999, Johnny Rustywire, all rights reserved.
--------- "RE: Poem: Borrowed Keyboards" ---------
Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2000 17:43:28 -0000
From: "John Rustywire" <rustywire at hotmail.com>
Subj: Borrowed Keyboards
Mailing List: indigenous_peoples_literature at egroups.com
a young indian mother dreams of new dawns
wanting to get across the great internet divide
walking down a reservation road from home
wanting to talk and not having a machine to say it with
starting out to town 30 miles away for a half hour slot
got no phone and the pay phone at the store is broken
getting on the road to work in the morning
carrying a baby on the back waiting for a ride
sitting at a desk wishing for a car and lunch
dreaming of kisses, the taste of candy bars
looking for a snack for less than fifty cents
watching the time slide by and putting on a face
working and slaving for food, lights and diapers
wanting to write, to dream of it, to taste it
waxing words, making pictures, talking in circles
wars rage, people laugh, dancing and making love
in silence they play out sitting at a typewriter
letters, correspondence, today's mail and travel papers
dreaming of writing, paper dreams and simple wishes
hitchhiking home and then to town 30 miles away
to get online for 30 minutes a day
no phone, no car, just hopes and dreams
wishing for tomorrow, on rainbows and soft rain
a young indian mother dreams of new dawns
and simple wishes, to write to write to say it all
as she heads on back down the road she came
with a baby on her back and tired feet
whoosh, whoosh the cars pass her by
as she walks on down the road
thinking tomorrow i can write on that machine
singing wires dance in her mind and she walks
down the road to reservation blues and homemade bread
looking at the sunset and running along its edge
with five cents and a diaper to change
rustywire
<a href="http://www.sondra.net/al/vol4/46keyboards.htm">Borrowed
Keyboards at Autumn Leaves-edited by Sondra for Rustywire</a>
http://www.egroups.com/list/indigenous_peoples_literature
--------- "RE: Verse: Hawaiian Book of Days" ---------
Date: Tue, 09 Oct 2001 06:22:04 -1000
From: Debbie Sanders <kepola at hgea.org>
Subj: Hawaiian Book of Days
A HAWAIIAN BOOK OF DAYS, week of October 22-28
OKAKOPA
(October)
(Ikuwa)
22
Pele builds and re-builds the land until she is satisfied with her creation.
23
Teach me the magic of the night.
24
Those we love are near to us in spirit.
25
Tread gently upon the dew-pearled grass of morning.
26
It is never too late to change, to learn, to grow.
27
The sunlight weaves dappled patterns of leaves upon the grass.
28
Only the wind can speak my true name.
(c) Copyright 1991 by D. F. Sanders
Me ke aloha i ka nani, ... Moe'uhanekeanuenue
(With love and beauty, ... Rainbow Dream)
--------- "RE: Indian Tribes pinning Tourism Hopes on Olympics" ---------
Date: Sat, 22 Sep 2001 11:11:56 -0500
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="OLYMPICS"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.minorities-jb.com/villages/native/Article_Detail.asp?Article_ID=6995
Indian Tribes Pinning Tourism Hopes On Olympics
by AP, The Associated Press
By Hannah Wolfson
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - Beyond the sports and snow, the thousands of
visitors expected here for the 2002 Winter Games will get a taste of the
Wild West - and of an even older culture.
Tribes are hoping the chance to learn about American Indians tempts
Olympic visitors onto their reservations, which are slowly delving into
the growing field of cultural tourism. Some tribes are spending millions
of dollars to do so.
"It certainly is an opportunity to get the world's attention," said Ben
Sherman, president of the Western American Indian Chamber of Commerce.
"More people want experiences that are close to the landscape and that
have some real value, and most would be interested in the Native American
experience if they could find us out there."
To get the word out, tribes are planning everything from sunrise prayer
ceremonies in Salt Lake City to Web sites geared toward Olympic visitors.
The Winter Games are such a focal point that the Navajo Nation, the
country's largest tribe, has earmarked $1.7 million for Olympic
exhibitions as part of a long-term tourism project.
"It's very important to us," said Fred White, tourism director for the
Navajo Nation. "It's an investment. We're really banking on returns on the
investment made, returns in the way of promotions and visitors."
Indian tourism isn't new. Southwestern tribes, in particular, have long
drawn visitors with their pueblos and pottery.
But much of the money from such enterprises went into the hands of
Anglos or individual entrepreneurs, rather than a tribal entity.
Traditional tourism also has depended heavily on shopping or entertainment,
with canned dances and colorful costumes that often strayed from true
traditions.
Today, tribes are trying to take back control of their tourism potential.
For some, the big money is in casinos or commercial golf resorts. Yet
for many, the main attraction is a traditional lifestyle or isolated
locations that can make Indian Country seem as exotic as Africa or Asia.
