Native American Press / Ojibwe News (Bemidji, Minnesota), 2002-12-06

              INDEX
NEWS AROUND INDIAN COUNTRY
NEWS BRIEFS
COMMENTARY/EDITORIALS
CLASSIFIEDS
2
3
4
7
University of
Minnesota student
awarded DOVE
Fellowship
page 3
Valuable lessons I
learned from my
grandmother
page 4
Statement by Arthur
"Archie" LaRose,
Secretary/Treasurer
to Leech Lake Band
members
page 4
Attention Dee
Fairbanks
supporters
page 4
Commentary
State budget deficit will
be felt especially hard in
Indian country
page 4
Forensic audit update at Red Lake
Auditors reveal that casino overexpenditures
top $14 million
By Bill Lawrence
Auditors Randy Johnson and
Don Romero of RSM McGladrey,
Inc., told the Red Lake tribal council members and other tribal members at a meeting on Tuesday, December 3, at the Red Lake tribal
council hall that the firm's audits
had determined that the River Road
Hotel and Water Park project
overexpenditures exceeded $14 milhon according to their revised estimates.
The purpose of the meeting between the auditors and the tribal
council members was to look at additional financial records in the accounts managed by former tribal
treasurer's Dan King which should
be audited. The decision was to
proceed in the following five areas:
1) business travel paid for by tribal
general funds from FY 1998 - 2002,
2) travel advances, 3) pubhc safety
travel, 4) salary advances, and 5)
Custom Doors I.
During the question and answer
part ofthe December 3^ meeting,
Romero said that the auditors have
documented overexpenditures of
more than $14 milhon at the River
Road casino expansion project. The
tribal council had authorized, by
resolution, expenditure of
$26,507,000, but the documented
expenditures for the expansion now
exceed $40,500,000, Romero said.
The additional unauthorized expenditures went into the casino expansion and purchase of slot machines.
Romero reiterated that
$7,344,000 was spent on the water
park, $22,279,000 was spent on the
hotel, and that as of September 10*
$8,672,000 had gone into the casino, and an additional $4 miUion
had spent which came out of the $4
milhon dollar "loan" which the tribe
withdrew from the stumpage funds
trust account.
The auditors ronffrmed that the
' 'winning bid'' for the hotel and water park expansion came in by fax
after the deadline for bids had officially closed. The construction contract was awarded to Stevens Construction of Madison, Wisconsin.
In addition, the purchase of the
Sabo Farm with $800,000 of funds
intended to plan and operate a
Youth Camp was discussed. Since
the money was spent on the Sabo
Farm instead, the Youth Camp
never happened, at now the USDA
wants their grant money back
Questions were raised at the December 3rd meeting regarding the
closeout audit of the Red Lake De
tention Center, which was recently
performed by the Office ofthe Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Justice. The audit revealed
unauthorized travel expenditures of
$7,000 from Detention Center
funds. The Regional Office of the
Department of Justice in Chicago is
presently doing an audit of expenditures for the Detention Center,
and are reportedly going to be doing a closeout audit with the tribal
council very soon.
The tribal General Fund audit for
Fiscal Year 2001 (October 1,2000
- December 31,2001) was not
complete at the time that the auditors met with the tribal council
members. Treasurer Darrel Seki
said that auditors told him that they
hoped to have it done by the end of
the week and in time for the next
tribal council meeting on Tuesday,
December 10th. The audit is being
prepared by the CPA firm of Brady
Martz and Associates of Grand
Forks, North Dakota. That firm
has previously audited Red Lake
Industries (Modular Homes) and
Red Lake Custom Doors n.
The Red Lake Band of
Chippewa Indians general fund
budget summaries as of October
31,2002 are reproduced on page 6.
Leech Lake chairman candidate Reese calls for
constitutional convention
By Jeff Armstrong
Since the year of his arrest at the
first Camp Justice movement protest at Leech Lake in 1988, Walter
(Frank) Reese has been putting
himself forward as a candidate for
tribal office in order to facilitate a
constitutional convention aimed at
creating a legitimate form of government which truly serves the
people. Previous efforts have
failed, Reese says, due to an institutional unwillingness on the part of
tribal officials to relinquish their
virtual monopoly of pohtical authority.
'We've got to beheve in the
people," he said. "The framing of
the constitution should come from
the people. Elected officials need to
start believing in the talents and
abilities of tribal members."
