tribal civics

Sharon Day: Disenrollment: Contemplating A More Inclusive Approach

Producer
William Mitchell College of Law
Year

Sharon Day (Bois Forte Band of Chippewa) makes a compelling case for Native nations to abandon externally imposed criteria for citizenship that continue to cause internal divisions within Native nations and communities and instead return to Indigenous cultural values and teachings predicated on unity, inclusion and love.

This video resource is featured on the Indigenous Governance Database with the permission of the Bush Foundation.

People
Resource Type
Citation

Day, Sharon. "Disenrollment: Contemplating A More Inclusive Approach." Tribal Citizenship Conference, Indian Law Program, William Mitchell College of Law, in conjunction with the Bush Foundation. St. Paul, Minnesota. November 13, 2013. Presentation.

"[Anishinaabe language]. So I just want to start by telling you a little story.

In 1984 or 1985 -- I'm not exactly sure when -- I went to Nicaragua as a member of a LGBT work study brigade. There was about four of us, we went to Nicaragua and we stayed with families in León and we took medical supplies because of course there was a U.S. embargo against Nicaragua. And so they couldn't get medical supplies or if they had a John Deere tractor that needed parts they couldn't get parts and none of those kinds of things. And it was actually the sixth anniversary of the revolution there. One of the towns that was near León was a little place called Subtiava and Subtiava was the birthplace of [Augusto César] Sandino who was...the Sandinista pattern themselves after Sandino and that was the beginning of the revolution.

So when I went to Subtiava, they had a cultural center, a museum and it was the only cultural museum in Nicaragua. And so I asked the people there, ‘Who...' because I was trying to figure out like how are they Indian, because they said Sandino was an Indian. So, ‘Who lived in Subtiava?' ‘Anybody who wanted to.' ‘Well, how do you govern yourself?' ‘Well, we have a council.' ‘Well, who can vote for the council?' ‘Whoever lives in Subtiava.' And this was like, what? Like how can this be because of course in our reservation systems who can live on the reservation, who can vote in the election, all of that's very tightly regulated, right? And so here's this community, an Indigenous community, in Central America where everything was just so open.

And so I was still having a...'Well, maybe they're not Indian after all.' And so I asked them, ‘Well, what do you do in terms of like...do you use like traditional medicine?' ‘Oh, yeah.' And so they showed me some of their medicines and they said, ‘In fact, right down on the beach a little ways up the coast we had a medical school where we train traditional practitioners in how to heal people before the Spaniards came and there was maybe...it was a school and we had 100 people there.' And one of the first things that the Spaniards did was burnt down that traditional medical facility. So then they pulled out all their land claims maps, like that I could understand. Same as us, right? But it was...this was 1985 and this is very...this changed a lot of the way that I thought about Indigenous people.

So I'm not a lawyer, I worked for the state for a number of years and had to deal with some state-tribal law for about 10 years and had some many good discussions there with especially the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, and who as a result the tribe...the state had to change their contracts with tribes, all their language. But you know what, as tribal people, we had a governance system prior to 1492. We had a system of governing ourselves and this system of governance really for the Ojibwe people involved our clan system. And so there were clans and myself, I already told you I'm [Anishinaabe language], and where we sit in the lodge is in the western doorway and our job is to protect the people. And so ever since I was a little child I could hear my dad saying, ‘Your job is to take care of your family, your clan, your band, the tribe, all Indigenous people and ultimately all of humanity.' Now I've been lucky all my life to be able to work in positions that have enabled me to do that.

We all have clans and there's sub-clans, but these are the major clans that governed, took care of things and some years ago we started a small charter school in Minneapolis. It was called Native Arts High School and it operated for about three years and we couldn't make it go financially, but the way that we planned everything was that we had the students broken up into clans and if there was a dispute, the clans got together and they made a decision. And if they couldn't decide then we went to the Fish Clan because they were the philosophers and they ultimately made the final decision. When that decision was made, that was it. So I guess they were sort of like the Supreme Court.

And so we also have these seven grandfather teachings, and I know among the Lakota and Dakota they also had a system. They had these very same values with the addition of fortitude because life out there on the plains is a little more difficult and so fortitude is something that is one of their values. And so you can't practice...you can't choose which of these values you're going to practice, which of these values you're gong to incorporate in your life because if you don't practice one of these, you're practicing the opposite.

I know it's the end of the day and there's...just to make it short and sweet, we had laws before 1492, we had ways of governing ourself. It was based on inclusion as opposed to exclusion. Everybody had a job to do. When I was a little kid, I was telling somebody at lunch, my...I was one of 13 children and I was smart. And so when my parents would get up at 5:00 in the morning, if I did all my work the day before, I got up with them at 5:00 and my dad would...I'd get to eat with my daddy, eggs and bacon and things like that. And he would tell my mother in Ojibwe what a wonderful child I was, what a wonderful child I was because I'd done all my work and I understood all of this that he was saying in Ojibwe, and it was my time to be with my parents. When I didn't do my job, I stayed in bed.

So we practiced these, we were taught these things, and in my work now at the Indigenous Peoples Task Force we have a youth theater program that's been in existence since 1990 and we have a cessation program for young people and when the kids come in every day, the first thing they do is they have tobacco ceremony. They say this is the favorite part of the program because they sit in a circle and they talk about who they are. And when they come in, they grab a little name badge like this and it has one of these words on it, one of these values and they put that on and in all the rest of the day there that is how they're going to respond to everything. And so we learn these values through practice and if we could begin to develop some of our programs on the reservations beginning in Head Start, pre-school, incorporating these values, we would be about being including people because the more people we have, the more power we have.

Right now, we're only one percent of the population or something like that and so we need to...we've lost so many people and so we need to become larger, to become stronger, and it's not just about those immediate resources. We need to think about how do we do this? We do this through...all of our children should know where did they come from, how did they come into the world. They should know their name. My name [Anishinaabe language], that means something to me. In my clan...next week I'm meeting with five young women who want to be put on their berry fast. These are the things that we're doing, teaching these young people these kinds of things.

The effects of colonization: none of us have, no matter what, I don't care if you're a lawyer, if you sit on the Supreme Court or if you're an elected tribal official, none of us have escaped the effects of colonization. We all have felt anxiety and depression, some of us more so than others and this is a picture that many of you have seen and it's actually Spaniards setting the dogs on people that they considered to be so different from them that they weren't quite human and these were...LGBT native population, we...many of us have self medicated, we've become addicted, and we've lost more than 50 percent of our gifts because we only come into the world with gifts and we have to get those back. And so how do we go through this process of de-colonization?

We're introducing these teachings into our community, hold community gatherings where we invite everybody, where...one of my cousins, she was on tribal, she was tribal chair for a couple of terms up at my reservation and one day she said to me, ‘Why is it that...you moved away from home when you were young and I stayed here and lived on the reservation all my life and why is it that you know so much more of the cultural teachings?' Well, partly it was because I sobered up when I was 21 years old. Between the time I was 14 and 21 I used up my quota of alcohol and drugs and the first thing I did was I learned how to meditate, and then gradually I found my way to the Midewin Lodge and began to learn some of these teachings.

Somebody else I was talking to a little while ago, Mr. Barber there, he said, ‘Some of those folks back in the ‘60s and the ‘70s, we were the old St. Paul families, the Indian families, and we clung together. We clung together because we were all that we had and nobody missed that Saturday night powwow at 475 Cedar St. where the Indian Center was.' And so we had those kind of community gatherings where people participated and we need to include everyone and we need to reorganize these kinds of community events in our...and I think we need to change our way of thinking. Instead of thinking about the glass being half full, we need to think about how do we fill up that glass so everybody gets a drink of that water? How do we build those kinds of homes? In our own community, my grandfather built many of the homes at Bois Forte and I tell you those houses were far better than those HUD homes that they came along in the ‘60s. But they did it together, my grandfather and my uncles -- they did that work together and that's what we need to do.

My mother was born in Canada, three generations ago. Her mother lived in Canada, my great-grandfather came from Leech Lake, but I'm full blood and I'm from Bois Forte, but you go back three generations and these boundaries that we have today did not exist 200 years ago. So why are we so intent on upholding these practices that tear us apart? In this room, you are the brightest people, you are the leaders, we've got to put our minds together and our hearts and come up with a new way of being, because this is the seventh generation and they said that if we are to ignite that light of the eighth fire that leads to peace and harmony, that we need to do it from a spiritual frame of view and to move forward that way.

So today, I will choose love and I hope that you do too because who are we if we are not...if we do not choose love. So it makes me really sad to think about some of the things that happen in our communities today -- some of the things that that we heard about this afternoon -- to many people, and if we're to survive and light that eighth fire, we need to move in that direction and if we're to not only survive as a people, but we have to make some different choices in terms of all humanity, all the people who currently live on Turtle Island, we need to bring them together. When they said, a new people will emerge in the time of the seventh fire, they meant we are all of that new people. We are all of those people and so it takes all the people on Turtle Island if we're going to survive as a species because certainly we know that the Creator has cleansed the earth before and there are many things that are going on today. We need to look at our resources and what are we doing to those.

On my reservation, I wrote an article about the water and they chose not to print it and they said because the mining companies might not like that. I said, 'But it's not about the mining companies, I'm not talking about the mining,' although we should be very careful about that because the sulfide mines that they're proposing are nothing like the mining that is taking place on the Iron Range near where I live. They said, ‘Well, but if we print it then the mining companies might want to have equal space.' And I said, ‘But you're the editor, you can choose.' So anyhow, they didn't and I went on and published it on a place called Alternate, which was then picked up in Canada and in many places and the article was about what I just said: today, I choose love. [Anishinaabe language]."

Stephen Cornell: Creating Citizens: A Fundamental Nation-Rebuilding Challenge

Producer
William Mitchell College of Law in conjunction with the Bush Foundation
Year

NNI Faculty Associate Stephen Cornell discusses how colonial policies have distorted and corrupted Native nations' conceptions of identity, citizenship and nationhood, and stresses the need for Native nations to forge a strategic vision of their long-term futures and then work to create among their people "citizens' committed to and capable of creating those futures.

This video resource is featured on the Indigenous Governance Database with the permission of the Bush Foundation.

Resource Type
Citation

Cornell, Stephen. "Creating Citizens: A Fundamental Nation-Rebuilding Challenge." Tribal Citizenship Conference, Indian Law Program, William Mitchell College of Law, in conjunction with the Bush Foundation. St. Paul, Minnesota. November 13, 2013. Presentation.

"Well, thank you all for being here. And I want in particular to thank the Bush Foundation and the School of Law, the Mitchell School of Law for putting this together and also acknowledge the first peoples of this piece of country, this piece of this magnificent continent. [I see I'm not yet quite there.]

I have found the discussion we've had already very interesting and I think it's unfortunate what's happened to this discussion of citizenship. And I think Bethany [Berger] did a really nice job of showing us the intrusion of outsiders' ideas of what citizenship should be and mean and the way that that has come to dominate the discussion of citizenship so that you -- whose citizenship and lives are at stake -- end up talking about blood quantum and other criteria which I don't think were ever -- as John [Borrows] has really shown -- were ever part of the way you thought about who you are. But that now dominates the discussion and the intrusion of the notion of boundaries. Gee, you either are or you aren't part of a people. How do we know? Because I went to court and the judge said. Is that really the way things should be? And then the counter to that intrusion and that transformation, that demand that you think about who you are in a particular way, then John presented a very different notion of citizenship as an expression of who you are as a people, of what kind of people you want to be. Not just what kind of people you were, what do you want to be? And that's a very different discussion, and I think it's unfortunate that a lot of the discussion of citizenship now is really bogged down in that first set of ideas and it needs to move to that second set that John really articulated for us. That said, my job, I was asked to...I want to do a couple of things here. I want to say something about what's happening across Indian Country in this area, and that's going to be just exactly the sort of criteria that have unfortunately come to dominate this discussion. And I want to say a little bit about some of the issues to think about as you wrestle with those criteria, but then I want to...I want to come back to what I think is important and that's something I'll talk about called 'creating citizens.'

So I'm going to give you some data. And unfortunately, this podium is beautifully placed so that half of you can't even see this and probably the other half can't read it because it's too small. But this is some of the citizenship criteria in Native nations. Now it turns out it's not easy to get a comprehensive view, maybe Matthew Fletcher or someone else knows of a place where you can find out all of these criteria. The best source I've come across was actually work done by Keith Richotte back in about 2007, when he went through a lot of tribal constitutions to track what they say about citizenship and how that's changed as constitutions changed. Tracked really some of the processes that you all are involved in and the point of this chart is really just to show you that today it's incredibly diverse out there from various kinds of blood quantum and what I've done is give you the criteria on the left and some examples of nations within the U.S. who are using those criteria or some version of them. And that list down the left, which matters much more than the examples begins -- for those of you who can't quite see it -- blood quantum; lineal descent from a base tribal roll; lineal descent and blood quantum in some sort of combination. We've got lineal descent and residency, that is, you have to show lineal descent and either your or your parents had to be a resident; a minimum percent of tribal or Indian descent–Bay Mills sets a percentage and says this is what you need to be a citizen; patrilineal descent; matrilineal descent; parental tribal residence at birth, that you don't see as much anymore, but there's still some nations that use that; participation in tribal affairs. I actually thought that was kind of an interesting one. Colville: you want to be a citizen, you better be involved, be engaged. Council discretion: Hey, we'll make up our minds, decide whether you are or not. General council discretion: open to a much larger body of already recognized citizens to decide. Comanche has special rules for minors. Nez Perce, Warm Springs allowing for adoption and naturalization.

In other words, there's a very diverse set of criteria currently existing out there. Which ones are the most common? Well, most include descent from a tribal member or citizen. Some include no further requirement. About 25 percent of tribes according to what Keith Richotte, Carole Goldberg, Ian Record, and others have been able to come up with, about 25 percent of tribes in the U.S. require descent from a tribal member, period. Parental tribal residence at birth still is a fairly large number, about 20 percent. One-quarter blood quantum is over 20 percent. One-half blood quantum less than 10 percent today. A quarter-blood quantum plus parental residence at birth less than five percent. One-eighth blood quantum, one sixteenth -- there are other criteria involved but the percentages get much, much less. They are getting rare. So while there's enormous diversity out there, there are dominate patterns and these are the things you see. What's the pattern of change, emerging trends? Reducing blood quantum, everyone's wrestling with the intermarriage question. If my nation requires one-half blood quantum, it's not going to take more than a generation or two before my children -- unless I marry someone else who is also a citizen of my nation by that criterion, or ideally someone who's full blood -- before I can't enroll in my own children in my nation.

