Native American Press / Ojibwe News (Bemidji, Minnesota), 2002-04-19

              INDEX
NEWS AROUND INDIAN COUNTRY     2
COMMENTARY/EDITORIALS 4
SMOKE SIGNALS OF UPCOMING EVENTS 5
CLASSIFIEDS 7
Patients confront
board of Indian
clinics
page 6
I felt that the truth
has to be said
page 4
Wisdom Steps
named
Champion of
Health
page 3
A vision of
Bobby
Whitefeather's
intentions on the
Red Lake Rez
page 4
Commentary
Judge Bjorkman
rewrites the law
page 4
MCT Primary results
by Clara NiiSka
The chart below lists the results ofthe
Minnesota Chippewa Tribe (MCT) primary
elections on Tuesday, April 16. The top two
candidates for each office will face off in the
general MCT elections on June 11.
Candidates in races where there were only
two contenders will automatically advance
to the general election.
MCT Primary Election
Results
Totals Candidates bj
Bois Fori
233
157
26
Secretary/Treasurer:
David C. Morrison Sr.
(incumbent)
Mark E. Drift Sr.
Barry Day
District I representative
154
21
128
Gordon Adams Jr.
Mildred R. Holmes
Dawn M. Benner
District II representative
30
67
16
Phyllis M. Boshey
Kc\ in Albert Strong
WilliamB.Tibbetts.il
Secretary/ Treasurer:
63
14
35
61
69
201
89
252
15
Robert Martineau
John DurFee
Carol Abramouski-Jurek
La\ em "Koon" Shortley
Bryan Jon Maciewski
Ferdinand Martineau. Jr.
Sandi Savage
Kevin Dupuis
Harvey Delbe
District II (Sawyer) rep:
60 V.R. "Butch" Martineau
15 Lonnie Susienka
35 Sulo Ammesmaki
51 John.Martin.'Jr.
6 Brian Abramowski
Grand Purta<u.-:
Secretary/Treasurer:
168 Gilbert Caribou
61 Duane "Butch"
132 Dean F. Deschampe
45 Donna Anderson.
Committeeman at large:
85
26
135
6
97
56
Wally "Gator" Deschampe
Gary Paro
James Corcoran
Donald Olson
Lorraine Wipson
Roger James
Committeeman at large:
36
60
66
136
51
28
29
Sam Vogal
William G. Myers
Darlene LcGarde
John Morrin
June K.. Evans
John Olson
Allan Deschampe
Secretary/Treasurer:
201
256
291
382
43
115
131
6
189
120
33
40
52
6
Walter "Frank" Reese
Jennie (Wind) Reyes
Fred K. Jackson Jr.
Arthur "Archie" LaRose
Bob Whipple
Birdena M. Cloud-Lyons
Sally Fineday Morrison
Clayton Alex Rainey Jr.
Richard Schulman
Victoria F. White (Vicki)
Diane E. White
Dennis Banks
Wil Humphrey
Donna L. Day
District I committeeman
215 Burton "Luke" Wilson
152 Peter D. White
11 Ralph W. Schaaf
115 Alfred Fairbanks, Jr.
6 Calvin W. Goggleye.
District II committeeman
120
42
19
61
10
31
Lyman "DeDe" Losh
Terrance "Chopper" White
Don (Wayne) Smith
Cara Dahl
Patricia Moose
Jack H. Seelye
Mille Lacs:
Secretary/Treasurer:
175
Herb Weyaus
26
Bahwahsung
95
Pete Gahbow
68
Douglas Sam
161
Sheldon Boyd
District II rep:*
Marvin Brunear
David Aubid
District III rep:
69
Harry Davis
44
Diane Gibbs
29
David Matrious
Secretary/Treasurer:
617
Erma J. Vizenor
96
Ralph "Bucky" Goodman
6
Gordon L. Boswell
11
John Stone
805
Franklin "Bud" Heisler
54
Bill "Beeker" Hanks
68
Leonard Roy
35
Albert L. Brunner
59
Sally Lu Littlewolf
115
John B. Buckanaga
132
Ken Brown
56
Michael G. Weaver
12
1 larvey Sullivan Bonga
District I rep:*
Irene Auginaush
Steven "Punky" Clark.
