Sarah Hicks

From the Rebuilding Native Nations Course Series: "Defending Sovereignty Through Its Effective Exercise"

Producer
Native Nations Institute
Year

Native leaders speak to the notion that Native nations' best defense of their sovereignty is the demonstration of their ability to exercise that sovereignty effectively.

Native Nations
Topics
Citation

Diver, Karen. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. September 17, 2009. Interview.

Fullmer, Jamie. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. June 17, 2008. Interview.

Gilham, Greg. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. March 25, 2010. Interview.

Gipp, David. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona.

Gray, James R. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. September 17, 2009. Interview.

Hicks, Sarah. "NCAI and the Partnership for Tribal Governance." Honoring Nations symposium. Harvard Project on American Indian Economics, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. Cambridge, Massachusetts. September 18, 2009. Presentation.

Sampsel, Roy. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. August 31, 2010. Interview.

Wilkins, David E. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. August 6, 2008. Interview.

Greg Gilham:

"Most nations proclaim their inherent sovereignty. But without action, all it is is a proclamation. So at some point in time, you've got to develop a way of exercising it in order for it to work."

David Wilkins:

"Vine [Deloria] was always saying just that in his many writings about tribal sovereignty, encouraging tribes all along, dating back to Custer Died for Your Sins and even when he was Executive Director of NCAI [National Congress of American Indians], to quit talking and to get out there and start acting, to start exercising, to start wielding the residual inherent sovereign powers that you still have. He said, 'They're all there, and if you don't wield them, if you don't use them, in their dormant state, they atrophy.' When something atrophies in this society, it eventually becomes brittle and it breaks away and someone from the outside swoops in and just takes it away, because they say, 'You're not exercising it, you're going to lose it.' It's the old water law doctrine: either you use it or you lose it. And I think that's what Vine, and certainly what Oren Lyons, is referencing there. That's where I think tribes today are really doing some wonderful things."

Sarah Hicks:

"There are many issues where, if we don't deal with them ourselves, we know that the federal government will intervene. Where there's a perceived vacuum around policy making, the federal government will intervene to develop policy, and so if we aren't developing our own policies, if we aren't making sure that county and state and federal governments know about the policies that we're developing, there's a real danger there."

Jamie Fullmer:

"Sovereignty is indeed is the act thereof. But it is also understanding that it's important for us to redefine it as time allows us. There are things that we as Indian tribes and nations couldn't do 20 years ago that we can do now because people are willing to exercise and express the sovereignty and push the boundaries. And really those leaders and those tribes that took on those challenges, those spearheads, allowed the rest of us to be able to stretch our own boundaries."

David Gipp:

"Well I think in this day in age when we deal with the U.S. government, or the tribal nations that deal with both the U.S. government, with state government, then all the creatures of the state as they say -- I think it is very important for us to utilize what that sovereignty is all about. Whether we do it through law enforcement, whether we exercise it in commerce, or whether we exercise it through our courts, or if we do it with our resources such as water. Those kinds of things have to be done if we're going to maintain and, for that matter, amplify our sovereignty. If you don't use it, you lose it, is, I think, part of the issue. And that is something that is very evident when we talk about things like court cases."

Karen Diver:

"To me, that really means, once again building those capable institutions. Everybody likes to know what are the rules that we're playing by, especially if you're dealing with outside entities that you do work with, whether it's governmental or through your economic development efforts. But also, that you're defining what those rules are. And whether you're dealing with a local unit of government, the feds, bankers, auditors, you know, they don't get to define the playing field. You're defining the rules, you're communicating them, and you're saying that 'Your work with us is going to be defined by us.'"

Jim Gray:

"I think that's an excellent point. I think a lot of tribes, certainly during the last century, really operate under the notion that if you stay quiet, if you stay under the radar screen, they'll leave you alone. And I think what is happening in the last generation of tribal leaders and tribal governments is that they've kind of broken out of that model and have taken the initiative to states, to the federal government, to the communities in their area and say, 'You know, we have the ability to help solve community-wide problems. We have the ability to address the social problems we have in our community.' We now -- in other words, instead of blaming somebody else and just operating under the radar screen, we're taking just the opposite approach, which is taking the fight to the streets and taking, and using the sovereignty of the nation to create programs and departments and initiatives that actually address the needs of our community."

Roy Sampsel:

"I think the tribes have been fortunate in that they have recognized that they have the ability to be self-determined and to exercise and to use their sovereignty. The question now is, 'Do they have to governance structures in place that allow them to make good decisions over time, and to implement their wishes into programs that actually deliver effectively?' That's the challenge, it seems to me, of the tribes since the seventies. But even more importantly, it'll be the challenge over the next few decades."

From the Rebuilding Native Nations Course Series: "Intergovernmental Relationships: Tools for Nation Building"

Producer
Native Nations Institute
Year

Native leaders discuss the ways that intergovernmental agreements serve as important nation-building tools for Native nations, strengthening their sovereignty and jurisdiction in the process.

Native Nations
Citation

Cladoosby, Brian. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy. University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. March 24, 2010. Interview.

Hicks, Sarah. "Intergovernmental and Intertribal Relations" (Episode 8). Native Nation Building television/radio series. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy and the UA Channel, The University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. 2006. Television program.  

Jordan, Paulette. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy. University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. March 25, 2010. Interview.

Ninham-Hoeft, Patricia. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy. University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. March 26, 2009. Interview.

Pecos, Regis. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy. University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. June 17, 2008. Interview.

Sampsel, Roy. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. August 31, 2010. Interview.

Sarah Hicks:

"Well, these kinds of relationships really provide a way for tribal governments to extend their influence beyond their boundaries. It's really a way for tribal governments to leverage their influence, to bring their voice to the table with other governments to influence the policy making that's going on outside of their boundaries."