I was talking to an Apache...a citizen of one of the Apache nations the other day and he was saying, 'My children are Apache, but I married outside the White Mountain Apache Tribe.' I can't remember whether it was Jicarilla or San Carlos Apache or who, married another Apache but not of that tribe, and as a result, he said, 'My kids can't be enrolled in my nation. They're as Apache as I am.' That's the result of this intrusion, this creation of boundaries that slashed their way right across peoples and said, 'Okay, you've got to set some criteria and then you've got to abide by them,' and now a lot of tribes are reducing blood quantum because as the generations pass they're starting to disappear so you've got to reduce the blood quantum in order to keep people within the boundary. Replacing blood quantum with lineal descent -- that's happening at a lot of places. From tribal blood to Indian blood, that is, we require Indian blood but not necessarily tribal blood. Growing attention to off-reservation representation and how you keep people not only as citizens, but engaged as citizens off reservation.

I don't know how many of you are familiar with the Citizen Potawatomi Nation's council. They recently redid their constitution. Any citizen, enrolled Citizen Potawatomi citizen, can participate in tribal affairs whether you live in Los Angeles or in Shawnee, Oklahoma where the tribal headquarters are. Their constitution, they have I think it's a 16-seat legislature. Eight members of that legislature have to be resident in Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma and the other eight can be resident anywhere in the United States. So they do their council meetings with video screens on the wall so that the councilor in Los Angeles -- where they have an office and who was elected to the council -- can participate real-time in the debates, vote, etc. And their argument is, 'We want to keep our people part of the nation, not just by saying yes, you're a citizen, by actually engaging you in what it means to be part of the nation.'

Dual citizenship: we're also seeing some tribes saying, 'No dual citizenship.' I don't know where that one is going. Unique sets of citizenship rules, that is, Grand Traverse is breaking away from some of the general patterns and creating its own rules. And of course we're seeing some of this extremely controversial and I think extremely dangerous phenomenon of disenrollment. What we're beginning to see now in California is people who've been disenrolled demanding that the federal government step in. That's the last thing tribes need is the federal government stepping in and saying, 'Okay, we'll decide who's a citizen.' But that's what's going to happen if it keeps on because there's going to be a large enough group of disenfranchised people saying, 'Who else are we going to appeal to? We'll appeal to the feds,' and there goes some of your sovereignty because the feds say, 'Okay, we'll take over this issue.'

So those are some of the things that are going on out there. As I say, the work that Keith Richotte did is about six years old. Carole Goldberg at UCLA has done some work on this a little more recently, but it's actually very difficult to find out exactly what's happening across the country, but I think this gives you some idea of some of the things that are going on. These things have real-world effects. When you change these things, and I think this is what...for some nations, I think the move to wrestle with citizenship criteria comes from some crisis. Either we get people demanding, 'I want my children enrolled,' so okay, we better fiddle with the citizenship criteria. Or there's a court case or there's a settlement and there's fighting over the benefits of the settlement or something like that. And very often, councils are under pressure to launch some kind of rethink of citizenship criteria without really sitting down and saying, 'What are the consequences of this action across the board?' And of course, some of these things are obvious. I think there's a consequence on numbers, that's perhaps the most obvious one.

As you loosen criteria, the numbers potentially increase; as you tighten them, the numbers potentially decrease. Does that matter to you? It's certainly got impacts on things like tribal capacities. Excluding someone is excluding a body of knowledge, a body of experience. Incorporating someone is bringing in knowledge and experience. What impact does the change in citizenship criteria have on your nation's capacity to do the things it wants to do? Political influence may be affected by this and not just by numbers, but in a sense you're...how you're viewed by outsiders may be affected by changes that you make in citizenship. The defense of sovereignty -- that's part of the disenrollment issue. What impact is this likely to have if we spin out the consequences of action? What impact is this going to have down the road on our ability to control what may be one of the most important aspects of nationhood, defining who we are? That should always be in your hands, not in someone else's, but you may take actions that make it harder to defend that sovereignty.

Compliance with federal regulations: there are federal programs, for example, including programs on which some of your citizens may depend to get through the winter, to survive, to meet the needs of their kids, where the federal government imposes regulations that your citizenship criteria may come into conflict with. On the unity and social cohesion of your people, on culture, and I think on self concepts, rigid technical and legalistic criteria versus the sense in the community of what it means to be a citizen, of those things that John just talked about. And I actually think that may be the most important of all these effects: What is the impact of the decisions you make about citizenship on your people's sense of what it means to be a citizen?

John mentioned some of what's happening in New Zealand. In August, I was teaching a course at a tribal college in New Zealand and for a group of Maori working tribal professionals who are working for their tribes in New Zealand. And I was struck by the fact that a couple of people were talking about their, who I would think of as the citizens of their tribes, as beneficiaries. They were beneficiaries of settlements; settlements over land claims and claims to fish into the four shores of New Zealand. And I asked them, 'Do you all really talk about your people as beneficiaries?' And they said, 'Well, that's kind of how the New Zealand government talks about them.' And we ended up talking about, what does it mean to be part of a tribe if you think of yourself as a beneficiary? I get something. It's like listening to radio station WIIFM, What's In It For Me? I'm a beneficiary. That's a limited conception of what it means to be part of a people, and I thought a really unfortunate conception of that. We need to find a balance somewhere between citizenship as rights and benefits and about me as an individual and citizenship as obligation and contribution and participation and as an expression of this collective consciousness, this collective understanding of who you are as a people. And what you do in citizenship is going to affect both ends of that continuum, but when I heard that term 'beneficiary,' I thought, 'Well, I know where at least those few people are. They're way over at that end.' Bad place to be for the future of a people.

And I don't know how many of you know Oren Lyons. I had an interesting conversation with Oren Lyons about seven or eight years ago. Oren is a traditional faith keeper of the Onondaga and a remarkable man, one of the architects of the U.N. Declaration on Human Rights, and we were talking about this term member and Oren, I thought...He said to me, 'Tell me something.' He said, 'Are you a member of the United States? Are you a member of the State of Arizona?' He said, 'At Onondaga we're not a club. We don't have members. We're a nation. We have citizens.' And I thought that's an important change in how you think. To be a member of something, what do I get? I get the magazine, I get a discount at the store, I get all these goodies because I'm a member. But if I'm a citizen, that raises questions about what do I give, what am I part of? It's about the thing itself, the nation, rather than about this flow of benefits to me.

I think the biggest challenge is not deciding eligibility criteria. You're having to do that, you live in a political and legal context where that's demanded of you. So you have to do it and you have to be smart about it and you have to think very carefully about what the consequences are of your decisions. But I think there's a much bigger challenge in this whole area of citizenship and I call it 'creating citizens.' Do you think about what it's going to take to create the kind of citizens that your nation needs? And I think that's really a strategic question. It has to do with what kind of community or nation do you want to be 25 years from now, 50 years, seven generations, whatever the time horizon is that makes sense to your people? What kind of community do you want your grandchildren to grow up in? What kind of citizens do you want your grandchildren to be? So when I talk about creating citizens, I'm not talking about adding to the roles or increasing your numbers. I'm talking about creating that future by creating people who can live it. If you know what kind of future you want, what kind of citizens will that require? Do you know? Have you thought about that and about how you'll create those citizens? And I think of that as something that...

In the work that I, and some of my colleagues, have done, we talk a lot about nation building, or as Oren Lyons says, 'nation rebuilding,' and I actually think this business of creating citizens is a fundamental part of it and it raises this question of, do you have a plan for creating citizens? And that would include things like language, culture, ceremony. The Cherokees investing...scavenging money from tribal programs so they can get their kids into immersion classrooms where they will learn their language and creating a school system where the teaching will all be in Cherokee. That's part of creating citizens.

History: I'll use the Cherokees again because I think this was another creative thing they did. Every employee of the Cherokee Nation -- whether you're a citizen or not -- has to take a history course on the Cherokee Nation's history and the chief of the nation -- the Cherokee, they call the top guy the 'chief' -- the chief of the nation said, 'We do this because we want to be sure everyone understands what's at stake here, what we've been through, what we lost, what we kept. When you work for us, what grand purpose are you serving? So we teach our history.' That's part of creating citizens.

Tribal civics: some of you know Frank Ettawageshik from the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa, and Frank talks about tribal civics. He says, 'My kids know the capitol of this state, they can tell you the major rivers in the state, but they don't know anything about tribal government. They don't know what it's about because none of our schools teach any of that stuff.' He says, 'We need a tribal civics course that teaches you why we have a government, what it does, what nationhood means. That ought to be in our school system.' That's creating citizens. What's the role of elders in creating citizens, of youth, of tribal leadership in creating citizens? And do your citizens know what citizenship actually means? Maybe that's a discussion -- which, as you go through some of these processes of rethinking citizenship -- maybe it needs to be a community discussion not about legal criteria or technical details, but about what citizenship means or what you hope it will mean 50 years down the road.

I was reminded...I was chatting with a good friend who's from one of the more traditional Pueblos in New Mexico last week and we were talking about...I had mentioned that I was going to be at this discussion of citizenship and we were actually talking about the fact that this Pueblo still practices banishment. It happens very rarely. In fact, he told me it hadn't happened in probably a dozen years but I thought it was interesting, banishment means excluding someone from the Pueblo, and I guess the legal version of it in some places today would be disenrollment, but what I thought was interesting was the discussion about what happens. Banishment doesn't have anything to do with whether you're descended from the tribal roll, it doesn't have anything to do with blood quantum in this Pueblo, it doesn't have anything to do with any of that. He said, 'The question is, can you live as a responsible citizen of our nation.' And he said, 'We have some people who engage in behavior that is unacceptable among our people and we have a process...' It's not written down. This is a nation with no written constitution, it governs in a very old way. He said, 'We have a process. You correct the person. You sit them down, you talk to them, you say, "You are not behaving the way we expect of our people," and you give them a chance to correct that. And if they continue to show that they can't do it, you do it again. You do it with elders, you do it with their relatives. You do it three times and if after three times they still demonstrate that they cannot live as a responsible part of our community, then they have to go because they're a destructive force in the community.' And he said two things I thought were interesting about that. He said, 'We can't think of a more extreme punishment because what you're saying to them is, "You can't come home again, ever." But it's not about blood quantum, it's not about descent. It's about, 'Can you participate fully and responsibly in our notion of what it means to be a citizen?' And maybe that's more the discussion that we need to be having when we talk about citizenship. Thank you very much." 

Paulette Jordan: Engaging the Nation's Citizens and Effecting Change: The Coeur d'Alene Story

Producer
Native Nations Institute
Year

Paulette Jordan, citizen and council member of the Coeur d'Alene Tribe in Idaho, discusses the importance of Native nation leaders being grounded in their culture and consulting the keepers of the culture (their elders) so that they approach the leadership challenges they face with the proper mindset and tools. She also shares a story about she helped to mobilize tribal citizens and non-Indians in her community to support a tax levy in order to preserve adequate funding for local public education.

Resource Type
Citation

Jordan, Paulette. "Engaging the Nation's Citizens and Effecting Change: The Coeur d'Alene Story." Emerging Leaders seminar. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. November 7, 2013. Presentation.

Herminia Frias:

"Our next presenter is Paulette Jordan and she is a tribal council member from Coeur d'Alene Tribe and she is going to be presenting her experience in citizen engagement and effecting change."

Paulette Jordan:

"Well, good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for having me. I really appreciate this opportunity. It feels like a homecoming because I was here back in 2009, right Renee [Goldtooth]? And so it feels like home, and I really do appreciate the hospitality and the good nature that I've always been given. I started out here for the Emerging Tribal Leaders Seminar just when I was just elected on to the tribal council. And so it's always a learning process, but you just have to run and go. There is no college or any type of education that you can go through really to really prepare you for tribal leadership. It's one of a kind, it's all on its own. You can go and get any specific degree and your MBA, your doctorate, whatever, your law degree, but none of that really prepares you for the challenges of what you're about to face when it comes to the people with domestic violence issues or meth issues -- as we heard here -- and housing issues. There's always a concern and how you manage that with your own people really is based on how you base your culture within your own heart and your empathy to understand your people and not judge them.

And so that's always been my big learning curve...is thankfully being raised by the elders, they've always said, "˜As long as you hold your heart out in your hand, that is how you approach your people,' and so that's always been my strategy is just to listen first and foremost and so that's why I come here to you all and offer myself just more so as a student. So whenever someone tries to put me up on any pulpit or anything like that I just say, "˜I'm just a humble person. I was just someone who was just raised on the reservation who just wants to come back and help make my community a better place.' And so whatever title or whatever someone wants to put on you, you just have to remind yourself where you come from and that's one thing my [Coeur d'Alene language] always said. So all the challenges that I've faced, even the ones that I'm going to be facing tomorrow and the next day and the next day after that, I have to remember my grandmothers and they always said to never forget where you came from.

And I mention that because I've pretty much learned over the years where the necessary places for us as tribal peoples. Now how many in here are tribal leaders, sit on your tribal councils, your tribal government? We've got some good representation here. As tribal leaders, what I've learned is we face a lot of conflicts, a lot of challenges, and in those approaches we have to build relationships. It's your job and your duty and your responsibility not only to build a relationship with your people but those surrounding communities, whether you live within a certain county, within a certain state and just being in the U.S. You have to go and meet with the President, with the Congress, with your city council, with your county commissioners, etc. and you have to develop those positive relationships for your people. So you have to be able to communicate to express the nature and the value of your citizens. And so for me, coming in as a young tribal leader learning that we had to promote our own people, promote our own issues, they're all unique, but to me as a Coeur d'Alene woman coming in, the vested interest in me was that we had to tell our story so that our concerns would be addressed at home and that meant building these relationships with the non-tribal community. And so that's what I've been doing and that's been my goal. That's also the reason why I ran for a state representative position in the State of Idaho as a Democrat in a very Republican state. But the point of doing that was in a very racist state, we live 30 miles south of a KKK [Ku Klux Klan] compound. So Idaho is a very not only Republican state, but very white supremacist-natured state, so we have to deal with these issues. But it's...everyone, every state has their issues so no one's better, no one's perfect, no one's more challenged than the other. But that's something I raise today because that also helps to build up [to] what I'm about to get to.