"It's the first time one of the key elements of being Native American
has been recognized as an asset," said Ed Hall, director of transportation
and tourism for the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Washington, D.C.
And those unique traditions can now mean big business, in the form of
cultural tourism, one of the fastest-growing segments of the tourism
industry. A recent study by the Travel Industry Association of America
found that 53.6 million American adults visited a museum or historical
site in 1999 and that cultural tourists spend more and visit more places
than other travelers.
Figures like that have encouraged many tribes to build a tourism
infrastructure on their reservations, start tour companies or open homes
and ceremonies to outsiders.
For example, travelers can spend a week rafting on the Ute reservation
in eastern Utah, guided to pictographs carved in the canyon walls by a
member of the tribe. They can take guided nature hikes on the Pine Ridge
Lakota reservation in South Dakota with a relative of Crazy Horse, or stay
in tipis while horse trekking through Blackfoot lands in Montana.
"People are curious about indigenous people in this country," said
Sherman, a member of the Lakota Tribe. "It's either the tragedy of their
history or the romance of their history or their relationship to the
natural lands or the spiritual aspect."
Western Europeans and residents of the Pacific Rim are among those most
interested in native culture, in some cases making up half of on-
reservation tour groups. That makes the Olympics, when thousands of
overseas visitors will pour into Salt Lake expecting to see a touch of the
Old West, a banner opportunity for advertising native tourism.
During the games, the Shoshone-Bannock - the official host tribe - plans
to have more than 600 performers coming from across the country, the
world's largest tipi and an exhibit of special ceremonies called "Dances
Rarely Seen."
The Native American 2002 Foundation, a Salt Lake-based group that is
organizing tribes for the games, has even put up a version of their Web
site in German to attract Olympic visitors, said development director Cord
Edrington.
The Navajo Nation, which has chosen not to participate in the Shoshone-
Bannock celebrations, will have its own exhibition tent, including food
and vendors from several tribes.
Promoters hope Utah's games are as successful at promoting indigenous
culture as the Sydney Olympics. Aboriginal leaders there said the focus on
their culture helped bridge the gap between native culture and the
Australian mainstream.
"It's kind of changed their whole perspective of the indigenous
population," Hall said. "Before they were not even second-class citizens,
but now they're starting to become, not revered, but at least respected."
Copyright c. 2001 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
Copyright c. 2001 iMinorities, Inc. All rights reserved.
--------- "RE: First American Indian rides to orbit in August" ---------
Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2001 08:10:38 -1000
From: Gary Smith <gars at Speakeasy.org>
Subj: NA News Item
- - - - - - -<Forwarded news>- - - - - - -
filename="ASTRONAUT"
http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm
http://www.floridatoday.com/news/space/stories/2001b/oct/spa100301a.htm
Oct. 3, 2001
First American Indian rides to orbit in August
By Steven Siceloff
FLORIDA TODAY
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - John Herrington will become the first American
Indian in space when shuttle Endeavour begins a mission in August.
An eagle feather will ride with him representing the first Americans,
the New World natives from whom he descended. "It represents strength,
it's an amazing symbol," Herrington said from Johnson Space Center, where
he and his new crewmates have begun training for the space station
construction mission.
"For me, it's just kind of who I am."
Herrington did not grow up on a reservation, but retains a tribal
membership in the Chickasaw Nation in Oklahoma. His mother did not talk
much about the tribe, but Herrington made up for it by reading about
American Indian history.
"It was a close knit group that I grew up in," he said. "No one ever sat
me down and said, 'this is the way you live your life.' "
Clara Sue Kidwell, director of Native American Studies at the University
of Oklahoma, said a combination of poor education opportunities and a
different outlook on nature kept American Indians from joining the
astronaut ranks sooner.
"Indian people have not been generally involved in the mathematics and
technical fields where astronauts seem to come from," Kidwell said. "And
there are some different ways of looking at science."
Herrington already has spoken to scores of schoolchildren, and hopes he
can change the previous mindset.
"I think there's a lot of people who need role models and they didn't
know they had them," he said. "They will follow the space program a lot
closer than they would have. When you know someone on the vehicle, you
have a real connection to it."
Since he is the lone American Indian in the Astronaut Corps, Herrington
also gets to teach others in the office about the tribes.
"I didn't wave a banner saying this is who I am," he said. "They're
curious about it. It's a chance to educate."
Herrington feels the flight, though preceded by several others, also
will represent a defiant gesture to the terrorist strikes in New York and
Washington. "No one can do this the way we do it," he said. "I think even
more so now, 'Here, watch this.' "
The mission will see Herrington join veteran flyer Michael Lopez-Alegria
on a series of spacewalks outside Endeavour to attach a new segment to the
space station.