Brian Cladoosby:

"We've been creating intergovernmental agreements since 1855 at Swinomish when my grandfather's grandfather Kelkahltsoot signed the treaty with the U.S. government ceding vast acres of land to the U.S. government in exchange for some reserved rights and some promises that were put down on paper. So we have been, we are a government, and we have to be viewed as a government, and we have to look at other governments, and when we need to make agreements with them that benefit us and them, we have to do it. I don't see it as something that gets in the way of our sovereignty."

Paulette Jordan:

"A lot of that's recognition. They have to recognize you first as a sovereign entity. And that, I think, by that recognition, that's what strengthens who you are, and that's how it needs to be. If you don't allow that or if you limit that in any way, then yes, you're limiting your sovereignty, your inherent rights."

Regis Pecos:

"We consciously are regaining control by entering into this intergovernmental agreement with the Bureau of Land Management that makes us co-managers of lands that we will never afford to reacquire because of our financial situation and lack of financial resources. But we've used that intergovernmental agreement framework as a way to co-manage areas important to us. So that's probably one of the best examples that underscores how you can use that tool or that mechanism...Because now we're co-managers of these lands, and if we did not fully exercise our powers and authorities in this kind of creative way, in a very conscious way, that is a very significant part of our articulated vision of how we engage other governments for that purpose, we would not, today, have access to [those] places. In fact, we'd be trespassing upon those lands as we have historically."

Patricia Ninham-Hoeft:

"So one tool that my tribe has used are service agreements. And they enter into these agreements, or intergovernmental agreements, with local municipalities to figure out how to share in providing services to the area and to our community. So, for example, in Oneida we live so close to the city of Green Bay and some other villages, and they provide services that are important to us. For example, there's an airport that's across from our casino and it's run by the county. We depend on roads to be maintained and plowed right away when there's bad weather. And at the end of the day, those services have to be paid for by somebody. And so a tribe can say, 'We're not allowed to be taxed by another jurisdiction.' But those services still have to get provided and someone still has to pay for them. And so entering into an intergovernmental agreement or service agreement with a municipality is an exercise of sovereignty, that we are going to help provide for that service. We may not actually provide it ourselves but we may help pay for it through that kind of an agreement."

Roy Sampsel:

"I think if they are written with the understanding that they are trying to create an atmosphere in which a common product and consensus, if you will, can be reached is particularly important...I agree with the tribal leaders that are recognizing these as governance tools, as a means by which to exercise and implement their sovereignty and their nation building desires. Local governments, I think, are coming to the same conclusion." 

Honoring Nations: Sarah Hicks: NCAI and the Partnership for Tribal Governance

Producer
Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development
Year

Former NCAI Policy Research Center Director Sarah Hicks discusses the growth of the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) and specifically its recent initiatives to support the nation-building and advocacy efforts of Native nations.

People
Native Nations
Resource Type
Citation

Hicks, Sarah. "NCAI and the Partnership for Tribal Governance." Honoring Nations symposium. Harvard Project on American Indian Economics, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. Cambridge, Massachusetts. September 18, 2009. Presentation.

"I want to start by just thanking you for allowing me to be here with you. On behalf of NCAI's executive board, our advisory council for the Policy Research Center, and our executive director Jacqueline Johnson Pata, we really appreciate the time that you've given us here today to talk about our work at the National Congress of American Indians, the work of the Policy Research Center, and in particular, a new initiative that I think is very closely related to the work that you're doing here and that I hope there will be some significant opportunity for collaboration on. So that's essentially what I'm going to talk about this afternoon. I've offered to try to shorten my remarks a bit so that I hope we can really get to the interaction. My hope is to present a bit of background information to you, and then to really have a rich discussion about how we might work together to accomplish this goal of our new initiative. So I'll talk a little bit about NCAI, about our Policy Center, and then about the Partnership for Tribal Governance, a new initiative that we're launching.

I know many of you are familiar with NCAI, but for those of you for whom it's new, I thought I would just give a quick thumbnail sketch. The National Congress of American Indians is the oldest, largest and most representative national Indian organization serving the broad interests of American Indian and Alaska Native tribal governments. We were established after a national conference in Denver, Colorado in 1944 to serve as a representative congress of Indian nations -- a kind of United Nations of Indian tribes if you will. So we serve as a forum for consensus-based policy making, a place where tribes can come together for discussion and develop an opinion about what's in their best interest. We are the collective voice of Indian tribes. NCAI has a committee structure and we have staff that have expertise in various policy areas and we address a huge range of issues. Our agenda is large -- really everything that tribal leaders prioritize from health, education and child welfare to cultural preservation, natural resources management, economic development -- you name it, we work on it. In our small organization of about 25 people we do a lot of different kinds of work. We advocate on behalf of tribes with the U.S. Congress and administration, we conduct legal and policy analysis, we do research, we develop policy, we educate the public and media and we build tribal capacity through trainings and technical assistance.

Next I'm going to tell you a little bit about the Policy Research Center within NCAI, the center that I direct. But first I wanted to share with you a few quotes that really underscore the reason that our policy center was established. So the first quote is from a former councilman Eddie Tullis, from the Poarch Band of Creek Indians. And he says, 'Outsiders have researched us to death and the research doesn't even benefit us.' A quote from Dr. Stephen Cornell, our friend, director of the Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy at the University of Arizona, 'Data is political.' And finally, Chairman Ron Allen, from the Jamestown S'Klallam tribe in Washington State, says, 'Tribes need data to support their own self-determined agendas.'

So our Policy Research Center was established through the wisdom of our leadership at NCAI. At around the time of our 60th anniversary as a national organization, our leadership reflected on the challenges that they faced in making policy that really benefits Indian people. And they realized that they needed a new resource, a center that would focus on anticipating hot policy issues, that would impact tribes, work with tribes to prioritize those opportunities, and develop the information and data that tribes would need to make informed decisions on behalf of their communities. So our center was established in 2003 as a national tribal policy research center that would focus only on issues facing tribal communities. Our focus is on forward thinking, deliberate, proactive Indian policy development opportunities and the development of timely, credible information to equip tribal leaders to make good decisions for their communities.