And so I talk about how the white supremacy group comes in and why it is that I decided to step up to some of these challenges, because each and every day I've learned -- whether I worked in D.C. or came back home and worked or even sitting on the tribal council -- that it always comes down to not just telling your story, but being those rooms, the meetings, doing the work, getting there to tell the people, the non-tribal people that this is what you're about, that you're not here to be an enemy, but more so a friend and how you can work together, how you can build those partnerships. Not just for you and that other person in the room that you're sitting across the table from, but for your communities at large and how that's going to benefit both the tribal and the non-tribal aspects.

So that was one of the first challenges that I've faced being on the tribal council and I just wanted to reflect that, because to me for us to get better as communities we have to look at who our friends are and that has to be everybody. We can't just think, "˜Oh, we're sovereign nations, we're going to move forward on our own.' That's not going to happen and that's really more of a pie-in-the-sky and wishful thinking but in all reality, yes, that's great, we're sovereign nations and let's act as such. Let's practice our traditional ways, let's continue to get out there and dig our roots and gather our berries and hunt our game and our wildlife, but yet still we have to know that we are one aspect in the larger picture and we are a small function in the greater world. But as my uncle always says, "˜We could still be a leader in this world based on how we walk our talk even as small nations.' Something I wanted to share, he's one of my greatest mentors, I probably should [have] mentioned this before, but I wanted to share that, how he has always stated to me that "˜the dollar is not the Almighty.' And again I'll say that, "˜The dollar is not the Almighty.' '...And that we must always remember to be humble before the Almighty God, to take care of our children, our elders, our people, our employees and our communities, to walk our talk and lead by example and in doing so,' he said, "˜we can improve our societies and show the world who we truly are as a nation. Our humanity is all that matters at the end of the day and how we look upon one another as relatives.' And he stated, "˜Once we can understand why and what it is we hold sacred, we can truly move mountains.' And so that is a quote that I wanted to share with you from my own uncle, who really helped advise me to the business woman, the leader that I am today.

Still, I just consider myself again a student, so I'm constantly learning from my elders. But it's always stated that you have to talk to your children. Arlene [Templer], she mentioned how you have to mentor each other, you have to mentor your children into these stages. Consult with your elders, your statesmen, your tribal leaders to build this historical knowledge to help prevent you from making the same mistakes that they made and then learn from their experiences because they all have great ideas, but people tend to write them off and want to move them into elders' homes when that should never be the case, that yes, they're in their golden years, but it's golden years for a reason. They're these treasures within our society that are the greatest resource that we have and I've seen within every tribal community that people tend to think more so towards and lean more so towards the western society and less to a cultural education. And so the problem with that to me is when we go all the way back to the United Nations, we talk about the Indigenous rights and the whole purpose of us fighting for that is basically to keep ourselves as a unique society within the world, to have this general understanding that yes we exist and we have these rights as Indigenous peoples, but to have those rights you have to practice those rights. And so that's the whole point is if you're going to practice it, then really walk your talk and go out and do those things of your people, your traditions and then teach your children.

And so with that being said, we have to be the change that we want to see. So I have a story to share and I know I was asked to come in and share some of my stories and I said, "˜Well, there is one recent one that really kind of strikes me that I think would be good for people to know,' because I've kind of been sharing this up in the northwest quite a bit. People ask me, "˜Well, geez, Idaho...' for example, is 47th in the nation when it comes to education, we're 49th in overall ranking. We're just poor as it can be, but again it's a Republican state. We have so many challenges to deal with, but one is education, but to our tribe, to the Coeur d'Alene tribe, we value education as the utmost priority. So to me, it became a problem when the school district within our reservation cut funding and then they were going to close that school when that school teaches around 70 to 80 percent of our students who are tribal students. So just to give an example of how we can engage our citizens and how we can unite with one another for the common good is what I'm getting to here.

It started with a levy, and I'll try to do my best to keep the story short because it's a long one, but it started with a levy. And basically the state said, "˜We're going to cut funding to the school and most of the schools throughout the state,' but our school was the only one who failed the increased funding basically to keep the school open. So it was going to lose its accreditation, lose its sporting programs, lose kindergarten, preschool programs, cut teachers and even good, great teachers, ones who were dealing with math or language arts, music, primary functions I would think for young development. And when that was going on, the tribe wanted to play a role, but the tribe played a role in more of a political sense. For me, I was just coming off of my own state campaign and I felt really worn out because to me it was a challenge about...it's more about educating people to again, telling our story, what tribes really are, how we impact our local economy, socially and economically. And again, we're the number-one employer in the region, so we do quite well, but we don't brag or boast about it -- that's just not our way -- but we like to have other people tell that story. So again, the whole past six months of my life was spent trying to tell our story and educate people about the good that we do and how we want to work together to provide better resources to grow the economy, to create more jobs, to better the educational system, and to help those within even our smaller rural communities.

So after all this was going down and then the levy comes up, we thought, "˜Okay, everyone will vote for the levy. Why not, it's supporting our children, supporting education?' But then that failed and it failed miserably and the tribe became frustrated, the local non-tribal community was extremely frustrated, and sadly people were just ready to give up: the teachers, the students, everybody. So people were thinking, "˜Okay, where do we go next? Where do we go from here?' In a small community where that's checkerboarded [land] tribal and non-tribal, you get a lot of people thinking about their lives. What are they going to do next, where do we go, do we move, do we find a better school system? And this is a reservation and us Indian people, we don't just up and move to where we find a better life. This is our land; we have a sacred relationship with our land. So we don't just call it quits and move on and pack our trailer and go. We have to find a way to make it work. So a lot of the non-tribal people, they knew my plight and what I was trying to do and so they had approached me, the superintendent, the principal, and a lot of the teachers and I was kind of shocked by that, but they came to me and asked me...again, I'm just a tribal citizen in the community and they said, "˜Help us. We need your help. You know how to get out to the people and we think you can unite because we're going to need tribal and non-tribal votes to get this levy passed.' So you can imagine I was burned out and I really don't like politics. I really don't. I didn't like those forums and debates or really getting into the issues, but I do love helping the people and if I know that it's going to better the people overall, that makes me feel good about things.

So when I said to that superintendent of the district, I said, "˜Well, give me a week. I'm going to be here and there, but I need some time to think about it because I'm also a mother, too, and I know this is going to be another commitment and I already have a full plate.' So it came down to basically me seeing the school board panic. They panicked and then they had to cut everything and I felt bad for that school board and a few of them were tribal and I thought, "˜This is what they have to deal with. They have to deal with the state legislature who cut educational funding and it's trickling down to the people.' And so the rural county, the rural society, they're having to put the economy on their shoulders. So these are people just like you and I who have bills and families to feed and they...everyone has issues, they have a real...reality, basically to deal with. And so whatever that was, I thought, even my neighbors. I looked at their struggles and I thought, "˜It's just tragedy overall if we do nothing about it.' So this is what it comes down to, how do we engage our citizens?

So what I did was talked with all of our local folks. We had our education director, talked with our chairman. Basically I had to make this a grassroots effort and turn it into a community-wide, strong movement because they all had to come together. I said, "˜Even our students are willing to help and our teachers are willing to help, our elders, our tribal leaders, anyone and everyone needs to get out and vote.' But they're not only just responsible to vote. They have to get up and show up to these meetings and keep everyone educated because that was the reason why the levy lost in the first place. It always comes down to how you educate, how you tell your story and the people said, "˜Well, I don't really want to go door knocking. I don't really want to have public meetings. Why should we do this?' And I said, "˜Well, let's talk about John Deer, for example, who is a local business owner. He voted 'no' because he thinks that you want to basically bear this burden on his back as a local property owner. You're going to increase his taxes. Whether that's a minimal tax or a large tax, it's a tax and a local business owner does not want to be taxed any further than they already are.' But how do you tell that story? I says, "˜Well, speak from your heart. I'm teaching these young students here to tell their story and how it applies to their neighbors in that community.' I said, "˜And I learned going door...' It's really humbling to go door knocking, by the way, if anyone's done that or not. But I learned that if you want to win these elections and tell your story or have a vote in the broader forums, you have to get out there and tell people who you are and why you're running or what you're there for and how you can help them. And so I said to these students, "˜You're not here for yourself, you're here for your neighbor and you're here for their future because you are their vested interest. They're investing in you and you are the future.' I said, "˜When I went to school, my elders...' as much as I wanted to go back home to the reservation, I stayed in private school, but I said, "˜Only because I knew that my elders would always be with me,' and I knew that when they said, "˜Your education belongs to us. Your dedication, everything that you do belongs to the tribe,' I wholly believed in that. "˜So what you're doing today, this belongs to your community and you're bringing that back to invest a greater interest.'

And so that's what the youth said. They understood that. They said, "˜Yeah, we know, we get that.' And then they told their stories from their heart and that's what it came down to and that's, I think, how we won because this is a happy ending because people were ready to give up and call it good and throw in the towel and move on. And then of course the tribe is stuck footing the bill because people thought, "˜Well, the tribe obviously should be expected to pay this bill. We should be able to hold up that fourth leg to keep it standing.' But it's not the tribe's responsibility. We don't have a leadership arm in the school district. It's the state and it's a state-funded school, but the state was not doing its job and it was withholding money from local communities. So to me that's a travesty, but also it's against the law because they were not upholding an Idaho State Supreme Court decision and it's a law that every child in the State of Idaho is guaranteed a free and good public education. So they weren't upholding the needs of the people and again, it's not the tribe's responsibility, but the tribe was willing to do whatever was necessary. But I said, "˜Wait a minute. This is not the tribe's responsibility, but we're all about community here. We want to build up our community just as the next person.' And so a grassroots effort -- you have to really get out there and tell your story if you want to make change. And so being the change you want to see is about walking your talk, sharing your message, being that voice. Each and every one of us has a vision and we are blessed to have those visions because not everybody is granted that ability.

You're here again for a reason, so you just didn't stumble through that door and decide, "˜I'm going to listen in on Paulette and Arlene here.' You have a good reason to be here. So I'm hoping this story is helpful because to me that really opened my eyes, because when I was in that room I was directing the command center at the last day on voting day and I didn't have the tribal council or the chairman, I was...I said, "˜You know what, this is best left aside from all politics. This is about the children.' So I put the children at the helm and I said, "˜This is their doing. They're the ones who got out and educated the community. They went door to door,' as shy as they are, some of them are the most shy people, but I think after that experience it's going to turn them into strong nationwide leaders because they are young warriors. And I said, "˜You have just been inducted into basically what is kind of like our Indian Way Leadership Academy. You have stood up and counted coup against this levy.'

And so that day was neat because in our tribal headquarters we had all of our youth, we had a lot of our tribal citizens, we had non-tribal people and the most amazing point of the day to me was when we had some non-tribal ladies joking with our tribal people and they were joking like we were all relatives and I've never seen that before. I've never seen tribal and non-tribal and again, we still have a lot of race issues, we still have that line there that we need to get rid of, but I think that line is not as bold as it used to be after that moment. And so for those race relationships we really helped one another, and I think that people will remember that day and they'll see that we came together for each other's children. And so people are starting to see that tribes are not enemies but we're friends and we want to be good relatives and good neighbors to one another and so we showed that by example. And so again, we walked our talk that day.

That was the story I was asked to share and I wanted to come down and express that much to you and I do hope you take something from that. But again, it is...engaging your citizenry is about being humble and having that vision and really I think having diligence and just being honest with your people about what the issues are and what the concerns are. Really tell them, if there's a problem, you have to tell your elders and your people and not be afraid of that backlash because, yeah, they're going to criticize you and I know it's hard to take, but just realize it's constructive criticism that will help you in the long run. I know I would, as the youngest person of the council, I used to develop and hold elders' meetings and I was the elders' liaison and the elders were considered the tough ones of all the bunch in our community. And so they said, "˜Oh, put Paulette over there, she can talk to the elders.' And they thought they were setting me up good "˜cause I was the young one and I got vetted for that job. And I said, "˜Well, I see that as an honor and a privilege. Thank you.' And all the elders of the council, they're all in their 60s, 70s, and so here I was at 28 and so I really seen that as an honor, but my first step was to engage them wholly and we had an elders' listening session and yes, that first session was great. All they wanted to know is that they were being listened to and that you were going to do what they said and not just throw it into the wind. So I followed up after those listening sessions and we had them yearly and so they became very productive. And I thought, "˜I wish we did this more often.' But I would have them once yearly and so trying to keep that tradition going. But that's all it's about is talking to your people and not being afraid to be disciplined and you know how that finger may be waved in your face or challenged in some way or form. So thank you. I appreciate this time again and I appreciate all of you having me and listening to me, especially after that good lunch we had. [Coeur d'Alene language]."

Frank Ettawageshik: Exercising Sovereignty: The Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians

Producer
Indigenous Peoples' Law and Policy Program
Year

Frank Ettawageshik, former chairman of the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians (LTBBO), discusses how LTBBO has systematically built its legal infrastructure in order to fully and capably exercise the nation's sovereignty and achieve its nation-building goals. He discusses some of the specific laws and codes LTBBO developed and why, and he also stresses the importance of Native nations building relationships with other governments on their own terms and in furtherance of their strategic priorities.

Resource Type
Citation

Ettawageshik, Frank. "Exercising Sovereignty: The Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians." Indigenous Peoples' Law and Policy Program, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. April 15, 2010. Presentation.

Frank Ettawageshik:

"It's really nice to be down here enjoying your nice weather and to be down here and to be working with the Native Nations Institute. I've had a lot of years, a lot of times over the years that we've been in touch with each other at different conferences and other places, but never really had a chance to be here and to work on, sort of as Ian said, reflecting and thinking about Native nation building, as we were way too busy doing it and we were working so hard on a lot of different things that it sort of boggles the mind in a way when you think about the full scope of what that means when you say 'nation building.' The first thing that a lot of tribes think about when they think of nation building is they think of economic development and they think of how does that reflect because they think you need...of course you need money for the projects and things that you do and there are some people who focus on the economic development part to a great extent. And to me, economic development is not nation building. Nation building includes a component that's economic development and you need to think of it in that way. And that's really the way that we thought about it.