District II rep:
179
Terrance Burnette
68
Murial A. Alvarez
80
Margaret "Marge" Rogers
56
Kelly Bunker
105
Patleen (Patty) Straub
123
Tony Wadena
56
Darrell "Boone" Wadena
87
Marvin "Moss" Tibbetts
27
Steven "Shuff' Bellanger
* Seals with only two candidates
automatically go to the general election
Lower Sioux Indian
Community strips elders of per
capita payments
Council uses "residency" as a weapon to retaliate
By Bill Lawrence
Maxine Eidsvig retired from
the United States Postal Data
Center in Minneapolis, Minn, in
1989. With her children grown
and having lost her husband in a
motor vehicle accident in 1972,
she decided to return to her roots
with the Lower Sioux Indian
Community, near Redwood Falls,
Minnesota in 1991. Being an
enrolled member of that Community and it being the proprietor of
the very successful Jackpot
Jdnction Casino her motivations
may have contained some
thoughts of participating in some
ofthe economic benefits flowing
from the new green buffalo. After
fulfilling her two years residency
requirement, Eidsvig begin
receiving her monthly per capita
payment from the Community's
gaming revenue in 1993. In the
early years she received approximately $3,000 per month, and in
later years around $6,000.
Community members receiving
per caps increased from 141
adults and 125 minors in fiscal
year 1990 to 311 adults and 236
minors in fiscal year 2001.
After giving retirement and
part time jobs a fling for a while
Eidsvig was bored and decided to
try something she always wanted
to do, go to college. So in 1995
at the comfortable age of 68 she
entered the University of
Minnesota in Minneapolis
seeking a B. A. degree in
Women's Studies. Being away
from education for so long and
needing some remedial courses,
Maxine graduated in May 2001.
Since Lower Sioux Community
educational benefits only pay for
four years of study, Eidsvig paid
the last two years herself.
After graduating in May 2001,
she looked forward to moving
back home to the Lower Sioux
Community and using her
recently acquired knowledge.
With housing in short supply in
the Community and in the
Redwood Falls area and because
of a serious asthma, she had
trouble finding suitable housing.
Aware that she had 60 days to
SIOUX to page 7
White Earth meeting calls for racial
unity in coalition against state-tribal
law enforcement agreement
By Jeff Armstrong
A biracial coalition of White
Earth residents opposed to a tribal
law enforcement agreement with
Becker County agreed to set aside
differences which emerged at
Citizens for Lawful Government's
second meeting in Callaway April
16.
"If we're able to band together—U.S. citizens and White
Earth citizens—we'll be able to
dismantle this police force. If it's
just one side or the other, we'll be
like a one-legged dog," said
Leonard Roy, Jr., a tribal member.
Former Callaway mayor Ken
Pearson, spokesperson for the
group, issued a similar plea for
unity.
"I think we're going to accomplish a lot more if we don't divide
along racial lines," Pearson said.
"Whether you're Native American
or not Native American, [the
agreement] is unjust, unfair and
illegal."
James Shimek complained that
since its founding two months ago,
CLG has successfully attracted
local media coverage of its
efforts—in marked contrast to the
scant media attention accorded
well over a decade of exclusively
Native efforts to resist authoritarian rule.
"Before, they wouldn't even
hear what the people had to say,"
Shimek said.
Tribal members pointed out,
however, that discrimination in
media and government was the
best argument for such a joint
effort.
"They won't address our
concerns, but they'll listen to white
people. It's racism, and that's why
we need each other," Roy said.
Although not discussed at the
meeting, it seems apparent that
non-Natives similarly depend upon
the participation of Anishinabeg in
the effort to defend against
potential accusations of racial
motivation.