When I tell this story about the history of our center, I think about the discussions that our leadership had as they deliberated about this. And it was really striking to hear these powerful leaders, some of whom have been serving their communities for decades, who are talking about the position that they're in to be good stewards of their community, to make good decisions on behalf of their community but without the adequate information to do so. And to hear the stories of people saying, 'We're making these incremental decisions because we're not sure what the impact will be and we're crossing our fingers, or we're praying, that whatever we're doing isn't going to have too bad of an impact.' It was really striking to hear the compelling rationale, the stories, their practical experience about not having the data and information they needed to make those good decisions on behalf of their community -- so feeling that heavy weight, that responsibility of being a steward of protecting your community, of doing things that benefit your community but without the appropriate resources, without the appropriate information and data to do so. So that was really the impetus for our center. The reason for our establishment was to help the tribal leaders to forecast those opportunities for policy development, to gather together the data and information in a credible and timely way, to inform tribal leader decision making, to really equip tribal leaders to make good decisions.

The vision of our Policy Research Center is to support Indian Country in shaping its own future. So we're a tribally driven research center, we have a tribally driven agenda. And we've taken seriously the need to forecast those opportunities for policy development, to get ahead of the curve, if you will, to help tribal leaders to think about the issues that are coming down the road in three years, in five years, to frame them in appropriate ways, to help think about scenarios and to inform their decision making with data.

Six years ago, our national advisory council directed us to take on four areas of work. We call them 'buckets of work' because the lines between these activities aren't always clear, sometimes they overlap. And I'm from Alaska so we like to use bucket analogies, but sometimes what's in buckets sloshes out, so it's not always neat and clean, but there are kind of four basic buckets of work that we think about. The first bucket of work is a clearinghouse and this is really about how we organize information, how we make it accessible. So we look at publicly available data, information that's already out there in the public domain, and how we can organize it in ways that allow tribal leaders to access it. So if you're going to testify on the [Capitol] Hill, you're going to a hearing -- there's a hearing next Wednesday about the impact of the 'silent depression' on communities of color. And so our executive director, Jackie Johnson Pata is going to go testify, on behalf of Indian Country. And so we're writing testimony about the impact of the recession -- we need to know about foreclosure rates, we need to know about the impact on small businesses. So where do we go to find this data? How can we put together the data that's kind of out there in the world, together in one place and organize it in a way that's most useful for tribal leaders, that allows them to access the information they need to make decisions locally, about their community on the ground, as well as about national policy? So we do work around this clearinghouse function. We have a web-based clearinghouse now and we're working to expand it continuously. So the intention really, is to make data more accessible.

The second bucket of work is about research support. And this is really support for the design of research and for analysis, for interpretation of data. And so we play a role -- sometimes with mainstream universities, sometimes with tribal colleges, sometimes with various other organizations, sometimes with tribes and tribal organizations -- but to really help support a function around research design and analysis. So to the extent that you have a research question, what are the best ways to answer that question given all kinds of constraints, time and budget and things like that? And once data is gathered, how do we aggregate, how do we analyze, how do we interpret data? So we play a role in research support.

Our third bucket is about tribal capacity building. And this is a really explicit part of what we do. We spend a lot of time at the beginning of research projects thinking about, what is it that we're going to leave in the community when we go? We're invited to a community, we come there to help with a particular project, but from the very beginning we're deliberate in thinking about what kind of skills, what kind of expertise, what kind of equipment, what kind of data and knowledge are we going to leave in the community once we go. So this is really about building the skills, the experience and the infrastructure to help tribes collect and analyze data in whatever ways they think are appropriate.

And then our last core bucket of work is something that we call a 'think tank' -- and I'm not sure that we're entirely happy with the terminology here yet, I think it's kind of confusing -- but the basic idea behind this, as our executive director says, is that we have the conversations that no one else will. And what we mean by that is that we serve as a forum for small groups of tribal leaders to come together to talk about politically sensitive issues that we know have the potential to have a dramatic impact on our communities. So we could think about a number of them right now. We could talk about citizenship. We could talk about per capita distribution policies. We could talk about off reservation gaming. We could talk about genetics research. There are a whole variety of issues that are significant to Indian Country and that tribes may have varying opinions about, varying experiences with, but we don't often have a forum to come together to talk about these sensitive issues in a real way -- to talk with one another intimately about our experiences, about the potential impacts of those issues and about options, policy options for dealing with them in our communities -- because there are many issues where if we don't deal with them ourselves, we know that the federal government will intervene -- where there's a perceived vacuum around policy making, the federal government will intervene to develop policy. And so, if we aren't developing our own policies, if we aren't making sure that county and state and federal governments know about the policies that we're developing, there's a real danger there. So how can we bring people together in a comfortable setting, in a way to have real conversations about these issues that could dramatically impact us, to really think about policy options? So those are the four buckets of work for our Policy Research Center.

Now I'm going to turn to the initiative that I mentioned earlier, our Partnership for Tribal Governance. I want to give you a little bit of detail about this, I'm going to spend a little bit more time on it, but I'm hopeful that at the end of my talk that this is where we can really focus our attention -- that we can have some discussion about this. And in particular, just to kind of give you a warning, I'm really interested in your thoughts, in your sense of how you might be involved in this work. Before I came here, I thought about who was going to be in this room. And I was really thinking, these are people who are on the cutting edge, these are the thought leaders in Indian Country, these are people who are engaged in their community, who are trying new things, who are learning from their experiences. And the question really is, how can this body of work that we're proposing support you, support your efforts? And how can you, in turn, contribute to this?

So Sherry Salway Black is here somewhere. Thank you. Okay, in this front table here, thanks. So I want to acknowledge her. The work that I'm going to talk about is some work that initially came out of our Policy Research Center -- some research that we did in partnership with the Native Nations Institute -- but Sherry is leading this work now. So I'm going to talk a little bit about it and then in time for our discussion, Sherry will come up here and join me so that we can have a fuller conversation about this. So let me tell you a little bit about the history of the project.