Herrington served at Kennedy Space Center as a "Cape Crusader," one of
the astronauts who straps other astronauts into shuttles, but does not
have a flight under his belt.
"I've been here five years and you start wondering when it's going to
happen," he said.
Copyright c. 2001 FLORIDA TODAY.
--------- "RE: Native America Calling" ---------
Date: Mon, 15 Oct 2001 11:25:32 -0500
From: Eric Martin <emartin2 at unl.edu>
Subj: Nammys Live Oct 20th + NAC Topics + The Words and Music of NY Tribes
1) Nammys LIVE Oct 20th
2) Native America Calling Topics for 10/15 - 10/17 + 10/19
3) `Voices From The Circle' - Continuing the Healing
4) Different Drums - The Words and Music of NY Tribes
5) alterNATIVE VOICES - Music of History and Peace
1) Nammys LIVE Oct 20th
KBC (Koahnic Broadcast Corporation) is proud to present the live broadcast
of the Fourth Annual Native American Music Awards from the Sandia Casino
Amphitheater in Albuquerque, New Mexico. We invite you to share in this
huge event.
Listen online at www.airos.org (in RealMedia) or www.knba.org (in Windows
Media)
Listen LIVE OCT 20th - 7:30pm - 10:30pm ET (If the show goes past 10:30pm
ET, live coverage will continue until the end of the show.)
You can also check a list of stations that are going to carry the Nammys
live on their airwaves ... to see if any of them are in your area
... http://www.knba.org/knba_nammystations.shtml
If you don't see a station in your area on the list, you can contact your
local Public Radio Station. For a list of the stations in your area go to
http://www.prss.org/Map/INDEX.HTM and clicking on your state.
KBC's live coverage of the Fourth Annual Native American Music Awards will
feature an outstanding lineup of live performances by some of today's most
talented artists including Keith Secola performing with John Densmore (The
Doors drummer), Annie Humphrey, Brul=E9 with Nicole LaRoche, Black Lodge
Singers, Bonnie Jo Hunt, Radmilla Cody, Crystal Gayle, Casper, Yarina,
Evren Ozan, R. Carlos Nakai, Janice Marie, Jay Begaye and others to be
announced.
The following special awards will also be announced: The Lifetime
Achievement Award to R. Carlos Nakai, the Hall of Fame induction of Crystal
Gayle, the Jim Thorpe Award and the Living Legends Award to the Neville
Brothers. Also, there will be a special VIP party with performances by Star
Nayea and Desert Horizon.
Throughout the evening, celebrity presenters will announce the various
winners of the 2001 Nammy Awards from Best Blues Recording to Best
Traditional Recording all the way to the end when we find out who won Best
Album of the Year.
Co-hosted By: Gregg McVicar of `Earthsongs' and Harlan McKosato of
`Native America Calling'
Production Staff: Gabriela Castelan, Steve Johnson, Jon Ghahate, Susan
Braine, Beth Santistevan, Chip Borton and Nola Daves
Distributor: American Indian Radio on Satellite (AIROS)
Funding: Paul Allen Music Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts and
the Corporation for Public Broadcasting
Executive Producer: Koahnic Broadcast Corporation (KBC)
For more information about KBC, Earthsongs, and Native America Calling, log
on at www.knba.org.
For more information about the Native American Music Awards, visit their
web site at www.nammys.com.
2) NAC Topics for 10/15 - 10/17 + 10/19
Listen live every weekday from 1-2pm ET by going to www.airos.org or tuning
into your local radio station. For a list of affiliates go to
http://www.nativeamericacalling.com/nac_affiliates.shtm
MON - 10/15: Resurgence of Native Agriculture:
Historically, special agriculture techniques have sustained the diverse
Indian communities, but reservation systems and relocation reduced Native
people to taking handouts, and put the government in the role of caretaker
of the 'Indian problem.' A return to traditional farming techniques is
taking root across Indian Country. Can new food system initiatives address=
nutritional health problems in Native communities? Guests include Clayton
Brascoupe (Mohawk/Tesuque) of the Traditional Native American Farmers
Association and Sherry Salway-Black (Oglala Lakota) of First Nations
Development Institute.
TUE - 10/16: Music Maker Edition:
The first 'Rez Bluez' showcase of the fall season at Toronto's Silver
Dollar Room will celebrate the CD release of Big Brother by The Ronnie
Douglas Band, the 1999 winner of the Toronto Blues Society's New Talent
Search contest, and Maple Blues Award nominee. An outstanding CD deep in
blues tradition, Big Brother has a new batch of original tunes. The show
will feature other Native rhythm & blues artists as well. Are you ready for
the blues? Guests include singer/songwriter Ronnie Douglas (Rama Band of
Chippewa) and Elaine Bomberry (Ojibway/Cayuga), producer of 'Rez Bluez.'