There was broad agreement
within the group that the existing
tribal agreement needed to be
WHITE EARTH to page 7
Lac Vieux Desert Band of Chippewa prevail in Appellate Court:
6th US Court of Appeals sends
gambling case back to District Court
the City of Detroit. At the time the
plan was developed, off-reservation gambling was not allowed in
the state of Michigan and the
Governor declined to move on the
proposal. Not long thereafter, a
non-Native group Atwater
Entertainment and Greektown
Casino also presented a plan for
casinos in downtown Detroit and
were successful in calling for a
referendum that overturned the
city's prohibition on casino
gambling. Inherent in the new act
that allowed casino gambling was
the provision that preferential
treatment be given to petitioners
that helped overturn the ban on
Detroit's casino gambling. It was
this provision that stirred the Band
to action. In February 1997, the
Band sought to have the act
A report from Detroit by Jean
Pagano
The Lac Vieux Desert Band of
Lake Superior Chippewa (the
Band) recently prevail on appeal to
the 6* US Court of Appeals in
Cincinnati over a gambling case
filed back in 1997. The Lac Vieux
Band claimed that the city of
Detroit unfairly granted casino
licenses to two of the three casinos
in Detroit in the mid 1990s. The
US District Court dismissed the
tribe's case in 1997, but the tribe
appealed and the Court of Appeals
has sent the case back to District
Court in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
The Lac Vieux Band currentiy
operates a casino in Watersmeet in
Gogebic County in the western part
ofthe Upper Peninsula of Michigan. In 1994, the Band, along with
several of its partners, developed a
plan to bring casino gambling to
LAC VIEUX to page 7
VOICE       OF       THE       PEOPLE
web page: www.press-on.net
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Native
American
Press
Ojibwe News
We Support Equal Opportunity For All People
A weekly publication.   Copyright, Native American Press, 2002
Founded in 1988
Volume 14 Issue 20
April 19,2002
Ft. Sill, OK - Army recruits
training at Fort Sill, Oklahoma.
The U.S. Army - demonstrably
the among the most "equal
opportunity" of employers in the
U.S. - puts newly-enlisted
soldiers through the rigors of
basic training, as well as offering
a range of advanced curricula
including K-9 school with attack
dogs who are ;Jso experts al
sniffing out drugs.
The original Fort Sill Mihtary
Reservation, comprising 23,040
acres, was created out ofthe
Kiowa, Comanche and Apache
Reservations by Executive Order
in 1871. During that same
decade, Apache reservations were
created in Arizona and New
Mexico. In 1876 the U.S.
attempted to move the Chiricahua
Apache from their traditional home,
to the San Carlos reservation. They
refused resettlement. After a
decade, they were captured by the
U.S. Army and imprisoned in Fort
Marion, Florida. In 1887 they were
transferred to a prison camp in
Alabama, where many of these
southwestern desert people died in
the alien climate.
In 1894, the survivors of
Geronimo's band were settled on
the Fort Sill Military Reservation in
Oklahoma. Their imprisonment
ended in 1912, when they were
allowed the option of joining the
Mescalero Apache Tribe in New
Mexico and two-thirds left
Oklahoma. Those who remained
were allotted.
Geronimo was bom in 1829, near
the present-day Clifton, Arizona.
His wife, mother and children were
killed in 1858 in an attack against
the Chiricahua, and he
subsequently participated in a
number of raids against Mexican
and U.S. settlers. Geronimo was
confined to Fort Sill reservation for
fifteen years, and died on February
17,1909. People still leave
offerings at his grave on the
reservation, including tying scarves
to neighboring trees.
■
APACHE INDIAN CEMETERIES
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Ik CtaeaJMtt: mat tmt mf $**•*» «f Mmjts Gttetate, Victoria, Cotbm, Naek «mt Jak twt.sf attti
tut temtt a KtaMxtef, ftatte, K*f*al> toi Martta. Hate *» to « «f it* SO Apseks «to mt U.S.
oKmi mt tastj at fat 98. btei »Sft ma nm k tkt k^Vm^mtki^tef tklt^f^t-
6mtdi^mM,HMwi,6ml^^mtrlmm,6l^mmmilmmt'lh»l
TMt etaatay m B«f (tank ant KljiliW in IW» fcf Sewai S»H. RaUMl ctastaHet warty
MtottCttwakea fht V4 athawlti «ai fM* pfet j»t aetk mm m mt.