The Kellogg Foundation gave us a grant in 2006 to engage tribes by region to talk about their ideas and experiences with governance. And this interest from the Foundation, grew out of their own reflections about the effectiveness of their grant making and desire to know more about the appropriateness of investing in governance -- this foundation, this basis governance -- as opposed to investing in specific programs, various programs at the tribal level. They were really trying to understand the impact of their grant making and think about where they could have the greatest impact, how they could best support tribes. And NCAI, from our perspective, we were really interested in this conversation and were ultimately willing to take on the project because we were simultaneously receiving a groundswell of questions and resources, requests for information from tribal leaders about strategies for strengthening institutions of governance. So it was really this confluence of events. On the one hand, there's this foundation, asking us for information and asking us for our opinion, asking what we think about their grant making focus. And on the other hand we're receiving this demand for information from tribal leaders, who are very interested in what's going on in other communities and how they can learn from it, and what technical assistance providers are out there, what kind of resources are available. So it was really the confluence of these events that led us down this path. And so we took on this project with the goal to visit the various regions of Indian Country and to convene people to have a conversation about a couple of key questions. And the questions that we ultimately chose to talk to people about were these. What does tribal governance mean to you? How is tribal governance different today than it was historically? What do you want institutions of tribal governance in your community to look like in 30 years? And what resources are necessary to support the vision that you have?

So once we'd thought about this large project and began to plan for this work, our first step was really to recruit good partners. And that led us straight to the Native Nations Institute and our colleagues Dr. Stephen Cornell and Miriam Jorgensen -- who are really natural partners for a number of reasons. They have a long history of responsive and responsible research with Native communities, they have a prestigious international advisory council that is actively reflecting about governance challenges, and then also, of course, they have experience convening tribal leaders to talk comparatively about governance and about governance reform. So they were certainly natural partners for us.

(I'm thinking about what I'm going to cut back. So, I was going to tell you a little bit about how we set up the conversations. I think I'll just jump to some of our findings.)

So between September and November of 2006 -- the Policy Research Center, NNI and regional partners -- we partnered with regional intertribal organizations, convened 11 forums to gather information from elected tribal leaders, professional tribal staff, intertribal organizations, elders, youth and native citizens. So it was really a broad audience, broad stakeholder group, that we were trying to bring together. And in total almost 300 people, almost half of which were elected tribal leaders, participated in our forums that we entitled 'Strengthening Tribal Governance.' So as I mentioned, we sought regional perspectives. We were really interested in regional differences. In addition to the regional focus we also focused two sessions specifically on youth. One session was held with our NCAI Youth Commission and there was another session that was held at Arizona State University with college students there.

So our findings from this work -- At the end of our data gathering phase we were really surprised, I would have to say, about the strikingly consistent themes that we heard all over the country. When we traveled to Alaska and talked to folks from rural villages there; when we were in the Great Plains talking to non-profit leaders; when we talked to youth, middle school and high school students at NCAI conferences; it was amazing that the same themes continued to emerge. And there were four primary themes that came out of this work, four areas of focus, if you will, on future activities, so I'll just mention them briefly. There's a strong interest in governing systems reform. And what we mean by this is constitutional reform, code development, court strengthening, those kinds of activities. There's a real interest in citizen engagement, both how do governments engage citizens as well as how citizens approach government. There's a theme around leadership development, both building the skill set of current leaders. So how do we help our current leaders to acquire new skills as well as thinking about our future generations and how we build the capacity for leadership there? And finally there was a theme that, unlike these three first themes -- which are kind of internally focused, things the tribe itself could do -- there was a fourth theme which was complimentary but external to the tribe. There was a strong theme around public education and media education. And so there was a strong sense among tribes that no matter what we're doing in these other three areas internally -- We can be doing really great work, but if the public, if the media aren't educated about tribes' governance, then we're still losing ground on some fronts. So how do we use that intervention point to help strengthen our own work?

So with my three remaining minutes, I'm going to tell you quickly about some of the work that we hope to do in the future, because again I really want to hear from you how you can imagine working with us in this framework. So just to summarize the work of the Partnership for Tribal Governance going forward, I would say that there are three main aspects. The first is something we called investing in the movement. So we see this work to strengthen governance as a movement. We see, it's happening in pockets all over the place, there's more and more enthusiasm, there's more interest in this. So we really are seeing kind of the building of a movement to strengthen governance. And so, when we talk about investing in the movement, we're thinking about financial investments, technical assistance investments, training investments, in tribes themselves, as well as thinking about the array of technical assistance resources necessary to support them. So what role might regional intertribal organizations play? What role might experts like the Native Nations Institute and the Harvard Project, who've been doing this work for years -- who have a lot of resources already that tribes would benefit from, having more readily available -- [play]? How might we think about the array of resources that we know of, that are already part of our network, as well as reach out to other resources that we may not even necessarily know about yet? So how might we build that field by investing in the movement? The next area of work combines a few components that are really about bringing together policy makers, practitioners, researchers who are focused on aggregating what we already know -- making sense of all the data and information that's already out there -- prioritizing what we still need to know -- so a policy research agenda -- and then building the infrastructure to expand this work.

So I mentioned there are certainly people who are already doing this work. We don't think that we're new to the game here and that we wrote the book on this and this is the be all and end all. Really a lot of this work is about organizing what's already out there, helping tribes to make sense of it, helping them to navigate it, helping them to make good decisions about resources that can really be beneficial to their communities. So we really think about how do we enhance, how do we organize, how do we expand the infrastructure for this work around strengthening tribal governance? And so this would include things like knowledge management, technology platforms and applications, communication, education and training -- so a whole variety of components you can imagine there. And then I'll just mention briefly the learning and evaluation partnership.