As the tribal chairman, I was the one whose picture was in the paper and who got quoted all the time and things of this sort, but there was a large group of dedicated people who were of a common mind or at least common direction -- maybe not always agreeing with each other -- who worked towards trying to develop an effective tribal government and to find ways to strengthen our community. And while we were doing that, one of the important things that we think about in that process is that we had to have...we had to keep ourselves rooted in our culture. We needed to have our ceremonies. When we had a community meeting, we always made sure that we had the community eagle staff there in the carrier and we had a drum, we carried a ceremony, a pipe ceremony at the beginning of the meetings and we did things like this that would help use the best of our heritage to help strengthen what we were doing in a way that it helped bring people together of one mind and it helped add a solemn nature, a serious nature and to help use the gifts that we'd been given in our culture, traditional culture, that would help keep us focused. And we did that, that was a big part of what we would do, and of course as years went by in the development of our constitution, we made sure that we supported freedom of religion, which was that we clearly have within our tribal community we have several different methods of expressing our traditional culture with different lodges, a Bedouin lodge, a Wabeno lodge, the independent people of different sorts that are involved in the tradition, but we also have Catholics and Protestant sects of various sorts and the Native American Church, we have some Muslims, we have some atheists and as you look through this, when the government's there, the government represents all of the people. And so we have to find ways that we can honor and respect everyone at the same time, as making sure that we keep the central identity of our nation through our culture and history, keep that as part of what we were looking at.

So what I wanted to talk to you a little about today was how we went about doing that, some of the things that we think are important and ways that...things that helped me as a leader to think through these things and to keep an idea of what's important. And I'll tell you what often happened in my office. Someone would come in and they'd be running and they'd be saying, ‘Oh, my god, BLANK is happening. What are we going to do about it and how can we take care of this?' And it's just the biggest crisis in the world. Well, the way I would deal with that is I'd say, ‘Take a deep breath,' and I'd say, ‘Well, is anybody going to even care about this next week?' ‘Well, maybe next week.' 'All right, now how about if they're going to care about it in six months?' And we'd try to put it in perspective. If it's an earth-shaking thing that really is going to be big, yeah, but most of those day to day emergencies are distractions. They can get taken care of in a fairly comfortable way.

Being in the legal office, the legal office was often the center of much of this activity. As the tribal chairman at our tribe, my office was in the west wing of our tribal administration building and right next to me was the...the office just in the hallway next to me is the general counsel and the vice chair and executive assistant and other staff. But I regularly worked with the attorneys, the tribal attorneys, and I would regularly consult and talk with them, but I never forgot what one of the elders taught me and that is, ‘We don't work for the attorneys, the attorneys work for us.' And in the legal education that people get, they're going to learn a certain perspective and yet, being a member of the bar and being a member of...an officer of the court and these things, you're going to have, say of a state bar, you'll have a certain perspective on the law and there are certain things that you can ethically advise, but being a tribal leader there may be times when that line of thinking doesn't fit with the exercise of our tribal sovereignty. So I've had occasion where our tribal attorney...we were at a meeting, we were talking, the tribal attorney said, ‘Say this,' and I looked at it and thought about it for a minute and I stood up and I said exactly the opposite and then I sat down and I said, ‘Now make that work.' That's the thing that is important for tribes is to help keep that perspective, understand where the center of their reality is and for us.

There's a story that I tell about a tribe that's not in the too-distant past, had opened a casino and it was a small casino and they didn't have a vault. They had a safe that was in the back room and their one tribal police officer was there and this happened to be in a non-280 state, which is another important factor to think about. But the safe got broken into and the casino manager came in the back room and the tribal chairman was there and their one police officer who was the chief of police, he was there, and they were all looking around they were saying, ‘Ah, what are we going to do?' And the police officer said, ‘Gee, somebody better call the cops.' Where is your center of reality? Where do you think this? And in a tribe, that center is within the tribe's nationhood. That's where it needs to be. And it's in the exercise of the tribe's sovereignty. And often our own staff, sometimes their head isn't there, sometimes our own council members have a hard time with that. They'll say, ‘Gee, will they let us do that?' That's a question that I've heard often when talking about something that the Bureau wants to do or something that somebody else wants us...

And what I have focused on throughout my career and as I've come to understand -- bringing all together teachings from various elders and from other people that I've spoken with over the years and other tribal chairman that I learned from over nearly 20 years in office -- the way I've come to understand it is that you're either sovereign or you aren't. You're not three-quarters sovereign or a little bit sovereign. Somebody can't make you a little bit more sovereign or somebody can't make you a little less sovereign; you either are or you aren't. And as a nation, as a tribal nation, expressing that sovereignty and exercising that sovereignty is really what your task is and functionally every sovereign is negotiating the exercise of their sovereignty with the other sovereigns around them. The United States just signed an arms treaty with Russia. It's an exercise on the limits of their sovereignty with each other, just signed. It's got to go before legislative bodies for approval, but that's an exercise of sovereignty. About three years ago, the Sioux St. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians, the Bay Mills Indian Community, both on the United States side of the St. Mary's River at Sioux St. Marie, Michigan and Sioux St. Marie, Ontario, and the Batchewana First Nation and the Garden River First Nation that are on the Canadian side of that river, the four of them signed a treaty. Now, the United States does not recognize our authority to sign treaties and yet these tribes have signed a treaty called the St. Mary's River Treaty and they formed the Anishinabek Joint Commission to work on cleaning up the river that they live on that has gotten so polluted that at times they have an advisory against touching the water -- not just not drinking it and not just not swimming in it, but touching it. There were people who were getting sick just having a picnic in their yard next to the river and this was the Native people who used to swim, used to drink the water, felt that it was important to work with each other. They signed a treaty with each other to do this. It's an exercise of sovereignty; it's an exercise of how they're going to be working together on things. So I think that this whole concept of dealing with sovereignty is something that people have a hard time getting their heads around often.

So I ask this question: we get interns that would come to the tribe, we have a couple legal interns every year who would come to the tribe to work, and when they came I'd bring them in my office. They'd be introduced to the chairman and I'd say, ‘I've got a question for you and I want you to think about it and come back and answer me next week.' I'd say, ‘When the Supreme Court of the United States issues a ruling that limits tribal sovereignty, I want you to explain to me how that limits our sovereignty.' Of course the answer is, ‘It doesn't limit our sovereignty in any way at all.' We're either sovereign or we aren't sovereign and the Supreme Court cannot take our sovereignty away like that, but the Supreme Court can make it so that the federal government and all of the political subdivisions of it all the way down to the counties and the townships around us that they have a harder time recognizing our sovereignty and they can make it really difficult for us to exercise our sovereignty. And that is the trick, that's the key thing that we have to think about as tribes is how do we and what do we do that protects the exercise of our sovereignty and that in doing so, how does that actually build our nation?

So we thought about a lot of this and one of the things that we did is we worked on lawmaking as a big central focus. One of the first laws we passed was a legislative procedures statute. We passed that because we wanted to lay out the process under which we would develop laws and it required that we...this required a posting period so that we'd have to post them so we couldn't just move into a meeting, put something on the agenda and pass it and 20 minutes later the whole law of the land, of the nation had changed. We needed some transparency, we needed the population of our tribal nation to have access to the process and to have input and so we wanted to slow things down a little bit. So we passed a legislative procedures statute. We passed a resolutions and regulations procedures statute. We did a number of different things that would help lay out how we would function within the confines of a constitution. We had...in doing this, we also realized that it wasn't just enough for us to be exercising our sovereignty in these ways internally, but we also needed to have ways that we dealt externally with those people around us. We had to deal with counties and townships, had to deal with the local sheriffs, we had to deal with the State of Michigan, we dealt with the...our international policy dealt with all of the tribes around us as well as these other governments and we had to find ways to...in which to sort of regulate or set these things up, how we would work. From the early days, we had a constitution that had been recognized. And I guess I should digress a minute here and let you know that our tribe had not been on the list of federally recognized tribes. We spent about 120 years in a legal battle with the United States over trying to figure out our existence. We felt we existed, they weren't so sure about it, and we spent a lot of time dealing with this. And in 1994, after several legislative attempts and other type court cases and other things, Public Law 103-324 was signed by the President and that reaffirmed our tribe's federal relationship. It didn't grant recognition, which would have implied that we never had it, it didn't restore it, which would have implied that maybe we had it and they took it away, but it's a reaffirmation act. It reaffirmed that we'd always had it, which was our position and that's the way the Congress passed that law.

Two tribes, Little Traverse and the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians just about a couple... about three hours south of us down along the Lake Michigan shoreline, we were both on the same bill. And when that bill passed we had an interim constitution in place. It was not really the regular IRA boilerplate constitution, but it was a constitution that had all of the authority in a single body and that the tribal council, the tribal chairman was a member of the council. The tribal chairman voted on everything that came before the council, as well as chaired the meetings, and between meetings, the tribal chairman was the chief executive officer of the tribe and implemented all the actions of the council. As long as you had a good tribal chairman, there wasn't an issue with that, but if you were to not have that or have somebody who wanted to abuse the authority, that's a lot of authority in one place. And there were no real checks and balances. The chairman controlled the gavel during discussions and could either lengthen or shorten discussion on things, could help set the agenda and so it worked pretty well, but the possibility of problems was great.

And when the bill passed, we had the interim constitution and it called for the creation of a new constitution or for us to have a vote on a constitution. We started a committee. It took us nearly 10 years in the development of a constitution when we adopted [it] and I had printed in this little booklet form. The constitution for the tribe was adopted on February 1st, 2005. And this constitution is a separation of powers constitution: it divides the executive, legislative and judicial into separate branches and talks about how they're going to interact with each other. But right up front in the document is something that makes it, I think, is the thing that really makes it more us as our nation. And that is, it directs the government through opening directives, it says that we are to promote our Indian language and our Indian culture at every...every law we pass is supposed to do that. All the ways that we set up programs and everything, we're supposed to be looking at this, at governance through that lens and that says right in the constitution. The other thing it says is that we recognize that our right of self-governance is inherent in a sovereign people and we also recognize that there are other sovereigns and we pledge to recognize them as they recognize us. It's the essence of a state department or a secretary of state or something that is a way of acknowledging the other sovereigns around us in what we do. And the constitution goes on to spell out a lot of other things, how things work, but it's been a really solid document to help us through, help us in our growth. And my personal belief is that it's a good constitution and that it really moves the concept of nationhood ahead in a very positive way.

There's a website at [www.]ltbbodawa-nsn.gov. It's our tribal website and on there we have a thing called the Odawa Register and in that we have, each branch of government has a section and we have all of our tribal code on there. We have our constitution, we have our regulations, we have pending regulations and pending statutes. All of this stuff is posted for us and our tribal citizens and the rest of the world for that matter to look at and to give input on. And the local newspaper has discovered this site and is now readily making use of it in writing articles about the tribe, which some of the tribal citizens are a little upset about thinking, ‘This is our business, why are they writing about it?' but actually, I welcome it because I think that it...what happens to the tribe is so important to what happens to the community around us that reads this paper that it's important for them to be aware of the proceedings of our meetings; the laws that we're considering, what laws we pass and things of that sort. So that's a little about the constitution and sort of how we brought that into being and the fact that we did things within the constitution; we also lay out a territory.

And our territory, just like us, was not on the list of federally acknowledged territories. In other words, if you go...if you look up reservations, you'll find that we do have a reservation, but it's only about 500 of the acres that we own. We own around...between 700 and 800 acres of a 216,000-acre reservation. This is the tip of the lower peninsula of Michigan here, this little map and this is just on the Lake Michigan side. There's a red line right here that outlines our reservation and this is the blow-up of that. If you notice, this is just like a state map. We got a regular map printed to help show our territory and to talk about the things that were important. And we pass these out to the local police and other people, even though it's not on the list of federally recognized reservations, we have asserted that in our constitution and we assert that in our laws and we believe that eventually this will come to pass, that it will be on the list of federally recognized reservations. It came from the Treaty of 1855, this particular boundary. So we printed something that actually shows where our territory is.

Some of the laws that we've passed are important. We have a criminal code, we have an Indian child welfare code, we have a lot of the things that are the everyday sort of meat of what it takes to be the government in Indian Country, the things that we work on, but we also have a lot of other laws that we've done. One of them is we passed corporation codes for the creation of corporations under tribal law and we have our own department of commerce and within that we have the ability under our corporation codes to create tribally chartered corporations that are owned by the tribe, individual tribal members can create corporations under our law, and we can create non-profit corporations under our law and we've done all three so far. And we have a tribal corporation called Waganakising Odawa Development and I'm the president of that board. And that's a tribally owned corporation that was created under our law. We also have a couple of tribal member corporations, one of which is a dessert business, another one is an IT business. These are individual members who have gotten...have functioning businesses under the tribal law. We also have a non-profit corporation under our law that is the Northern Shores Loan Fund. It's a CDFI, community development financial institution, through a program with the Department of Treasury and it's a revolving loan fund to help people be involved in business. And these are things that we've created. It has a 501(c)3 tax exempt status from the IRS and is set up for working to help people with business plans and do things to help them get into businesses. That's one of the laws that we passed. Of course, when you're doing all of that, you need something else -- this is like a jigsaw puzzle. The next thing we needed was we needed the comprehensive commercial codes and what we needed the most was article IX, Secured Transactions. And with that, we've adopted that. We have plans in the future for others, but we needed to have that as we were getting more and more into business and we've adopted that, but then we also did some other things.