WED - 10/17: Preserving Tribal Languages:
Native American languages are under siege. Barely 150 of the hundreds that
existed and flourished 500 years ago are still alive. Experts say that all
of them are endangered at this point. The Indigenous Language Institute of
Santa Fe is working to preserve, protect and perpetuate tribal languages.
If language is the cornerstone of our culture, what happens if we lose our
language? Guests include Cherokee actor Wes Studi, spokesperson for the
Indigenous Language Institute, and Gerald Hill of the Oneida Nation of
Wisconsin, President of the ILI board of directors.
THU - 10/18: TBA:
FRI - 10/19: Special Native Awards Show:
The Native American Music Awards will recognize several Native people who
have accomplished significant achievements. We will showcase these special
honors which include a Lifetime Musical Achievement Award, the Jim Thorpe
Sports Award, and the Living Legend Award. We will also hand out a few
special awards of our own. Do you have an award you'd like to present to a
prominent Native person? Invited guests include Ivan & Cyril Neville
(Cherokee/Choctaw) of the Neville Brothers.
3) `Voices From The Circle' - Continuing the Healing
VOICES FROM THE CIRCLE listeners can share in the healing music of R.
Carlos Nakai and Amazing Grace, Pop Icon Robbie Robertson and Unbound, The
Badger Singers of Wisconsin's Lac Court O'reilles Ojibwa reservation sing a
woodlands sidestep. Cha Das Ska Dum & Dean Evenson bring us an Oklahoma Cry
Song, Joanne Shendoah reminds us of the great Tree of Peace and also brings
us something new with Feather from Heaven from her latest Eagle Cries CD.
Doug Spotted Eagle helps us to Walk In Beauty while Storm Seymore sings us
a story of the Rainmaker. Jana shows us an Indian urban perspective on Oh
Baby, Baby. `Voices' concludes with Lawrence Laughing who sings of Men Of
Peace.
Listen online by going to www.airos.org (All Times ET)
Monday 10/15: 4pm, 10pm
Tuesday 10/16: 4am
Saturday - 10/20: 3pm
Sunday - 10/21: 4am, 3pm
Monday - 10/22: 4am
4) Different Drums - The Words and Music of NY Tribes
Honoring the music, culture, and wisdom of Native people from the region
around "Ground Zero."
Long before there was a World Trade Center, for thousands of years before
there was a city called New York or a country called the United States of
America, indigenous people have lived in the region of Turtle
Island now known as the State of New York. The indigenous people of New
York State include the Haudenosaunee people who are members of the Six
Nations of the Iriquois Confederacy, and the Shinnecock Nation of Long
Island.
This week we feature music and words which express ancient wisdom pertinent
to today, from artists representing tribes of the New York area, listening
with new ears to music and words recorded long before
September 11, and hearing of the Peacemaker who long ago taught the people
of the region new ways of harmonious living.
Listen online by going to www.airos.org (All Times ET)
Tuesday 10/16: 10am, 4pm, 10pm
Wednesday 10/17: 4am
Saturday 10/20: 5pm
Sunday 10/21: 6am, 5pm
Monday 10/22: 6am
5) alterNATIVE VOICES - Music of History and Peace
This week on alterNATIVE VOICES, field reporter Derrin Redfeather reports
on the All Nations Transform Columbus Day walk to the Colorado State
Capitol. Our music theme this week is history and peace. Tune in and learn
something.
Program information, events calendar and contact info is always available
at www.alternativevoices.org
Listen online by going to www.airos.org (All Times ET)
Wednesday 10/17: 10am, 4pm, 10pm
Thursday 10/18: 4am
Saturday 10/20: 6pm
Sunday 10/21: 7am, 6pm
Monday 10/22: 7am
Eric Martin
Native American Public Telecommunications (NAPT)
Web Communications Specialist
emartin2 at unl.edu
Listen to Indian Radio on the Internet 24 hours a day at nativetelecom.org
To subscribe to AIROS' electronic program guide e-mail airos at unl.edu with
the subject heading subscribe.
--------- "RE: Upcoming Events" ---------
Date: Sun, 21 Oct 2001 15:39:14 -0
From: Gary Smith (gars at speakeasy.org)
Subj: Upcoming Events
=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=
EVENTS ARE FEATURED IN ODD NUMBERED ISSUES ONLY
=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//-
Notice of Copyright Clearance by Contributors:
The following have granted permission for their original articles to
be reposted in order to help mend the Sacred Hoop:
Gary Smith, Frosty Deere, Jess Hansen, Ray Levesque, Brigitte Thimiakis,
Ben Kiden, Leonard Peltier, Leonard Peltier Defense Committee, Kim Catrel,
Janet Smith, Valerie Scott, Debbie Sanders, Johnny Rustywire, Eric Martin
--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//--//-
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