So in addition to supporting work on the ground, we are very interested in a more systematic way of gathering information, and making sense of information, about what's really happening. So we've been working with NNI and others to develop, what we call, an action framework. We were strongly advised -- maybe I could say -- not to call it a theory of change, but to call it an action framework. So now we talk about action framework. But we've developed this action framework, which is really a backdrop for a series of tools. We've talked about developing some assessment tools, we've talked about planning tools, and we've talked ultimately about evaluation tools, and we're talking about real time evaluation here. So as tribes are taking steps, as they're implementing pieces of this work, how is it that they're getting feedback about how things are working? How is it they're processing this information, deciding about other appropriate strategies to try? And at the regional and national level, how do we aggregate these experiences in ways that make it easier for other tribes to decide what will work for them and to try to take some of the same steps?

So I think that learning and evaluation partnership is really critical. And so maybe I'll just end with that. I think my time is up so I'll just say [thank you] for having me here. And I'd really love to hear your thoughts and certainly, further questions about what I've shared. I'd invite Sherry to come up here with me in case they're really tough questions. And thank you for your time."

Native Nation Building TV: "Intergovernmental and Intertribal Relations"

Producer
Native Nations Institute
Year

Guests Jaime Pinkham and Sarah Hicks focus on Native nations’ efforts to enhance their relationships with other governments as a way to advance their nation-building objectives. It details how some Native nations are forging mutually beneficial intergovernmental agreements, and chronicles the many advantages to forging similar intertribal arrangements.

Citation

Native Nations Institute. "Intergovernmental and Intertribal Relations" (Episode 8). Native Nation Building television/radio series. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy and the UA Channel, The University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. 2006. Television program. 

Mark St. Pierre: "Hello, friends. I'm your host, Mark St. Pierre and welcome to Native Nation Building. Contemporary Native Nations face many challenges including building effective governments, developing strong economies that fit their culture and circumstances, solving difficult social problems and balancing cultural integrity in change. Native Nation Building explores these often complex challenges in the ways Native Nations are working to overcome them as they seek to make community and economic development a reality. Don't miss Native Nation Building next."

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Mark St. Pierre: "Today's show explores the importance of intertribal and intergovernmental relationships and the innovative approaches that many Native Nations are taking as they forge ahead with Nation building goals. With us today to examine these relationships are Jaime Pinkham and Sarah Hicks. Sarah Hicks, a citizen of the Native village of Ouzinkie in Alaska, is a doctoral candidate at Washington University. She also directs the National Congress of American Indians Policy Research Center where she works on a joint project with the National Conference of State Legislatures. Jaime Pinkham, a citizen of the Nez Perce Tribe, is Watershed Program Manager with the Columbia River Intertribal Fish Commission and Intertribal Fisheries Organization. Welcome to both of you and thanks for being with us." 

Jaime Pinkham: "Thank you."

Sarah Hicks: "Thanks."

Mark St. Pierre: "Jaime, when we talk about intergovernmental and intertribal relationships among Native Nations, what are we really talking about?"

Jaime Pinkham: "Well, Mark, I feel we're talking about creating a platform that respects the individual autonomy of the tribes or the governmental agencies that sit at the table and it's a relationship that's built upon trust and mutual respect and provides our ability to provide collective talent and wisdom and resources to overcome conflicts or to move forward on areas of mutual concern."

Mark St. Pierre: "Would you like to respond to that?"

Sarah Hicks: "Yeah, I think we're really talking about deliberate relationships between sovereign governments who are coming to the table as equals. We're looking at relationships that are across various issue areas, we're looking at relationships that are between different levels of government, different kinds of governments and even different branches of government."

Mark St. Pierre: "Sarah, what role do these relationships play in building a Native nation?"

Sarah Hicks: "Well, these kinds of relationships really provide a way for tribal governments to extend their influence beyond their boundaries. It's really a way for tribal governments to leverage their influence, to bring their voice to the table with other governments to influence the policy making that's going on outside of their boundaries."

Mark St. Pierre: "Just as a follow up, is there a concern that tribes who work with, say, state or county agencies are surrendering some sovereignty, or how does that work out?"

Sarah Hicks: "Historically, because of the government-to-government relationship between the federal government and tribal governments, that there's been a great deal of attention to this very critical important relationship. But on the other hand, as we've seen devolution, or the federal government passing resources and authority to lower levels of government, to state government, to county government, in some cases to tribal government, that I think tribes are becoming less concerned about what they're giving up, and I think they see many more opportunities to cooperate on issues of mutual concern. So they're really looking to their neighboring governments as potential partners to accomplish some of these really important jobs that local governments perform."

Mark St. Pierre: "Jaime, you seem like you want to jump in there."

Jaime Pinkham: "I don't see it as an erosion of sovereignty when we reach to other governments, and I think we're seeing more and more -- because of the capacity that tribes are building -- is we see these other governments reaching out to us. We've built the institutional capacity on resource programs, education and health care, and the other thing is that the tribes have unique access to federal resources, for example highway trust funds, which we can help rebuild or maintain infrastructures, especially in rural communities, that county governments and local municipalities depend upon, too. So I see them reaching out to us as well."

Mark St. Pierre: "You've both seen a shift in how Native nations view these relationships and their potential benefits. Historically, what began that shift in emphasis?"

Sarah Hicks: "Well, I think much of it was devolution as I was just mentioning earlier. Really in the late 1980s, we started to see more and more federal programs, environmental programs, some human service programs, community development programs that are being moved to more local levels of government, and over time the pace of devolution has increased. So throughout the 1990s and into the 2000s, we've seen more and more resources really being directed at more local levels of government, and this just increases the incentive for tribal governments and state and county governments to look for these issues of mutual concern, to really bring to bear their limited resources on both sides to address issues that all governments care about."

Jaime Pinkham: "I also see the follow up on that is some courtroom fatigue where too often we're trying to resolve our differences in the court room and when you go to court you have one winner, one loser but when you come together in exploring these relationships you try to harmonize your efforts, and while litigation and negotiations are both difficult paths to take, the difference is the outcome and the outcome is the mutual benefits. The other thing is I've really witnessed over the past 10 to 15 years this elevation of both state and federal governments in formalizing tribal policies. It's an expression of tribal relationships, so we see the cabinet levels in the state legislatures and representatives of the governor's office now reaching out and creating new relationships with Indian tribes."