In the summer of 1987, Reese
was one of hundreds of MCT
members who turned out for a TEC
meeting in Cass Lake to block the
TEC's efforts to amend the tribal
constitution so as to assume dicta
torial legislative, judicial and executive powers. The outpouring of
tribal opposition not only convinced the TEC to withdraw
Amendment JJX as it was called,
but also compelled the tribal governing body to hold a constitutional
convention within 18 months.
Reese said the TEC further committed to holding primaries in the
upcoming election to insure a majority vote.
"They said they'd have [primaries] in place in the next year's
election, but of course they didn't,"
Reese said.
Although he fell well short ofthe
top vote-getter in 1988, Reese successfully challenged the election on
the basis that no candidate had received a majority vote, a requirement under the existing tribal constitution. A reservation election
judge affirmed Reese's contention
that constitutional references to a
majority vote meant just that—
50% plus one. When the judge,
Peggy Treuer, refused to withdraw
her decision under pressure from
the RBC, the TEC created a tribal
appellate court headed by Skip
Finn—who had argued for Reese's
opponent before the reservation
judge—to overturn the decision.
Since then, the TEC and RBCs
have coUuded to implement at the
reservation level the judicial powers they dared not submit to a tribal
vote in accordance with the MCT
Constitution.
Ironically, by the time primary
elections were instituted a decade
later, they cost Reese a seat as secretary treasurer. In the 1997 elec-   f
tion to serve the remainder of
ousted secretary treasurer Dan
Brown's term, Reese was first in
balloting by a significant margin
but iell short of Linda Johnston in
the runoff.
Reese said the existing judicial
systems are tilegitimate in the absence of a constitutional amendment and called for a renegotiation
REESE to page 6
Petition served on LaRose at Leech Lake
Cass Lake, MN—On Monday,
December 2,2002, a petition for
removal was served on Leech
Lake Reservation Secretary-Treasurer Arthur "Archie" LaRose.
The petition charges LaRose with
three violations of the MCT Constitution: charge 1) malfeasance
in the handling of tribal affairs;
charge 2) derehction or neglect of
duty; and charge 3) refusal to
comply with any provisions of
the constitution and bylaws ofthe
tribe. It appears that the charges
were simply copied from the September 2002 petition to recall
former chairman Eh Hunt.
Archie LaRose denies the charges
and says that he will vigorously
oppose them.
The petition, which was reportedly served by Leech Lake tribal
member and former Leech Lake
legal services attorney Mike
Garbow, contains 503 signatures,
which is 52 more than the required 451 signatures constituting
20% of enrolled resident voters.
The threshold was verified by
Minnesota Chippewa Tribe
(MCT) Executive Director, Gary
Frazer, over the telephone,
Pras.s/CW called Garbow for
comment, and he verified that he
did serve the petition last Monday. Garbow, who is now the Assistant County Attorney for
Beltrami County, said that he
served the petition as a concerned
member ofthe Leech Lake Band
and as one ofthe spokespersons
for the petitioners, not in his official capacity as a Beltrami
County official.
LaRose reportedly reacted to
the petition by stating to his fellow RBC members that 'This is a
sloppy petition you guys presented to me and if it's a fair and
honest validation process it's going to be thrown out." Mr.
LaRose was referring to the process that the validation committee
had foUowed in determining the
validity of signatures on the removal petition for former Chairman Eli O. Hunt. That petition
was determined to be valid and
Hunt was removed from office in
a recaU election on October 11,
2002.
Inside sources say that at least
25% ofthe signatures wiU eventuaUy be determined to be invalid. "There are cases of nonresidents signing and cases of
elderly people hving in nursing
homes signing. These nursing
homes are located off the reservation also and there might be some
concern over the ability of these
elders to understand what they
are signing." The implication is
that the petition signature gatherers have somehow taken advantage of these vulnerable elderly
tribal members.
The RBC appointed a group to
undertake the validation process
LAROSE to page 6
VOICE
O   F
THE
People
web page: www.press-on.net
We Support Equal Opportunity For All People
A weekly publication.    Copyright, Native American Press, 2002	
Founded in 1988
Volume 15 Issue 27
December 6,2002
The Feeding of the Spirit. Oil painting by Joe Geshick.