We did...it's my belief that we're the first tribe in the country to have a notary public law. Now you don't need notary publics very often, most people go through their lives and need one...maybe once or twice, tribal government maybe needs it a little more often, a few times a month, where you have something...but people think that it's not something that's really...that is every day for people. But if every time you notarize a tribal document you go and do it under the authority of the state that you're within, through a state-licensed notary, somehow that detracts from the assertion of nationhood and the exercise of sovereignty. And so when you have a right to govern yourself, you also have a responsibility to govern yourself and responsibilities are not always easily met. Sometimes they're difficult. And it took several years to develop this notary public law and it got passed. I had a six-month time period within which to implement the law. So we called up an insurance company and said, ‘We're going to need to get insurance,' the surety bonds for notaries. And they said, ‘No problem, we do that all the time.' And I said, ‘Well, it's the tribe calling.' And they said, ‘Oh, no problem. We can do that.' So we didn't worry about that. Then we started trying to get someone to print our stamps and the embossers for us for doing notary. Well, we went to several companies and once they found out it was the tribe doing it, they couldn't do it. And we went...I spent about two or three months looking for companies. And finally we found one who we talked into doing it and they said, ‘Now how many tribes are there?' We said, ‘There's over 500.' He said, ‘You know, maybe we could do this.' And this was one of the smaller companies that does this and I think they're thinking there's a lot of business out there. And so we got that agreed.

So then we went to get the insurance for the people who'd applied, the surety bonds, and even the large Indian companies couldn't do it because all the product that they had was for state-authorized surety bonds for state-authorized notaries. And we spent months trying to figure this out. And finally we...one of our tribal members is married to a woman who's an insurance agent who specializes in hard-to-insure things and she...took her about 17 hours to come up with somebody who thought they could do it. Ironically, it's a company called First American, it's in Boston and it's not Indian, but they have an Indian in headdress as their logo, but this company had...some of the executives had just been to a seminar somewhere and at that seminar they had talked about tribal sovereignty and they got real interested in that. And then a phone call came and gave them an opportunity to work on it. They were real excited about it. And so we worked out over about another two months, worked out all the forms and all the things that were necessary to create this product. And we now have tribal notaries. We have 10 notaries, I believe, at the tribe. And while we were doing this, we didn't just sneak this in under the radar, we had meetings at the governor's office and with the governor and her deputy legal advisor who is the liaison to Indian Country, we told them what we were doing and said, ‘This is what we're doing, it's what we're working on and we're going to have this in place in a few months.' So we didn't just sort of try to blindside anybody with it and we now have this law. How often is it used? I don't know how often it's used, but I can tell you that this kind of work is not the big, sexy exercising tribal sovereignty kind of things where you're going to the Supreme Court and winning a big case or you're off doing the fishing rights or hunting rights or some big thing with this. This is one of those little grunt-level things that happens that just...it's a part of the everyday exercise of sovereignty that's important in nationhood.

Some of the other things that we have, I have some copies of regulations. These regulations have the force of law under our law and these regulations were promulgated by our natural resource commission and they are hunting and fishing regulations in response to a consent decree that we have in a lawsuit U.S. vs. Michigan hunting and fishing rights case that has been an ongoing case for years. The Great Lakes portion had been settled and there's a limited time consent decree. The first one was 15 years, the next one is 20, in how we exercise our rights. In court, we won the fact that the right existed on the Great Lakes. Then there's a...court has continuing jurisdiction through consent decrees on how we're going to exercise those rights. On the inland portion, that hadn't gone to trial and it started to heat up just a little just a few years ago and we decided that...we were on our way to court, we were doing depositions and everything, but we decided for one last round of negotiations to see if we could settle it. Lo and behold, we actually settled it. In the discussions for this major case, it was one of the major rights cases across the country, we anted up in the discussions by agreeing to not put gill nets in inland lakes and streams and we agreed to not commercialize our inland harvest. We weren't going to shoot deer for sale on the market. The state anted up with a stipulation. They agreed to stipulate that our right existed forever and be a permanent consent decree. So we put that stuff on the table and then we started to talk and we talked for a long time. There was 30, 40 of us in a room at a time and the tribes and plus the...we have a very unique animal in this case that's called litigating amicae. They haven't joined the case, but they have this special status and it's the Michigan United Conservation Clubs and Upper Peninsula White Tails and the various sport groups around the state that had an interest in this, and they had this special status in this case. Well, they had representatives in the room as well and we, at any one time during the long negotiation we had, there were times when one or another party was the one that left the room all red faced and in a huff over something and eventually we just kept talking and we gradually worked it through to where in the end, there were certain things that we had given up. Both the state and the tribe had given things up, but we also each won way more than we would have won if this had gone to court. And the problem with court is you have absolutely no idea how it's going to come out. You make your best case, you do your best shot and you don't know for sure what the judge is going to say or what a jury's going to say, and plus you don't know how it's going to go on appeal because almost every one of these cases that goes to court ends up running up to the Supreme Court and frankly, tribes have not actually had a real good experience in the Supreme Court lately.

So those are some of the things that we worked on. We worked on these regulations, we did all this, we passed laws and we worked on the implementation and enforcement of those laws. Another law we passed was a law against patenting, patents. Let's just say this right, I got my tongue tied here. But against patenting genetic material. Now, why would we do that? Because we heard all these...the various stories that have occurred around with Indigenous people and their genes, personally their own genes as well as the genes from our traditional foods. The wild rice case up in Minnesota was one that just really raised our concern because there had been strains domesticated and were being grown in paddies and those genes were drifting off into the wild and when people were selling wild rice somebody was, they started to want a cut of that sale from the wild rice because it had those genes in it from the patented versions. We felt that this was a danger to our traditional foods and so what we did is we passed this law. Now our jurisdiction is fairly small. In many ways in the grand scheme of things it's more of a show of intent and an exercise of sovereignty than it actually has effect because very few people are going to be patenting genetic material, but it also prohibits our government from cooperating in any venture where there will be a patent issued from our territory and our jurisdiction. So those are...that's another way that we went about working on things with our laws.

One of the more interesting laws that we passed -- this came from one of our council members Fred Harrington who...this was very good and it's called the Application of Foreign Law. Now if you've looked at Indian law and you've looked at various issues and you look at how there's a chart that's published by the Department of Justice that has which law and which person and which jurisdiction and all of these things and it's a great big chart on whose, which law applies to whom and what part of Indian Country and who's got...I mean it's really complicated. And there are clearly times when within our own jurisdiction, for us, there are people who aren't under our jurisdiction and yet we have to deal with them. And we've actually been working on a cross-deputization agreement with the local county, but we wanted our officers to be working under our law not just working with the county law or county authority. And so we passed this law that said, 'Anybody who's physically within our jurisdiction who isn't subject to our law has to follow state and federal law, and therefore our officers can enforce that law following our own law. It's a subtle point, but I think it's really important and that is an example of the kind of things that our government has put forth. We're a...I think about the kind of issues as we work toward things and we're taught to consider the consequences of our actions through a time period long enough to encompass seven generations. Now that's something that...I first started talking with people from the office of the governor and they were talking about things and they talked about a long-term plan that was seven years. And I said, ‘Well, you know, we've got something to tell you. Our long-term plan is generational, multi-generational and we're to think about that and to have that long view.' Well, the other part of that is that each one of us is someone's seventh generation. What did they do that got us, for instance, us in this room? What did they do that got us here? What things...where did they move, what did they study, what kind of things...where's our propensity for understanding things, for higher education, what are the things that got us to this room and what are we doing that seven generations from now will be echoing down through the generations for people at that point? So we're sort of in the middle of this continuum.

We talk in Indian Country a lot about balance. And we have balance in the medicine wheel and the four directions and we try to make sure that we maintain ourselves in balance, balance and harmony. And we try to make sure that a substantial amount of what we do restores harmony, restores that balance. Well, we're also in balance between the past and the future and we need to keep a balance there. If we just look...I was out at Sabino Canyon here last...just last weekend and I got to looking at the mountains and it was just...oh, they were incredible and I tripped on a stone in the path. You've got to be looking ahead of you, but at the same time you've got to be looking up. If you just look ahead of you, you miss everything, all you see is a path. And so we have to be careful how we do these things in terms of how we balance our vision. If we just look to the past and all of our answers and our salvation's in our past, we miss what's happening right in front of us as the world's unfolding and if we just look at what's unfolding without any comprehension of where we've been, we also miss the richness of our own sense of place within that past and future, within the four directions, within our, the growth in our communities and all of those things. So it's very important to have this vision and what I look at is in a vision is that what...the vision for tribes is to be a healthy community with healthy individuals and have healthy institutions and to be at peace and to be at harmony and that's the goal, that's the center, that's where we try to go to and that all of these documents, all of these things I've talked about, the regulations, the constitution, the maps and all these things, these are all tools to help us achieve that, but by themselves they don't achieve it. We have to balance ourselves between these different things that have a tendency to pull us and distract us in different ways.

I've had sort of a general talk here about things and I had one other document I didn't hold up and that's a U.S. Constitution. As a tribal chairman, I virtually always carried one of these because too few people who are in Congress and in other places in government, they've never read it looking at it through, ‘What does this mean to an Indian? What does it mean to the Indian nations?' The Commerce Clause, Article VIII, things that are really fairly, that are fundamental to the U.S. federal Indian law and how it relates to tribes and that relationship. Very few people actually understand that, even ones who you would think would need to. So I carried one of these, I carried our tribal constitution, I carried maps with me, all of these are things that help outwardly show people what it is. When I handed somebody one of these, what did it say to them? It says we're a constitutional government, and that means a lot in terms of people understanding things. So I'll be glad to take questions and discussion here and I'll do my best at what I can answer."

Audience member:

"Do you have any provisions under your corporate codes that allow you to take trust, to take land into trust under a corporate status for the tribe?"

Frank Ettawageshik:

"No, not specifically. We talk about taking land into trust through the constitution and that...we don't take it into trust, but we put land in trust. But we have never...we don't have something that allows the tribe to hold things in trust and that's something that we don't have in there. There's been a lot of talk about land and land reform in Indian Country. The fact...one of our big problems in growth is the lack of inter-generational transfer of wealth, which most often is done through property in non-Indian society and that's something that is a big problem in Indian Country. We're missing that step because we don't have a private sector economy for the most part in Indian Country, but there's a lot of talk about how we might look at that and change that. I talked a lot with a number of individuals over the years and the Indian Land Tenure Foundation has done some work in this regard. I know there's a lot of people thinking about it. Maybe that's something that the folks in this room might work on some day and help us resolve."

Audience Member:

"If you're a federally recognized reservation, are you subject to the Major Crimes Act?"

Frank Ettawageshik:

"Well, our 216,000 acres is not acknowledged as a reservation, but our trust land, which is the smaller ones, are acknowledged as that. So we are subject to the Major Crimes Act when it comes to that, when it comes to the casino, the tribal administration building, tribal housing, the various parcels. We're buying our reservation back one little piece at a time as we work on things, but we are subject to Major Crimes and so...but we have something unique also in our district in that the U.S. Attorney has developed a misdemeanor docket for non-Indian offenders on trust land and this is throughout the whole western district of Michigan, which includes a lot of tribes and our casinos and so we...someone commits a crime that wouldn't have risen to the level of federal prosecution, but it's clearly a crime, urinating in the parking lot for instance at the casino, which is something that people bring up, but all kinds of different things that fall into this. We now have a way to write them a ticket that they can pay a fine through this, as opposed to having to go and appear in federal court for these, if they choose. If they want to fight it, they've got to drive three-and-a-half hours to the closest federal court and go to court. So we have...this is sort of a...not every area has this and our U.S. attorney who is one of the ones that was fired, by the way, of that group that was fired, Margaret Chiara, she really worked hard to put this together. Other questions?"

Audience member:

"You talked about when you tried to develop the notary public and you talked to the governor and they seemed to be pretty receptive to that, but can you talk about some of the strategies you and your government went into when you came up against factions or individuals in state or local government that seemed to be opposed to y'all expanding sovereignty or exercising that sovereignty?"

Frank Ettawageshik:

"We've done some real interesting intergovernmental relations over the years in Michigan, one of which is under the previous governor. This current governor is nearing the end; she's in her last year of two four-year terms. And actually -- Jennifer Granholm's the governor -- she's on that short list of people that is being looked at as a potential Supreme Court Justice, but she's...yeah, which reminds me. I've got a letter here from the Native American Bar Association that was written to the President, this is a copy of it, informing him about the lack of Native people in the federal court system as court clerks in the Supreme Court or as Supreme Court justices and it's very well written and hopefully it will be well received, but I thought it would be good since I was coming here today to pass that out. But some of the things we did is we passed a tribal-state accord with the governor. All the tribes in the state signed this along with the governor and it acknowledged the sovereignty of the tribes pledged to work together and pledged to create a tribal-state forum, which was a monthly staff level phone call at which things could be worked out so that any issue...It's basically a safety valve in case there are any issues.

So anyway, that's the first thing that we did. And then, through those monthly calls, we were able to head off a lot of issues like the ones you're talking about. Probably one of the big issues was that we had game wardens in the state who really didn't like the fact that Indians had ‘special' rights. And so any time they could, they would push the envelope. Well, we'd reached an agreement with the governor's office and through the director for the [Michigan] Department of Natural Resources that, while we were working on the U.S. v. Michigan case, it was a government-to-government issue and they weren't going to pop individuals who were hunting with proper licenses from the tribes. So I got a call. A 14-year-old hunting deer for the first time with his dad got his first deer and the game warden took the deer, took his rifle and they were all upset. Well, I had a phone number. I called it and it was the phone number of the liaison to Indian Country that was through the Department of Natural Resources. He was on his deer blind in his mom's back 40 up in the Upper Peninsula and I called him. I said, ‘Jim, this is what just happened. We've got a problem.' Jim said, ‘Okay, just a sec.' And he got off the phone and he made a couple phone calls and he called me back and said, ‘Don't worry, it's all taken care of.' The guy got his deer back; he got his rifle back. It took a couple days, but they had gutted the deer and they kept it refrigerated, they'd done all the things that they needed to, but we were able to deal with things like that and we built these safety valves in.