Mark St. Pierre: "In regions where tribes are really a small minority of the local or general population, have these relationships in fact increased the power of tribes in regional and local politics?"

Sarah Hicks: "I would argue yes. I think that this is a vehicle for tribes to come together on the one hand in intertribal organizations. We've seen an increased growth in regional intertribal organizations, and I would say an increased strength in those organizations as well over the past couple of years. So on the one hand, tribes being able to come together to voice their collective concerns, to share their resources that they have has definitely made a difference, but I also think that on the state and county level, neighboring governments are starting to see tribes as bigger political players. Tribes are getting on the map. They're starting to realize that there are a lot of common interests with tribal governments."

Jaime Pinkham: "And I agree. I think we're seeing many cases where local governments would like to ride upon the coattails of tribal governments because of the capacity that they have at dealing with the variety of levels of issues from very local to national in nature."

Mark St. Pierre: "Just on a personal level, on a human-to-human level, do you see these relationships strengthening communication and relationships between literal neighbors of the reservations?"

Jaime Pinkham: "I think we do, because as the tribes get more active in local politics, especially you start seeing members of the tribal communities becoming on school boards and county governments and city governments, and that helps really soothe and create and foster some positive relationships. What concerns me is we see the growth of these anti-Indian, anti-sovereignty organizations, but if we could work better and have these positive examples, we can try to teach these places where this fear exists of tribal sovereignty that really there's nothing to fear but really there's an opportunity, a partnership that can really help all communities prosper and grow."

Mark St. Pierre: "That kind of leads to a logical question I guess then. How have tribes or Native Nations avoided litigation, avoided conflict in dealing with other governments?"

Sarah Hicks: "Well, I think tribes and neighboring governments have really looked to local agreements as a way to avoid litigation. As Jaime was mentioning earlier, litigation is frequently extremely time-consuming, extremely expensive, and often results in an outcome that nobody's happy with, so to the extent that tribes and states or tribes and counties or tribes and other tribes can come to the table together to negotiate agreements that work better for everybody down on the ground, that's a win-win situation. We've seen a number of examples. If you look to motor fuel taxation and tobacco taxation, there have been some great agreements in Nevada, in Nebraska, in Oklahoma, in Arizona. There have been agreements around natural resource issues, around protection of cultural issues, around human service delivery. So I think we're seeing a proliferation of these kinds of relationships across a whole range of different topic areas."

Mark St. Pierre: "Is it in the best interest of federal, state and municipal governments to cross these traditional divides and work together with Native nations?"

Jaime Pinkham: "I believe it is. If you look out west, where that sense of individuality is treasured, but as long as we remain isolated, anonymous and faceless, we will never be able to come over some of those very difficult issues out west and a lot of those issues will deal in terms of the environment, the return of wolves or the recovery of salmon, where we see divisiveness in our communities. So the best way really is to start as local as you can. It's the politics of place in crafting those relationships very locally and using that to build up the ladder to state, federal governments. Who better to resolve local issues than those of us who live there? And to take those outcomes to where we really need action passed, and whether it's at Congress or at the state legislative level."

Sarah Hicks: "I guess I just wanted to make a related point, which is that I think not only are we seeing these relationships grow in all different kinds of topic areas and really in all different places across the country, but I think we're also seeing relationships that are being built across different branches of government. So increasingly, we're seeing relationships not only with the executive branch but with the legislative branch or in some cases they're relationships with the judiciary, with training of judges around some particularly important issues to tribal communities. So I think the trend is just growing and I think increasingly we're seeing that we have so many common issues where all neighboring governments are concerned about finite resources, about protecting our environment, about serving our citizens, making sure they have the essential governmental services they need. So I think increasingly we're just seeing more opportunities for governments to come together to solve these issues at the local level."

Mark St. Pierre: "Has this caused a shift in how these governments view Native Nations they work with? In other words, the State of Washington for instance, has it created a shift positive or negative in how they view the tribes in Washington?"

Jaime Pinkham: "Well, I can't speak for Washington, but in Idaho when I was on Tribal Council with Nez Perce, we did sense a shift, but unfortunately the shift was going two directions. One is where we were working collectively with a local county government and a city government to provide services to the reservation, but by us being there having access to economic development funds we were able to improve the infrastructure of the City of Lewiston. On the other hand, we saw these other governments riding on this wave of concern about what sovereignty will do to a community, and so we were faced with an alliance of 22 entities from school districts to city governments to county governments who feared tribal sovereignty and what it could do, the concerns about regulation and courts and they feared this word called 'sovereignty.' Sovereignty is something that really is an expression of the health of a community. So we worked hard to try to overcome the misconception that some of these communities had and the way to do it is to try to show the positive relationships we had with other neighboring communities."

Mark St. Pierre: "In South Dakota, I think there's a tremendous fear that in negotiating with the state, for instance, about anything, you're in a sense violating your treaty, because your treaty is between the tribe and the federal government. Do you want to respond to that concern 'cause it's a powerful concern."

Sarah Hicks: "Well, and I think part of this comes from a sense or a fear that many of these protections can be eroded, that the resources, the federal trust responsibility to American Indian tribal governments can be eroded. And so out of the fear to sort of protect what we have, there's been in some cases a real resistance to developing these kinds of relationships. But I think that nationally, we've started to move in a bit of a different direction. We've started to hear in national forums, tribal leaders articulating, 'We need to make sure that the federal trust responsibility is protected. We need assurances from the federal government that increasingly tribal self determination and tribal self-governance efforts, that increasingly, intergovernmental relationships aren't in anyway affecting the federal trust responsibility.' So I think on the one hand, tribes are concerned about that and I think they are looking to ensure that those protections are in place, but on the other hand, because of again the many, many common concerns and because of the increasing resources and opportunities for collaboration at the local level, I think we're seeing tribes move in that direction."