Ojibwe artist opens exhibition in Minneapolis
Joe 'Mishakeebaneesh' Geshick, a Bois Forte member, is opening an exhibition, "The Feeding ofthe
Spirit," at Horst Galleries, 315 Lincoln Street Northeast, in Minneapolis on Friday, December 6, from 6
- 10 p.m. Opening events wiU include Ojibwe singing and dramming. The exhibition will be open
through January 10.
2 Cass Lake teens charged in beating death of blind man
by Larry Oakes, Star Tribune
Northern Minnesota Correspondent
WALKER, MINN. —Two 16-
year-old boys from Cass Lake,
Minn., were arraigned Monday in
Walker on charges of beating a
blind man to death with an ax
handle in what authorities say appears to have been a random act of
violence.
"This could be no more than a
drunken, stupid thing," said Cass
County Sheriff's Office investigator Mike Diekmann, who was trying to determine the extent to
which two other teenagers may
have been involved.
DarreU (Louie) Bisson, 48, was
walking his dog near his home in
Cass Lake about 11:15 p.m. Friday
when he was attacked, apparently
without provocation, and left to die
on the sidewalk along the town's
main street
Residents of Cass Lake, a town
of about 900 people on the Leech
Lake Indian Reservation said the
lolling fits a years-long trend of increasing violence and other crimi-
Darrell (Louie) Bisson
nal activity by juventies in the area.
Authorities say they have weapons used in the attack: a bloody ax
handle and an athletic shoe one of
the boys was wearing when he
stomped on Bisson's face.
The shoe left a partem of the sole
on Bisson's face.
After being implicated by witnesses and arrested over the weekend, Jessie Royal Tapio and George
Allen Raphael Boswell, both 16, appeared Monday in Cass County District Court on two counts each of
second-degree murder.
The accused, wearing orange jaU
imiforms, were handcuffed as deputies led them into the courtroom
where several of their relatives sat
on one side ofthe aisle and a larger
group ofthe victims' relatives sat on
the other.
No sooner had they entered the
room when one ofthe victims' relatives swore loudly at one of the defendants and yeUed, "Remember my
face!" A bailiff laid a hand on her
shoulder and told her to be quiet.
The relative later said the boy had
smirked at her.
District Judge Michael Haas
asked each if he understood the
criminal complaint filed in his case.
Tapio replied, "It says I murdered
someone." Both defendants softly
answered questions, sometimes addressing the judge as "sir." Their
faces were expressionless.
Hass ordered that they be held in
separate juvenile detention centers
pending a hearing next Tuesday on a
motion by County Attorney Earl
BISSON to page 7
Former Leech Lake chairman withdraws from election
Associated Press
WALKER, Minn. — EH O.
Hunt, who was ousted as chairman ofthe Leech Lake Band of
Ojibwe in October, withdrew Sunday as a candidate in the special
election for the office.
Hunt said he did a lot of "soul
searching" since filing his candidacy and decided that "the demands of the job and the current
pohtical climate may have an adverse impact on my health."
In an Oct. 11 recaU election, the
band voted to remove Hunt from
office after the Tribal CouncU
blocked an audit ofthe band's
payroU. Fifty-six percent of band
members voted to recall Hunt, while
44 percent voted to keep him as
chairman.
Hunt was elected to his first term
as Leech Lake chairman in 1996
and to his second term in 2000.
The push to remove Hunt began
in August after the band's new secretary-treasurer, Arthur' 'Archie''
LaRose, tried to initiate an audit of
the tribal payroU but was stopped by
the Tribal CouncU.
Some accused Hunt of preventing
the audit because he was afraid of
what it might show. They accused
him of failing to keep track of ex-
penditures at restaurants and for
movies and of paying severance for
two former Tribal CouncU members
with gaming funds and repaying
those funds when a new operating
budget was set.
A primary election is set for Dec.
17. The special election wtil be held
Jan. 7.
Hunt said he was grateful for the
support he's received from some
band members.
"There are many fine candidates
for this office and I wish our people
weU as they vote for our next chairman," he said.
Note: Eli Hunt's Letter to Leech
Laker on page 4.
State in dispute
over fuel tax
on reservation
By Joe Kafka
Associated Press
PIERRE, S.D. — State authority to tax gasoline and diesel fuel
trucked onto the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation was chaUenged
Tuesday in arguments to the
South Dakota Supreme Court.
Loren "Bat" Pourier, the
Oglala Sioux owner of a large
convenience store at Pine Ridge,
should not have to pay the iUegal
tax, said Vanya Hogen, a Minneapohs lawyer hired by the reservation businessman.