There's a liaison to Indian Country in every single department in the state. The list is published, these phone numbers are available to people on the state website. If you go to Michigan.gov and you go to the governments, there's a bunch of different things there, but go to governments and on the state government page there's a link to tribal governments. And as the page opens up, there's a link to all the tribal websites and all of the agreements that we have done with the state are on there, which includes the Tribal-State Accord, a water accord on how we're going to mete [out] unshared water resources, an economic development accord and addendum to the initial economic development accord that was done the next year. Each of these are the results of a summit meeting with the governor that happens annually where we all get together. And as usual in summit meetings, we don't actually do the work at the summit meeting. It's done all year and the summit meeting is, we're all together, the chairman and the governor sign the document and there's photographers and we share pens and all this stuff. It's a photo op and it ices the cake, but the cake's already baked, is basically what we're talking about here. But all of these agreements are there including the most recent one, which is an accord on climate change issues that we signed nearly a year ago now. And this one, they create meetings like with the...the water accord created a meeting that happens twice a year with the tribal...at the staff level between the tribe and the state on how to deal with shared water issues. And we are meeting at the end of this month with the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, as furtherance of the economic development accord that we passed. We've had the director come to speak to the United Tribes of Michigan meetings. We have a variety of things where we're working together and we've just tried to establish how do we do this. And what happens when we have people that don't agree, we try to make a political climate in which it is more difficult to disagree than it is to sit back because they're there still...but they're not the ones that are leading the discussion. And we also do our very best to convert them to the fact that...I say to, and unfortunately, I don't know if anybody here's from Ohio, but I pick on Ohio quite a bit. I say, ‘Poor, Ohio. Every time they have to do anything environmentally and stuff, they've got to go to the EPA all by themselves.' Michigan has 12 federally recognized tribes, so 13 of us go to EPA together to work on the issues. And the tribes have access to resources that the state doesn't and vice versa. Together we can really get a lot of stuff done.

And so actually, this idea has not only taken root within the people that we deal with in our communities, but they actually come to us now. We had a local governmental entity come to us and inquire about us putting a piece of land in trust because they wanted to do something with the land that they couldn't do under their law, but they thought maybe we could. We couldn't do it either, but nevertheless it was such an amazing turn about that I was blown over by that. But those are some interesting things in the working relationship with other governments around us. Other questions?"

Raymond Austin:

"Could you talk a little bit about you as a customary law, customs, traditions and tribal government operations not necessarily in court decision making, but the overall structure of the government itself? That's one. And two, can you say something about attorneys working with Indian tribes? What are their responsibilities, duties and all that to not only the tribal council, but the chairman, the president or whoever and what their roles would be? Sometimes you have general counsels that are overbearing, they come up with policies or they draft laws on their own and then they give it to the tribal council. The tribal council merely rubber-stamps those things, that type of thing. How should attorneys work with tribes in your view?"

Frank Ettawageshik:

"Well, let me answer that last, second question first in that I reiterate what I said initially, is that the attorneys work for us, we don't work for them. And that's a difficult thing for some people to think through, but the other one is that we have to when we're passing laws and you're thinking about sovereignty, the attorneys may be the drafters, but they're not the ones...they make the draft or they find the words to make happen what their bosses, the legislators have said. ‘We want it to say this.' They might not be able to find the right words to say it, but then the attorney's job is to help draft it so it says that. And as you said, there are...we worry about activist judges. Well, there are activist attorneys as well who really work hard at trying to get certain points of view across and at times there are a number of things that you get a tribal council of lay people who sort of get awed by the attorney and say, ‘Well, the attorney said this. It must be true.' Well, attorneys are trained to argue either for or against a particular point and they may or may not believe that point, but the job is to do the best you can with what you've got to win the case whether you agree with it or not. I used to be a debater in high school and we debated on the affirmative for the first half of the year and then we'd switch and we'd be the negative and we'd switch that in the middle of the year because we'd heard all the good arguments from the other side and now we could argue that side pretty well. I learned that.

That's the problem we have a lot of places is we don't, people aren't...what they really don't understand, and this is the thing I think that happens a lot for the tribes is that the elected officials and perhaps the citizenry don't have a really good understanding of how their government works. And one of the projects I've been working on here is developing a good strong outline for civics education for tribes, sort of a subheading of ‘How to Get the Most out of Your Elected Officials,' some way to help people understand what the roles are so that they know better what their powers are and how they can be expected to act. And I think that in the absence of people knowing that, it leaves room for attorneys to actually take those actions as you described and I've seen it happen some places. I've had...I don't, as you might hear or suspect, I really have not had that problem because I wouldn't tolerate it. I knew what we needed, I knew what I would want and I would argue quite strongly for it without letting someone just write something that we rubber stamped. I was sort of dealing with the second question first, but I've forgotten the first one."

Raymond Austin:

"Culture in governance?"

Frank Ettawageshik:

"Oh okay, yes. To me, one of the ways that I deal with culture and how it relates to governance is I've worn a ribbon shirt almost every day of my adult life. I've worn a ribbon shirt when I was the only one and out of a thousand people in the room that was wearing a ribbon shirt. When I mow my lawn, I wear an old ribbon shirt because I've got to wear them out. And the thing is that I've always tried to make sure that I let people know that I was Native and that I was proud of it and that this was an important part of the things that we did. When we meet with the governor, the State of Michigan does not allow prayers before their meetings, but every single meeting that they have with Indian people starts with a prayer. They concede to us to do an opening prayer and we do that because we feel that that's an important part of us all being in the room, we need to come together as a mind. We feed people. This is part of our culture. You get a bunch of us together, we always eat. Well, we make sure that if the state or the other agencies, these people love to come visit us and have the meeting because we feed them. When we go to there, they're so embarrassed that they'll personally go out and buy some donuts and coffee just so they'll have something because the state will not spring for any of those, any refreshments or anything at their meetings. And so we make sure that they understand these elements of our culture and understand these elements of protocol.

I think it's important to sort of let people understand that we try not to make rash decisions, we try not to jump into things real quickly, and it's impolite actually to do so. It sort of implies that we're not actually giving careful consideration to the thoughts of the other side. So sometimes it takes a longer time in dealing with us and we've done some trying to understand that culture, understand how we bring that into our governance. I mentioned that we start our meetings, our community meetings with the drum, with songs, with the eagle staff being brought in, with our tribal flags, with the pipe ceremony and that this is something that we do in those big community meetings. But we also, when I was the chairman, I carried my personal bundle with me into the room even though I didn't open it in the council meeting [on] a regular basis, but I had it with me because to me it was sort of something that helped root me where we were.

We have an opening at the meetings for a smudge. We try to do everything that we can in our, within our community to...let's look at this way: in the architecture of our tribal administration building, we incorporated our culture. And in doing so, what it is, you walk in...even though the driveway comes in from the south and at most big buildings you'd turn the building so that it would face the driveway, we faced the building east because that for us is the direction we need to face with the building. And, there's a big octagon center that's got a big vaulted ceiling in it. And in the center of that is a circular area that has a fire pit in the center that's right on the earth. The architect said, ‘Oh, we'll just build some concrete, we'll fill it with sand.' We said, ‘No, we won't. We're going to have undisturbed earth right there where we can build a fire and that's going to be the center of this building.' And there are no offices in this big center building. It's open. We have a kitchen, we have a receptionist and we have a little meeting room and bathrooms and other facilities and things, but this is a commons area in which we meet, it's the center of the people, it's ceremonial and then off the north facet we have a two-story office building in which there are our tribal police, our environmental services laboratory and offices, the computer lab and the education department, the archives and records and the accounting department and the tribal administrator. All these are in this north wing. In the south wing is the tribal, first of all, the tribal council and tribal court chambers, we share it. And then all the court offices and the probation officer and all that are in that south wing. The west wing of the building built on the west facet of this octagon is on the south side of the building are all the executive offices for our government. The north side are all the legislative offices. And this building, as you walk in it, it's an education in the way our government functions and it's an education in our traditions in that around that fire pit we have tile in the floor that are the four colors for the four directions.

We've had meetings in there where we had a gathering of the eagle staffs from throughout the Great Lakes Basin and there were 17 staffs and 21 pipe bundles that were all in there in that circle as part of the ceremony. We've had the Attorney General of the United States come in and we had a meeting where we hosted him in Indian Country in Michigan. We've had the Governor's Interstate Indian Conference with all the different state governors and their staff of places where they have tribes in their states, they have this organization that they meet, they came and met. We've had the Kiwanis and the Rotary that come and meet from the community in this place, but this building itself lets them understand elements of our culture. Every time they see it, we get a chance to explain it and every time a staff member walks from one wing to the other, they come to the heart of the community on their way through. Other thoughts?"

Stephen Cornell:

"I was just wondering how these assertions of nationhood and of sovereignty have been received at the sort of level of local publics. You're in an area of the country where there at times have been a great deal of tension between local constituencies and you've mentioned the state, but I was wondering what have these, how have these been received by local people, including the people, you're in an area of mixed population. I'm just wondering what impact this has had in your relations?"

Frank Ettawageshik:

"Well, we're in an area where there -- within my lifetime -- there were signs ‘No Indians' in some of the bars and there were places that we really couldn't go. Nobody would have thought that they were being discriminatory, but we certainly have lived within this knowing that there were things that they couldn't do. Early in my tenure, an Indian student came to the school in Petoskey drunk and they pulled all the Indian kids out of class and breathalyzed all of them. So a couple of people and I went into the school to the superintendent and said, ‘Listen, either you and us are going to get to know each other really well as we go to the Supreme Court and we sue you and seize all of your assets or you're never going to do this again,' and they've never done it again. They straightened out and they realized they shouldn't. So we managed to go through that, but we have had those certain kinds of tension.

One of the initial parts of tension in this is I got...early on in our, after the reaffirmation bill was signed in 1994, I'd say about '95, maybe '96 or so, I got a letter from a local prosecutor who said, ‘Dear Frank, this is to inform you that your police officers are impersonating police officers. It's illegal for them to be on the road with lights and with emblems on their car. It's illegal for them to...' Most importantly, he said, ‘It was illegal for them to have the chip in the radio that allowed them to pick up police frequencies.' And so he said, ‘You have 10 days to deliver those to me.' So I wrote him back a letter, ‘Dear Bob, you know where those cars are and you're welcome to come get those chips anytime you want, just be prepared for a visit from the U.S. Attorney as soon as you're done.' And so he called the U.S. Attorney and within several months actually, he had signed off on a limited deputization with our officers, but before long we actually had a full cross-deputization [agreement] where the sheriff and the deputies from two different counties had came before me in our tribal courtroom and took an oath to uphold the tribal constitution and all of our laws, and our officers were sworn in as deputies with the county so that we had seamless law enforcement. So that's one way that things have happened.

We gave people the map and we've showed them the constitution and a lot of them didn't realize that we were a constitutional government. And there are tensions, but we've also done some tremendous things. One of the things that we did that...we are either the only tribe or one of just two or three that got the ‘The Great Read,' ‘The Big Read.' There's a program through the Humanities Councils and the Arts, I forget. It's through the...it was some agency through the National Endowment for the Arts on 'The Big Read' and we got a grant for it. Some of the other recipients were like Maryland Public Radio got one of the grants and things like that. Well, our tribe got one and we worked with the Great Lakes, the Little Traverse Symphony, we worked with the library in town, the college and various other people and we put together this thing where we all read To Kill A Mockingbird. And we had programs throughout every place and the tribe was the lead agency on this working with the others in terms of comparing what our situation was with the situation in To Kill A Mockingbird and the story from that. And these are the kind of things that we've done with the other agencies in town to help people understand where we're at; it helps to get rid of a lot of the tension. And those are things that we've done both in big and small ways that have tried to deal with that tension. It still exists and we have individuals who would be a great detriment to us if they were the one in charge, but nevertheless this thing works quite well. I think my time has arisen; actually the timekeeper has risen from his seat. And so with that I want to thank you all for the opportunity to speak with you today."

Honoring Nations: Miriam Jorgensen: Lessons to Take Home

Producer
Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development
Year

NNI Research Director Miriam Jorgensen concludes the 2004 Honoring Nations symposium with her impressions about the lessons learned from the convening, from the great diversity among Native nations to the great strides they are taking when they devise their own solutions to the challenges they face.

Native Nations
Resource Type
Citation

Jorgensen, Miriam. "Lessons to Take Home." Honoring Nations symposium. Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. Cambridge, Massachusetts. September 10, 2004. Presentation.

"I just want to say thank you to the previous speaker because he really...it's Rick George? I'm sorry, I was busily writing down all your notes and the name was like the thing up ahead. You just did a fantastic job of making a lot of the same kinds of summary points that I'd like to make. Even though you were thinking ahead to the future about how to continue on the success of programs, I just hope that everyone was really taking to heart a lot of the things that he was talking about, because they really scored deeply in my mind as things that were very important. So in a sense, I kind of feel like I'm kind of adding to your list or underscoring some of the same things that you were saying. I was asked to draw together some lessons that we've heard at this symposium and also to offer some more reflections, just to try to put a tie up on things.

And I think we all have probably some different ideas about what we've learned, the thing that we're walking away with that touched us the most, but I just wanted to start off with this observation. Boy, tribes are solving really tough problems, aren't they? These are not sort of little easy things that your programs are addressing, not little administrative fixes, not little 'let's take this small program and do this little change and things are going to be done.' You're addressing problems that are as big as the rights of Native people incarcerated in local, state and federal prison; preserving the rights of American Indians and Native nations to have the say over how remains are appropriately treated and reburied; the right to control land and water and other natural resources in ways that make sense. The programs that address really tough problems like children's safety, family violence, and problems that are very overarching, but hit at the core of what Native sovereignty means, like control over whether or not you get to run your own law enforcement department, because what more fundamental right is there in tribal government than to be the one that controls, who wields coercive force within your society? Should that be the federal government? No. And tribes are...and we've honored a program, the Gila River Police Department that took that on, that task. So these are tough problems.

And that leads me to one of the big lessons that I think comes out of what we've learned today: that in addressing these tough problems, there's clearly a lot that we can learn from each other. There are ways to figure out the way through the administrative maze of working with state departments or with the federal government or even going up to the international level when that's necessary. Things we can learn from each other about those administrative fixes or about particular strategies that apply sometimes across programs of different sorts, or when we have programs that are very similar to each other, there are definitely things to learn from each other. But there's also a sort of a parentheses at the end of that, and that's the notion that if you look around this room there's also tremendous diversity. And I think that's kind of the notion of saying, 'Yeah, we can learn a lot from each other, but sometimes what we learn from each other is how different we still are.'

I think there's this thing...and I do a lot of teaching about Native America to non-Natives and of course others have said this before, that one of the things that's the first reaction is, ‘Oh, my gosh! You mean there are still a lot of Native people in the United States?' And after that they say, ‘And of course they're all the same, right?' And you look around this room and say, ‘No, we're not.' We come from very different cultural traditions. We come from very different practices, very different histories. Some tribes have the Trail of Tears, others had no removal; some had no major battles, some had lots, some have a very modern history of struggle and fight. There's just a lot of differences out there, and I think in learning from each other about our programs, it's also acknowledging that difference and saying, ‘You do it that way and that's helping me understand how our way is different and we need to be different as well.' So I think there's lessons in difference as well, as much as there is to learn from similarities and things we can do the same.