Jaime Pinkham: "And no doubt, I sense there still is some concern in Indian Country, because you have the federal government and then tribal government, state governments and the lower governments, and there's the concern that if we work with governments below us from the states down to city governments, that it's an erosion of our treaty rights and an erosion of our sovereignty. But the thing to keep in mind is we have the sovereign choice to work with those governments only if we choose."

Sarah Hicks: "Right. And I think we are. I think Jaime's right. We're talking about deliberate relationships between sovereign governments. It's governments coming together at the same table as equals to determine the type of relationship they want to have and what that relationship will encompass. So with tribes at the driver seat, I think this is really just underscoring that this really is about tribes as governments, tribes behaving as governments."

Mark St. Pierre: "I certainly think that sends a powerful idea to those tribes that are very nervous about these kinds of things, to hear that there are tribal groups working on positive relationships with local governments. Let's turn to a totally different thing here and look at intertribal relationships. Why are a growing number of Native Nations developing relationships and ties with other tribes in their region or nationally?"

Jaime Pinkham: "I think it's built on longstanding alliances and relationships that we've always had. In the Columbia River it was the salmon that always brought us together. The Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, we're focused around the salmon, so we've always had the traditional alliances. The other thing, too, is recognizing the diversity of the landscape of Indian Country with our forms of government, our languages and our economies, it's important that we begin to share our talent and also to share knowledge and wisdom. When you look at parts of the U.S. where maybe we don't have the economic strength or we don't have the political strength and we're going to rely upon our neighboring tribes, and so I think these alliances are pretty fundamental to helping to elevate the tribal voice in places like Washington, D.C."

Sarah Hicks: "Part of it's strength in numbers, the sheer fact that tribes can come together, that we do have consensus on a great many issues and that we have a stronger voice if we work together. I also think that Jaime's right, a lot of this is really just formalizing relationships that have always been there."

Mark St. Pierre: "The tribes that work together, is it important that they kind of have their own internal tribal ducks in a row, that they have an effective government?"

Jaime Pinkham: "Yeah. Again, getting back to all politics is local, yeah, you have to be well-grounded and have strong, stable political leadership and use that as the basis and build up from there."

Sarah Hicks: "There's no doubt that it's important to have a message straight from the top that says, 'These relationships are important, that we're going to do what we can to work collaboratively on issues that we can.' This isn't to say that neighboring governments can always find common ground and can always agree on solutions to joint problems, but it is to say that it's important to have a message from the leadership that articulates very clearly the intention of cooperative relationships. On the other hand, I also think it's really important that the technical folks, that the staff, that the program directors are also on board for this. In some sense, you need the message from the top, the general policy that says, 'We're going to work together.' But on the other hand, it's the technical staff, it's those folks that are actually doing the work who really have to take to heart what it means to work collaboratively, to look for those opportunities to invite the other governments to the table."

Mark St. Pierre: "This question's for Jaime. In your capacity with the Nez Perce Tribe, you've been involved in a number of intergovernmental relationships. How did that process start? Tell us how that began and what it led to."

Jaime Pinkham: "Well, let me use an example, it's a recent example. We were involved in one of the largest water adjudications in the nation, the Snake River Basin, the Snake River Basin Adjudication, and actually we had two tracks going. We had the litigation track in court, but through the McCarran Amendment we're stuck in state court. And that's not the most comfortable place for a tribe to have their issues resolved. The other option we took was to try to find a negotiated settlement and both processes were going on track. And so the Tribe decided that we needed to keep both options open and we aggressively pursued a negotiated settlement working with the State of Idaho as well as representatives of the federal government. And believe me, it took us almost eight years to get this thing through and it took a lot of hard work. And like I said earlier, both paths are difficult but the only difference is the outcome. So we were able to resolve our differences and we had to be prepared to give a little and to gain a little bit. But in the end we avoided court, we avoided a court that may have ruled against our sovereignty, a court that could have ruled against some of our treaty-reserved rights. We preserved that. Those are the core values of our community and through negotiation we were able to preserve them."

Mark St. Pierre: "For those of us that aren't familiar with the actual issue, give us a framework for what brought the conflict to be."

Jaime Pinkham: "Actually, it started when the state went after securing their reserved water rights out of the Snake River Basin and they filed claims with the federal government. Well, the tribe couldn't stand back. We had to submit our claims and our claims were based on really two fundamental principles. One is in-stream flow to protect fisheries and the second one was the consumptive uses on reservation, whether it be for residential or industrial uses. And so we went through a long process to establish our tribal water rights claims."

Mark St. Pierre: "You now work for the Columbia River Intertribal fish Commission and I understand that's an award-winning intertribal organization. How has that commission empowered its member tribes, the Nez Perce, Umatilla, Warm Springs and Yakama?"

Jaime Pinkham: "Actually, I see it the other way -- that they've empowered us as a real function of tribal government. We provide technical expertise, legal expertise and assistance in intergovernmental affairs, but really when you look, the real strength of our organization rests in the tribes and the capacity they've built on the fisheries front in the four tribes in the Pacific Northwest that have treaty rights on the Columbia River. So really they empower us and we act and respond to whatever directions that they want us to go to. It's a wonderful organization and I would say that we're on the cutting edge of salmon recovery in very contentious times, the fate of the salmon and subsequent fate of the four lower Snake River dams. It is a difficult issue to be dealing with, but fortunately we have four strong tribal governments that have empowered us to act on their behalf."

Mark St. Pierre: "I guess one of the things that I'm looking at, the salmon recovery, is something that has broad economic implications for the region doesn't it?"

Jaime Pinkham: "Oh, it does. The irony is that when the settlers first came out west they had the timber, the agriculture, and the salmon economies, so salmon helped get a foothold. But today you hear them speak only passionately about protecting the timber economy or the agriculture economy and we need to once again elevate the significance that the salmon economy played, not just for Indian people but for the region. And a strong salmon economy also means a strong, healthy environment."