Furthermore, Pourier should
get a $938,000 refund for taxes
he paid under protest on 5 miUion
gaUons of fuel deUvered to his
service station between July 1995
and January 2000, Hogen said.
She argued that the state Revenue Department cannot coUect a
tax on fuel that Pourier hauls to
his business because Congress
has not given states the power to
tax fuel sold on Indian reservations.
TAX to page 6
Court rules Mount Graham observatory foes' appeal
claim moot
By Arthur H.Rotstein
Associated Press
TUCSON, Ariz. — Afederal appeals court ruled Monday that arguments by opponents ofthe University of Arizona's 23-mtie power
line on Mount Graham are moot.
The ruling essentiaUy means environmental foes and two Apache
organizations who have scrapped
and scratched to fight the Mount
Graham International Observatory
project for more than a decade
have httle left to try to block the
first phase from completion.
The university is working with a
scientific consortium to complete
construction of the Large Binocular
Telescope, one ofthe world's most
rxiwerful optical instruments. The
eastern Arizona observatory encompasses 8.6 acres on Mount
Graham's 10,470-foot Emerald
Peak in the Pinaleno Mountains.
Two smaUer telescopes were
completed on the mountaintop,
about 110 miles northeast of Tucson, in 1994.
Partners with the university in
buUding the LBT, which wtil feature twin mirrors 28 feet in diameter, include Italy's Arcetri Astro-
physical Observatory, Ohio State
University, Notre Dame University,
Tucson-based Research Corp. and
a group of German astronomy institutes.
Construction already has been
APPEAL to page 5
Tribal government was in 'total disarray,' chairman says
Associated Press
CROW AGENCY— Numerous employees have been fired in
order to end a pattern of corruption and incompetence that has left
the Crow Tribe's government in
"total disarray," the new chairman
says.
Tribal spokesman Ken Real
Bird acknowledged that "a substantial number" of employees
were tired on Thursday, but would
not confirm reports that the total
could be close to 400.
"When the tribe makes changes,
it is drastic," said Real Bird, the
tribe's pubhc relations officer.
"When the government changes
hands aU the president's men walk
out."
Real Bird said the firings were
in the areas of education, contracts, grants and administrative
positions. No one in essential services such as health care and security was fired, he said.
"When people are not doing
their job, then things have to
change," Real Bird said. "A lot of
the. stuff that happened here borders on malfeasance."
Carl Venne, 56, was sworn in
Nov. 12 as the third person to caU
nimseff chairman since September, when Clifford Birdinground
resigned after pleading gutity to
federal bribery charges.
Btidinground's vice chairman,
Vincent Goes Ahead Jr., took
charge after the resignation and
ran an unsuccessful campaign to
DISARRAY to page 6
McCaleb announces major
realignment of BIA to improve services
Washington -Assistant Secretary
of Indian Affairs Neal McCaleb announced a major proposal to realign
the management organization ofthe
Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) and
Office ofthe Special Trustee for
American Indians (OST) on December 5th. The reorganization is intended to improve services to individual Indian and tribal trust beneficiaries. The "Indian Trust Management Plan" is the result of consultation meetings ofthe Interior Depart
ment held this year with tribal leaders
and the efforts ofthe Joint Tribal/Department ofthe Interior (DOI) Task
Force on Trust Reform to find ways
of improving the DOI's management
oflndian trust assets.
The problems which have plagued
BIA's management of royalties for
oU, gas and grazing on Indian lands
have come under public sciutiny during the Cobell v. Norton lawsuit
McCALEB to page 5
Cases could redefine government's
responsibilities to tribes
By Robert Gehrke
Associated Press
WASHINGTON—The Supreme Court grappled Monday with
how much responsibtiity the government has to protect the resources of
American Indian tribes and whether
the government can be held liable for
failing to meet those obligations.
Two Arizona cases aUege the Interior Department has fatied to keep up
buUdings held in trust for the benefit
ofthe White Mountain Apache
Tribe, and that a former Interior secretary coUuded with a coal company
to keep royalty rates low for a lease
on the Navajo Nation.
In both cases, the Bush administration is seeking the reversal of an appeals court ruling that said the government is liable for damages. In the
Navajo case, those damages could
reach $600 million. The White
CASES to page 5
!plKi8*8ff|i|i**fo^^