SawtJ Maaajai mi Dwrajfi mi, affertt teHtfjmrter 6««ge M*Htt an IwrW in. rta P«t CaMtttt.
Fort Sill, Oklahoma _„
Louise Erdrich
wins two
Minnesota Book
awards
Associated Press
ST. PAUL—Louise Erdrich
won the Minnesota Book Award
for best novel Friday night and
Robert Bly won for best poetry.
Erdrich's book, "The Last
Report on the Miracles at Little No
Horse," is a story of life on a North
Dakota Indian reservation told
through the memories of a priest
who keeps something hidden.
Bly's "The Night Abraham
Called to the Stars" is a collection
of poems that examine art and
nature through a complex Middle
Eastern verse form.
In other awards, Garrison
Keillor won the Nature and
Minnesota category for "In Search
of Lake Wobegon," a collection of
essays with photographs by
ERDRICH to page 7
Ramsey County judge says 2 Indian
bands' gambling audits are nonpublic
by Pat Doyle
Minneapolis Star Tribune
A Ramsey County judge ruled
Tuesday that the gambling audits of
two Indian groups that own some
of Minnesota's biggest casinos
should not be made public.
District Judge Louise Bjorkman
ruled that the audits contain trade
secrets that are not public under the
Minnesota Data Practices Act.
Bjorkman ordered the Minnesota
Department of Public Safety, which
collected the audits as part of its
efforts to regulate gambling, not to
release them.
The Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe
and the Prairie Island Dakota Tribe
sued the Department of Public
Safety to prevent release of their
casino audits after another state
agency issued an opinion that they
were public.    The Mille Lacs
band owns Grand Casino Mille
Lacs near Garrison and Grand
Casino Hinckley, and the Prairie
Island tribe owns Treasure Island
Casino in Red Wing.
There was no immediate
reaction Tuesday from the state on
whether it will appeal. "We're
reviewing the decision," said Leslie
Sandberg, spokeswoman for
Minnesota Attorney General Mike
Hatch, whose office represented
the Department of Public Safety.
The Mille Lacs band and the
Prairie Island Dakota argued that
releasing the audits would divulge
legally protected secrets to
potential competitors.
In the Ramsey County case,
Bjorkman granted summary
judgment to the Indian groups,
saying, "The number of requests
for the data and nature of the
requesting parties support the
[Indians'] argument about the
data's independent economic
value."
AUDITS to page 8
Red Lake man pleads guilty to
criminal vehicular injury
Minneapolis - a 21-year-old Red
Lake man who was driving his car
while under the influence of
alcohol when he crashed an auto,
pleaded guilty today in United
States District Court to criminal
vehicular injury.
Derek Lee Thunder entered his
plea before Chief Judge James
Rosenbaum in Minneapolis. He
admitted in court that on June 15,
2001, he was driving well in excess
of the posted speed limit after he
had been drinking. Thunder's
blood alcohol concentration was
more than .10 when he was
involved in the accident. As a result
ofthe accident, one passenger, a
GUILTY to page 8
Supreme Court not kind to tribes
Indian law conference, feared by county,
attended by Mille Lacs Band
by Joel Patenaude
Messenger Staff Writer
Out of concern leaders of Indian
tribes across the United States wish
to increase their jurisdiction over
non-Indians, Mille Lacs County
saw fit to mention an Indian law
conference, that had yet to take
place, in its federal lawsuit
challenging the reservation
boundaries.
The county lawsuit, filed in late
February, briefly previewed the
Federal Bar Association's 27th
annual Indian Law Conference,
titled "Reaffirming tribal sover-.
eignty in an era of judicial
activism."
As it happens, that conference,
held in Albuquerque, N.M., April 4
COURT to page 8