Mark St. Pierre: "Sarah, in your work with the National Congress of American Indians, you've been exposed to many mechanisms available to develop these types of partnerships. Can you talk about how that came about and what some of those methods are?"

Sarah Hicks: "Sure. First, I think just the National Congress of American Indians is an interesting model. Our organization was founded in 1944, actually in response to attempts by the federal government to terminate American Indian tribes. So the very impetus for our organization was that tribes needed to gather together collectively to advocate against the federal policy toward termination. So the whole purpose of our organization was to bring tribes together and to represent their interests to the federal government. So that's just one model of intertribal organizations. But then I think what you're speaking more directly to is a project that the National Congress of American Indians has had with the National Conference of State Legislatures, a national organization that serves the legislators of every state in the United States so actually they serve a little over 7,000 state legislators. And in this work that NCAI has done with NCSL, we've been funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation for about six years now to start to provide some targeted technical assistance to states and tribes who are interested in finding new ways to work together. So some of the models that we've looked at and shared broadly include the establishment of Indian Affairs commissions, so these are usually executive-branch offices within the state government that try to coordinate the affairs of the executive branch in relationship to tribes. Then, of course, there are a number of legislative committees. I believe there are 14 states that have 17 different legislative committees that deal specifically with tribal issues. Some deal broadly with state tribal relationships where as others deal with particular issues around the relationships so perhaps repatriation, perhaps gaming, things like that. But there certainly are quite a number of models out there where states and tribes are finding new ways to work together developing new mechanisms and developing new agreements that will sort of chart the circumstances under which these relationships should continue."

Mark St. Pierre: "What I understand, it seems to me from what you're saying that the general climate is improving for the positive. Would that be your..."

Sarah Hicks: "I think so. If you look at some of the work that NCAI has done over the past year, we've been working up in Alaska with the previous administration there to sign a government-to-government agreement with the tribes in Alaska. That was the Millennium Agreement. We've seen similar types of agreements in a variety of other states. We've seen an increased number of Native legislators. I think that's a big sign that Native people think it's worth investing in the state system. We've seen increased number of bills that address tribal issues in state legislatures. So I think across the board we're seeing various indicators that tribes are moving in this direction. And again, not that this is a panacea. We don't think this is the be-all-and-end-all, that this is the solution for everything. Certainly tribal governments and neighboring governments will have very different views on some things in large part because of tribal cultures and tribal values may differ substantially from other governments. But on the other hand, it makes a lot of sense to look at issues that we can agree on and I think we are definitely moving in that direction."

Mark St. Pierre: "Let's turn now to some success stories. I know both of you have tremendous involvement in a wide range of these kinds of relationship building and conflict resolution. Give us some ideas of some of the successes in the country that are based on this new energy."

Jaime Pinkham: "Some of the things that we've worked on back home in Nez Perce country and looking at issues that were once conflict that had now come into a cooperative relationship, and one was when we were looking at protecting our traditional foods and medicines and the federal government had a plan to spray herbicides and it was to take out noxious weeds. And then we protested that so in turn the federal government and the state worked with us to develop a new method of controlling noxious weeds that would safeguard our traditional foods and medicines. So we started a bio-control center, so I think that was one where we took conflict and turned it into something that was positive and actually is providing resources, non-pesticide options to control noxious weeds in the Pacific Northwest."

Mark St. Pierre: "Sarah?"

Sarah Hicks: "I guess there are a couple that I can think of. One is that in 1998, the Rhode Island Department of Transportation signed an agreement with the Narragansett Tribe that would actually allow for tribal members to be hired by the state department of transportation to monitor some of the progress that was being made on developing highways, to be there when human remains or cultural artifacts were found so that there would be tribal members on site to try to make sure that those things were protected and they were addressed in a way that was appropriate to the tribe. So there are some examples like that. There are examples around federal subsidies to tribes to deal with foster care and adoption. Right now the federal funding flow is only to states, but we've seen some progress such that there are 71 tribal state agreements in 13 different states that allow these federal funds that are so urgently needed to deal with child welfare issues in tribal communities, to allow these funds to flow through the state to the tribes and in many cases there are other administrative funds and there are training funds that go with these so we are seeing I think...Jaime's pointing out some examples, and I'm talking about a couple others, and we're seeing that really this isn't relegated to just one domain, that we're actually seeing these kinds of efforts in a variety of different topic areas."

Mark St. Pierre: "I know in the fishing industry in the northwest that there have been arguments about water flow in terms of the revitalization of salmon in those rivers and they've required very complicated agreements. Can you tell us a bit about some of those?"

Jaime Pinkham: "Well, yeah, some of them are complex agreements where we have to work with a variety of people. If you look at the river system, it's a river of life. Not just human life, but an economic life, and a wonderful example is where the Confederate Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation have reached beyond...we can talk about [intergovernmental] relationships and intertribal relationships, but also there's the importance of creating private sector relationships, and the Umatilla Tribe has a wonderful example of that where they were concerned that the irrigators were pulling water out of the life-giving river as they were trying to return salmon to the Umatilla River. So they worked with the local irrigators to do a water exchange to keep water within the river system. So they took what were traditional adversaries and now they've become allies in salmon recovery. So we see those kinds of agreements at play. And I'm hoping we'll see more and more of those. The salmon issue is not going to be resolved overnight and you've got so many players in the game from utilities to irrigation to recreation interests and the long-seated tribal interest that is there, and we need to continue to reach out and build more of these relationships. And you see the tribes who are taking the lead on running fish hatcheries and working with federal government on land restoration to kind of restore the habitat that is important to these species, so the relationships are really building out in the northwest."

Mark St. Pierre: "We want to give a heartfelt thanks to Sarah Hicks and Jaime Pinkham for appearing on today's edition of Native Nation Building, a program of the Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management and Policy at the University of Arizona. To learn more about Native Nation building and the issues discussed here today, please visit the Native Nations Institute's website at www.nni.arizona.edu/nativetv. Thank you for joining us and please tune in for the next edition of Native Nation Building."