One of the other big points that I walk away with -- and all of you who have been close to the Harvard Project for years or just learning about the Harvard Project may think that this is just one of the things that we trumpet all the time, but in hearing conferences and symposia like this, I think that we're getting it right: that you can't ever abandon this notion that tribal sovereignty, the sovereignty of Native nations and the issues of self-determination and self-governance just stand above all in a lot of these programs. And you can just hear it in the strains of how important that is in the way the programs are implemented and the actions that the leaders are taking to make those programs work.

But I think another...and a reflection and something I've heard in listening to the breakouts and listening to the speakers is that the notion that that battle for sovereignty just never ends. And I think it was somebody yesterday who talked about being wary of complacency, that you may feel like you've gotten to a point where things are successful or that battle is won, but I'm reflecting on something that the gentleman Edward [Wemytewa], whose last name I'm not going to pronounce correctly, who's the Zuni Eagle Sanctuary representative said to us, ‘You know, we have to fight that battle all the time because the personnel change and sometimes memories are short. Even our own memories change and we have to keep at the forefront what our battle is for -- it's for our rights and our sovereignty,' and that's just something that keeps going as a lesson throughout as well.

Sort of a sub-piece of that, and this again is to tie into what Rick George said, is that one of the very important pieces, and kind of picking up on what, you know, the reactions I heard to Myron's [Brown] talk yesterday and some of the things that Greg Mendoza said this morning, is that one of the ways to keep fighting that battle is to really train the youth, be they on-reservation youth, off-reservation youth, folks who are really engaged or folks who are not yet engaged, is to teach them about tribal government, about the rights of American Indian people, and to have them be ready to hold that banner forward as well.

The next point -- and this is just a quick one because it's already been covered well by Mr. George -- this is the one where I was thinking, ‘Hey, this is exactly what I was going to say,' is the notion of leadership. Julie Wilson talked about this this morning a little bit, how she said there's leadership in every place. She said that was what struck her, somebody coming from the outside, looking at Indian Country, not thinking about it very much before, is how the leadership of the Honoring Nations programs emerged from lots of different places. When we think about the safety program that the Mississippi Choctaw have put together, one of the things there is that this emerged from just activists, community activists. It's the same with a program we honored several years ago, the White Earth suicide intervention program. These are not people who are already engaged in tribal government, but activists that bubbled up from within the community. Other times it's a tribal bureaucrat who says things can operate differently or somebody like Greg who was out of government, just a youth who said, ‘We need to change the system.' So leadership is everywhere and honoring that, reacting to it, providing a means for them to move forward is just an important piece too.

The last thing I want to say, and if anything this is the thing that I felt this symposium did really well and that Amy [Besaw Medford] really needs to be honored for and those who really worked with her on that, is that one of our goals in all of this is to create an environment where we can learn from each other and I think that happened. I think that this has been a place where, and I'm going to use a really sort of Harvard Business School kind of word I guess, the 'network' word, but I think we've done more than network. I think what we've done is expanded our circle of friends. Manley Begay earlier in the day was saying to me, I said, 'how do you like those sessions, Manley?' And maybe I'm telling tales out of school, but he said, ‘I've just been having trouble getting to the sessions, Miriam, because I've just been talking to so many really interesting people about great programs and learning a lot about them and expanding our teaching skills and thinking about stuff that we ought to be looking into and making more friends and renewing old friendships.' And I said, ‘Manley, I know what you mean.' And I walked away from that and I kept looking around going people are really engaging with each other. If they didn't know each other before, they're introducing themselves to each other, they're renewing old friendships and they're even getting together with their group that they came with and said, ‘Oh, I just talked to so and so and I learned about this.' That is great. That's what we wanted to do. And that, I think, is more than networking because networking to me kind of implies I'm going to get out my pack of business cards and I'm going to hand it out to people because I'm going to say to them, ‘What are you going to do for me? Are you going to get me a job? Are you going to get me a connection?' But this is networking among friends. It's expanding that circle of friends so that when we walk out of here we know lots of people who do very interesting things that can help us and the tribal communities that you work with certainly, but there are also support systems and colleagues and people to share joys with -- people who care about us personally, about our professional careers, and about the Native nations that you serve. And I think to that extent this symposium has been very successful and helpful and something that I'll definitely remember.

So those are the lessons and reflections that I offer and I just want to send you off with that spirit of positiveness and hope that you've gotten that joy out of this symposium like I have."

Honoring Nations: Myron Brown: Akimel O'odham/Pee-Posh Youth Council

Producer
Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development
Year

Former President Myron Brown discusses how the Akimel O'odham/Pee-Posh Youth Council is an example of building a great program in a political setting, and shares how Gila River youth are having their political voice heard through this innovative leadership development mechanism.

People
Resource Type
Citation

Brown, Myron. "Akimel O'odham/Pee-Posh Youth Council." Honoring Nations symposium. Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. Cambridge, Massachusetts. September 10, 2004. Presentation.

"'Building Great Programs in a Political Setting' is what I would like to present to you today. Youth have always have had the disadvantage of being both young and inexperienced in getting both their voice and needs recognized and heard. To engage in this type of dialogue at the tribal level [can be frustrating]. What has developed over the past 16 years is a series of interlocking programs and activities. These have provided the youth with a series of long and hard engagement within the world. This engagement has allowed the youth of Gila River to both understand and appreciate the efforts of working in a political setting. The following is a brief summary of the programs and the activities provided to 'Building Great Programs in a Political Setting,' and this program gives a basis by which to operationalize the following activities for hands-on engagement of active participants in the political setting.

One of our main programs that the Gila River Youth Council hosts every year is the Gila River Close Up Program, which started in 1998. This annual event explores the rights and responsibilities of tribal members' involvement in American and tribal government. The Gila River Close Up is an educational and leadership project for high school community youth to promote participation in government process. Now, with this program we usually...it's an intense two-day gathering within the...we invite, I think, 50 students from the community to participate in this program. And we host it. It's at a hotel; it's a two-day gathering. And that, within those two days the kids learn about our tribal government, the three branches of our government: legislative, judicial, executive. What we recently found out through Andrew Lee is that this is actually, the Close Up Program, Gila River is the very first, the Youth Council is the very first to focus a Close Up program on the tribal government and not on the state government. So that's one good thing, because our children, our kids in the community know a lot about the state government, the federal government and how it works, but they're not too familiar with the tribal government. It's a whole different thing, how our tribal government works. And then so...and during this two-day gathering, we invite a speaker from the state or the federal government. Speakers include Representative Cheryl Chase, Pete Rios, just like our tribal government, like our tribal leaders, people like that, people who influence our community. And within the two-day gathering, they get to travel to the courts and they have a mock trial. And so it's really interesting and the kids get to learn a lot about the community and the government.

Another program that we have is the Gila River Kids Voting Program, which the Gila River Kids Voting Project features specially designed curricular for grades K-12, and culminates with the community youth accompanying parents to the voting place on Tribal Election Day to cast their ballot in simulated election. The purpose is to instill lifelong habits in youth and boost voter turnout among future adults. Now, another thing is since this is a critical time, the Tribal Election is coming, the state election is here, the federal election is here, and so we're getting ready for the general election. And with that the kids get to vote. They get to vote for the president, they get to vote for state representatives, and it's simulated. And so the gig is they have to bring their parents along with them so they can vote, which is a cool thing because the kids want to vote. The kids, 'I want to vote.' And so the thing is they have to bring their parents with them. And our Tribal Election Department credits the kids voting for bringing a seven-percent increase in voter turnout in our community. And with that we have seven tribal schools, and so the youth population in the Gila River Community, the population in the community is almost 20,000, and the youth make up over 50 percent of that. So we're also the first tribe of the nation to have kids voting at a tribal, state and national election level. And so with that, the 2005 election is coming up, and so we're getting ready for that. And that's really a good thing. So we're just getting really ready for this election, the kids are excited. I actually work the voting polls, and this past primary election our state had, kids started coming and showing up. And the kids voting...it's not until the general election that the kids voting starts. And so kids were like, 'Can I vote?' I'm like, 'Aw. Yes, you can vote in the general, but please remember, bring your Mommy and Daddy, you know.' And so that's another influential program that the Youth Council offers.

Another, our next program, as you've seen in the video, a lot of that was with our Gila River Youth Conference. The Gila River Youth Conference is held annually for community youth and draws an average of 500 youth. An intense two-day gathering of addressing the issues rose during the year with regards to input from tribal leaders and recommendation to tribal leaders. During this time, changes to policies and procedures may be raised, new officers may be elected, and the direction of the council may be set for the upcoming year. This activity promotes youth leadership and communication while building confidence and self-esteem. Over this past summer, we just had our, we just celebrated our 16th Annual Youth Conference, and it was at our brand-new Sheraton Wild Horse Pass Resort. And so the focus for this year, we thought it best, we focused on diabetes seeing as though Gila River Indian Community is rated number one in the nation for high diabetes. And so the Youth Council thought, 'Well, let's do our conference on, you know, health,' which was, and we got a great turnout this year. We invited our hospitals, we invited our community leaders, we had a health panel, and the hospital did a, what do you call it, it was like a fair, like a hospital fair, you know, they had the X-ray department, they had the dental department. A lot of the kids who want to be, you know, maybe kids who want to be future dentists or doctors, you know, a lot of kids liked the booths. And so that was really good. There was a really good turnout in the workshops that we had, workshops such as, you know, dealing with health issues. Most of the workshops we had were, had to do with health. And so it ended. And well, we got a good turnout. Some have even called it the best youth conference ever. So I was really excited with the youth conference.

And not only with the youth conference do we talk about future issues, it's also whenever we elect new officers for the Youth Council. And with that, on one of the days we send all the youth to, our community is composed of seven districts, almost like political districts. And so the youth from their respective districts would go into these separate rooms, district one through seven. And then so we'd have the leaders...like I'm District One, so I would lead the room. And since my term will be ending, you know, you'd address the youth, any of the youth who want to participate in the Youth Council, they'd nominate themselves or declare themselves candidates. And so with that they go through a process, they go through a caucus, they go through speeches, and then they go through the vote. And it's the youth of the community that vote them in the office. It's the youth of our community that vote us into office. And so, and then the results come back within the last day. We usually have dances every night for the young people and the results come in the last day, 'So and so, you're declared our District One candidate.' So that's how we develop our Youth Council, is through our youth conferences.

And closing with my presentation, as a result of the Honoring Nations 2002 study, these are the lessons that they concluded with: statements about the importance of tribal youth should be backed by concrete investments in their development. For example, tribal leaders can facilitate the establishment of youth councils, host, fund and participate in youth activities and events, and encourage you to participate in national organizations. These and other investments inspire youth to make a positive difference in the community and build up the pool for future leaders. With appropriate training and organizational support, youth can make meaningful contributions to tribal government, they can offer input into the issues affecting their peers, provide guidance and feedback in policy formation, and serve as effective spokespeople for the tribe. Like tribal governments, tribal youth councils require good organization, by-laws, staggered terms, a code of ethics, election rules, and clear processes for decision-making are institutional ingredients for success. So with that, that is the conclusion of my presentation. I'm open to any questions, you know, later on. So if you guys see me just holler or something."

Amy Besaw Medford:

"Does anybody have any questions right now? I can pass the microphone around."

Audience member:

"Are you open to invitations from anybody like us? We would like you, representatives of the Youth Council to come to our community to visit us."

Myron Brown:

"Can you say that again, please?"

Audience member:

"Are you open to invitations from communities all around the country? Like we would like one or two of your representatives to come and talk to our youth in our schools."

Myron Brown:

"Exactly. We're open to anything like that. Did I hear it right or what? I hope so. I think. I hope I heard what you said. But we get a lot of invitations from different youth around the country, youth who want to form organizations just like our Youth Council. Everywhere we go, you know, we always meet new people, and they're always fascinated by our program and they want to form something like this in their community. And so just get in contact with us. I have a business card if you've like more information about our youth council and how it got started. So, yeah."

Amy Besaw Medford:

"Does anybody have any questions for Chairman Pico or for Professor Mary Jo Bane or Myron Brown?

Audience member:

"I have a question for the speaker. Are things changing? You said traditionally, elders...oh, I'm sorry. I was talking to the Youth Council person. I'm embarrassed. OK, let me start over. I'm sorry. What I was going to ask is are things changing at Gila River? Are the elders now making a place for the youth? I mean it sounds like you've carved out your own."

Myron Brown:

"Yeah."

Audience member:

"But are they now looking to you for answers to some of the pressing issues there?"

Myron Brown:

"Well, we're always involved with our elderly nowadays. I mean we invite them to our youth conferences. This past youth conference, a lot of elderly came. They had so much fun. They danced with, sometimes they will dance with us, we'd have a good time with them. So to answer your question, yeah, we're involved with our elderly now. They have opened up a lot. They have pretty much adapted to our Youth Council, and so we're very thankful and we look up them, and so if that answers your question."

Audience member:

"It's more of a comment than a question. After today's presentation, I began to reflect a little bit about what's happening at Lummi. We have the Lummi Cedar Project, which is a youth initiative. We have a youth leadership program in place where they're looking at starting to serve as voting members on our nine commissions that we have in advisory capacities to the council. And after hearing the presentation today, I can tell you there's a national movement and is not limited to just Indian Country. I wanted to close my comment out with saying that I have every bit of confidence that Indian Country is going to be in good hands."

Myron Brown:

"Thank you."

Amy Besaw Medford:

"One more."

Audience member:

"I also, just to applaud the amazing things you're doing with the new community, and sort of to follow-up on the, I guess the question about the elders is the next question is, is within the tribal governance and leadership, is it the intention to be able to also have a voice there, or do you have a voice?"

Myron Brown:

"We do have a voice there. It's a formal voice. The Tribal Council is always asking us questions. They always want our input, which is a good thing because it never used to happen before 1987. It never was like that. Like Greg [Mendoza] and his friends, it was never like that. That's why we formed the Youth Council. Now that we're formally recognized as a youth council, the Tribal Council now make some kind of recommendations. Like an example, the Cardinals stadium that was coming into our community, it was a big issue for our community. And so the Tribal Council said, 'Well, why don't you guys ask our youth about it, ask our youth how they feel. What do they think about this big thing coming into our community? So the head from the Cardinals actually came to our youth council, made a presentation, and was giving out freebies trying to really, you know, trying to really go for that 'yes' vote. And of course, giving out footballs and all the good stuff. And so, yeah, I mean it's a good thing. The Tribal Council has always...we have a voice there. We also present matters to the Tribal Council. Like at our youth conference, we go into like unity circles and we basically develop problems. It's usually something, since our last conference was about health we talked about issues in health, why is everybody diabetic? Kids post some really good questions, and so at the end of the conference those questions are then tabulated into a report and it goes before Tribal Council. And they get to see what we talk about, and maybe changes can happen from there. So those are just some of the good things that the Tribal Council has done for us. And it's a bonding thing, we're all one."

Honoring Nations: Gregory Mendoza: Akimel O'odham/Pee-Posh Youth Council

Year

Gila River Indian Community Governor Gregory Mendoza, formerly the director of the Akimel O'odham/Pee-Posh Youth Council, provides a history of this trend-setting example of innovative governance and discusses the many different ways that it strengthens the Gila River Indian Community.

Resource Type
Citation

Mendoza, Gregory. "Akimel O'odham/Pee-Posh Youth Council." Honoring Nations symposium. Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. Cambridge, Massachusetts. September 11, 2004. Presentation.

Gregory Mendoza:

"Good morning. First of all, before I begin my presentation I'd first like to acknowledge my bosses. Our president, Myron Brown, Jr., all of you remember Myron. And one of my other bosses -- this is Britney Bydell, who didn't really get to speak yesterday, but she will have the opportunity right now. Britney."

Britney Bydell:

"Can you all hear me? Good morning, how is everybody? Good. My name is Britney Bydell and I am 16 years old. I am the District Three representative and we are divided up into seven political districts. And I am also a part of the Arizona Youth Commission for the State of Arizona. I attend Higley High, where I'm in the 11th grade. And I want to say that it's a great honor to be here and to be able to come and meet all of you wonderful people and to learn about Harvard University and to be able to experience and learn about the Honoring Nations and I will learn this all for the very first time. Greg."

Gregory Mendoza:

"Thanks Britney. And I don't know if I could top what Myron did yesterday, but I'll do my best. But I just want you to know that this program started back in 1987 and I was just right out of college and wanting a job, really. And I share this story with the youth council members. Every year we have our in-service orientation for the new members coming on board, and I think it's important for them to understand the chronological history of the youth council and where it evolved. But myself and about maybe nine other college students felt very frustrated back in our community.

Back in 1987 there was very few opportunities for our young people to come together. And so it was through that interaction with my colleagues that we wanted to bring our young people together to bring a collective voice for our community. And so that year began, and it was quite a frustrating process for me because my parents had to support me for one year from 1987 to 1988, but my parents understood my mission. They understood the importance of giving young people the opportunity to come together.

And our community is comprised of two tribes, the Pima and Maricopa Indians. Our ancestral names are the Akimel O'odham and the Pee-Posh. The Pima are referred to, our ancestral name is the Akimel O'odham, meaning 'the river people.' The Maricopa ancestral name is the Pee-Posh. So the youth council named...the official name of their organization comes from the ancestral names of the two tribes that make up the Gila River Indian community.

But again, the year 1987 was real trying because we had to sort of convince the people of my community to come together to support a concept, a concept in our culture which was really unheard of, to give young people a voice. Because in our culture we're taught not to be boastful, we're taught to be respectful, we're taught not to speak over our elders, and we're taught just to be there and listen to them. But we soon decided that we needed to bring the young people together and so we sponsored our first youth conference and we drew in about 300 young people and the idea of the youth council was born.

In 1988, the youth council became fully incorporated under the laws of the Gila River Indian Community. We became the first tribal youth council to be fully funded by our tribe. We are a youth servicing, youth-led organization complete with again, our bylaws, our constitution. And again, I've been their facilitator now going on 17 years. And as I reflect back on the 16 years, actually my 17th year will be coming up. On October 17th would be my 17th sort of year with the program and with the organization. As I reflect back, I have to just say that working with young people in our community is tremendous. It's a wonderful opportunity as you see with Myron and with Britney -- perfect examples of what our young people are capable of.

And I just have to add something about our president Myron because he's going to be leaving us very shortly. Myron is very involved. This young man is a precinct committeeman. He was manning the polls during the primary election. And I have to add this and he's not going to like this, but you know what, he has his own mind and he's a very proud Republican. And I think that's so unique about Myron. Myron was a delegate to the Arizona State Republican party convention. He's hoping that he will be a delegate at the next Republican National Convention. So he also just was recently elected one of the directors for Students for Bush. So Myron is involved and I admire that in any young person, to be involved at that level. And to tell you the truth, I don't know how he manages his time. This guy is a full-time college student, second-year political science major; he works part-time for a health care corporation. I don't know where he finds the time and he's still president of our youth council. As Britney mentioned, she's an up-and-coming rising star of the youth council. She just got appointed by the State of Arizona's governor to the state governor's youth commission. She has a voice for Native American youth at the state level, so that's very commendable as well.

Gila River Indian Community is comprised of over 20,000 tribal members. Young people represent about half of the tribe's total population. Our problems are no different from other youth from throughout the country. We have the same social issues that affect our youth, gang violence, drugs, alcohol, teen pregnancy, which are very high within our community. And so we, the co-founders of the organization decided there was a desperate need and urgency to develop a youth program.

Our tribal council in the past have always focused on the elders and the young people were somewhat overlooked. Young people had no idea what the system was all about, the governance of our community. We were somewhat disillusioned about our lack of voice within the community and so the council was created based on giving that young people the opportunity to provide positive change within the community.

Today, the youth council has a formal voice and I invite all of you to come to our youth council. It's just amazing. You ever see a tribal council meeting? These guys do better. These guys know parliamentary procedures, they know motions, they debate motions; it's a really unique setting when you see them coming together on issues facing the youth of the community. And of course Myron being the president, he has the gavel and he controls the council with his gavel. But it's an interesting process because we get a lot of groups, youth groups particularly, that come to Gila River just to see and observe and study our council. I think our adults and our elders are just really taken by the leadership of this young group and it's really amazing.

So I do encourage if you're at Gila River, if you ever want to see a youth council meeting, the youth council meetings range from maybe three to five hours. Their agenda is anywhere from, what is it? Two- to four-page agenda. They have the same process, reports, old business, new business. Every once in a while they'll have resolutions on the table that they'll entertain, but it's a really unique setting.

I'm their boss and what I do is I work with them directly. I work really closely with the president; I advise him. I sort of give him some direction on where we need to go, but they sort of give me the insight, their perspectives, that I do as the administrator to put all these ideas together in the form of either a report, a grant application, or a position paper. My job is just to work with them and I do a lot of the writing on behalf of Myron but with his perspectives going into that.

I think it's really important for people today, if you're going to develop a youth program you need to make sure young people are involved in every phase and at Gila River we do that. And what's so unique about the relationship with our community is that our tribal council gives us that authority. These young people, once they're elected onto the council, they're actually sworn in by a tribal judge that makes them official. They're considered like any other tribal elected official in the community and they have perks just like any tribal council member. Of course, they get stipends, of course they travel, of course they're given many opportunities, just like tribal council members to attend various events, receptions, activities, stuff like that. And what makes that really unique is that the council, they get invitations from time to time to meet with the council members or even meet with the governor. So it's a really good setting for the young people in our community.

And I have to just say that the accomplishments are great and I'm just going to include some of the benchmarks over the years, in the last 16 years that this group has accomplished and it's really good. And I think Myron pinpointed some of those accomplishments.

In 1993, the youth council launched again the Kids Voting Program, which mocks the polls to the young people. What we did with the Kids Voting Program is that we developed a curriculum K-12 and what we did with that curriculum is we took basic concepts from the tribe's constitution and bylaws and we developed it into a curriculum. The curriculum also includes some corresponding activities so that the young people not only has the kids voting curriculum for their lesson planning, but they also have corresponding activities. So the curriculum, again, was adapted from a state program, but we included it, we tailored it to meet the needs of our community. And again, as Myron mentioned yesterday, we're getting ready for the presidential election, so you'll see young people coming to the polls come November second. Our youth council members will be manning the polls in each of our communities' districts, political districts. And what makes our community really unique at voting time is that our theme for our Kids Voting Program is called 'Voting is a Family Affair,' because you see young people taking the parents to the polls along with themselves. And what is even better is that community, they have like barbecues in all the districts and now the young people are afforded that same opportunity to eat with their parents in a sort of a community fun environment. So I think it's really something special when you see young people involved in the electoral process and understanding some of the basic fundamentals of voting and when they become of age...you know we've been doing this for almost ten years, just think what we're doing with all these young people that have gone through the program since 1993. The last Kids Voting Program, we brought in close to 1,000 young people to vote. We're looking forward to this next coming election because again we're hoping to surpass that 1,000 amount.

In 1996, the youth council succeeded in establishing a Boys and Girls Club in the community, the first Boys and Girls Club in the State of Arizona to serve a Native American community. This project grew from the youth council because we thought there was a great need to develop a youth program for the younger ones. So as you know, the Boys and Girls Club, they do a lot of their programs, they focus primarily with the young ones all the way up to teens. So what we did is we initiated the planning and the application process and we submitted a grant application to HUD [Department of Housing and Urban Development] and we were awarded a $1.5 million grant. The tribal council included an additional $2 million to the project, and to this day we're very proud to have two clubs now in our community.

In 1998, the youth council won a grant from the Close Up Foundation to implement an intense program focusing on tribal government, to explore the rights and responsibilities of citizens in a democratic nation. The program is a hands-on program for young people. It exposes them to tribal leadership from the courts to the tribal council to the governor's office. So the young people got to see how our tribal council operates and how our government functions. And what's so unique about Close Up is that we bring the select group of youth, 50 young people from about 14 different high schools, including boarding schools that service Gila River Indian community, and they come in for three days to examine tribal government one on one. And it's a unique opportunity because the young people are even introduced formally to the tribal council, they're introduced to the governor, the lieutenant and our tribal judge. And what happens at Close Up is that they elect their own governor, they elect their own lieutenant governor, they elect their own tribal council. So these are like a mock community for the young people, and it's a really unique opportunity for them to examine their tribal government. What we also included in this particular program is that we have a curriculum that focuses on the three branches of government that is based specifically for high school students from our community. So we're very proud of this program.

In 2001, the youth council learned the benefits of persistence when we advocated back in the mid-1990s for a tribal teen court program. The youth council was first involved in the development of this grant when we were invited by the Department of Justice to go to Washington, D.C. to provide some feedback with regard to developing a tribal youth program grant for tribes throughout the country. Our youth council members didn't know at the time that they were developing a grant program called the Tribal Youth Program Grant and it was through that opportunity where they provided feedback to the Department of Justice on the needs of the young people in their community. And so as a result of that, the tribe won a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice to develop a tribal teen court program. So we're very proud that we are now beginning to reduce and prevent crime within our community, particularly among the young people.

And just recently the youth council won a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to develop a 'Celebrate Fitness" grant initiative. As you know, as Myron mentioned to you, diabetes is the number one problem within our community and what we're discovering among our young people is that a lot of our young people are now being diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes. And so I personally am involved, not only my health because my parents are diabetics, but now my two younger brothers are diabetics. And it's something that I've been very passionate about with regard to our young people because it's starting to come to our young people. 60 Minutes did a special segment about the fattest Americans and which featured the Gila River Indian Community. We featured this video to our youth during our youth conference back in August and it was just alarming for the young people. I think for our young people in the community it was a shocking, an awakening for them to see that diabetes is an issue within the community and we need to begin to develop preventative measures to prevent this from our community. So of course, I've taken that as well because I work out, I try to work out every day and as you saw in the video yesterday I looked a little bigger in that video. So I've been very cautious about my eating habits as well as exercising daily. But again, we won this grant and so the youth council is beginning to develop Celebrate Fitness projects within each of our communities in the community.

So again, these activities and these different initiatives are all projects that had been launched by this youth council and it's remarkable what these young people can do together, collectively, as a group and it's a pleasure to work with them. Challenging at times, you know. And I just...I think it's the best job in the world and again you meet such great people as Myron and Britney. And again, a lot of our alumni, we've served over 300 alumni who have now become educators, teachers, firemen, policemen. We have some that are presidents of some of our tribal corporations and you have even one that's served on our tribal council. So 90 percent of our alumni that have gone through the program have come back to the community. They come back, they have a sense of community, they want to use their education and so they are. A lot of them are involved still and a lot of them still look to the youth council, they advise us, they give us direction. A lot of our board members, we do have an advisory board comprised of former members of the youth council.

So I just want to say that in the 16 years, it's been a great opportunity. I think Gila River is very fortunate because we also have the financial support of the community. Of course, as their administrator, I look into other financial sources, grants, and we've been very successful. So with that, thank you."

Indian Education Must Support Dual Citizenship, Nation-building

Producer
Indian Country Today
Year

In contemporary nation states education is a key institution for the socialization and creation of citizens. Schools are designed to provide common rules of civic understanding and responsibilities. Students are taught to understand the history, goals, and functioning of government. In many ways, educational institutions are a great equalizer in the sense that students, many as immigrants, can have the opportunity to learn U.S. culture, share citizenship, and gain the skills necessary to participate in the market economy...

Native Nations
Resource Type
Citation

Champagne, Duane. "Indian Education Must Support Dual Citizenship, Nation-building." Indian Country Today. July 01, 2013. Opinion. (https://ictnews.org/archive/indian-education-must-support-dual-citizenship-nation-building, accessed July 21, 2023)

The Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians

Producer
Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians
Year

This video, produced by the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, provides a brief overview of the nation's history, from its push to achieve federal recognition to its efforts to create a diversified, sustainable economy.

Citation

"The Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians." Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians. Peshawbestown, Michigan. February 3, 2012. Film. (http://www.gtbindians.org/history.asp, accessed May 14, 2013)