The Ojibwe News (Bemidji, Minnesota), 1993-12-24

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Assistant Secretary of Interior Ada Deer meets
with vocal community
By Gary Blair
Ada Deer's visit to the Twin Cities last
Friday was quite eventful. Over one
hundred Native Americans filled the
gym of the Minneapolis American
Indian Center to greet the Assistant
Secretary of Interior for Indian Affairs.
U.S. Senator Paul Wellstone gave
opening remarks and then left without
taking questions.
Deer told the group she came to
learn more about the conditions now
facing Indian people and to learn
about the programs that serve them.
The two hour meeting which ended
around 2:30 p.m. was hosted by the
Minnesota Affairs Council.
Shortly before her arrival, urban
enroilees from the Leech Lake
Reservation formed a protest outside
the Indian Center. Apparently,
members living on the reservation
had received a one hundred dollar
Christmas bonus while urban
members were told they would receive
the same if they could come forward
before 3:00 p.m. on December 15th.
According to the protestors, they
learned of the money offer at about
1:00 p.m. and they went directly to
the Leech Lake Twin Cities office
expecting to collect their money. To
their disappointment, however, they
were told by office staff that the 3:00
p.m. deadline meant they would have
to be in Cass Lake by that time if they
were to receive the money. The trip
takes over three hours by car and they
were given less than two hours to get
there, so the enroilees were very upset
with the obvious unfairness of the
situation and were requesting loudly
that Deer do something about it.
[Although it did not occur until later
DEER/Page 3
fVational Indian Business Association elects Al Paulson co-chair/ Page 1
New Prairie Island tribal council takes office/ Page 1
fPictures of Leech Lake enroilees protesting at Indian Center/Page 5
£)pen letter to Leech Lake members from Ada Deer/ Page 4
Lac du Flambeau responds to newspaper smear/ Page 4
Gaming negotiations reach impasse/ Page 1
Voice of the Anishinabeg
■    ■■■■■■■■■ - ^.':-,.:;,-V^ .::::-    .'    '
Tribal casinos wasted millions, auditors say
Minneapolis (AP) ~ Indian casinos
signed contracts paying outside managers at least $62 million in excessive
fees and spent 12 times more than
needed to lease gambling machines,
the U. S. inspector general said Friday.
The report said the Bureau oflndian
Affairs, the National Indian Gaming
Commission and states failed to enforce laws to assure that Indian gambling primarily benefits tribes. The
report said 37 tribal casino businesses
~ one third ofthe total ~ were operating without state agreements in apparent violation of federal law. The
report concentrated on Michigan and
Wisconsin, where auditors said some
of the biggest problems were found.
Auditors said six Wisconsin tribes
paid $26 million in excessive fees to
lease gambling machines — 11 times
what the equipment cost to buy. Wisconsin tribes lost another $500,000
from theft and embezzlement. Michigan casinos spent $ 12 million to lease
gambling machines worth $623,000,
the report said. An overriding conclusion was that many tribes relied on
inaccurate financial advice or wasted
money because they rushed into the
casino business before federal regulations were enforced or even passed.
Auditors contacted Indian tribes in
Wisconsin, Montana, Michigan, Ne
braska, Oklahoma and Oregon during
the first half of 1993 for the report.
They also interviewed state officials
in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan,
Nebraska, California, Iowa, New Jersey, Nevada, Oregon and Washington. Auditors did not specify how much
money may have been lost by Minnesota casinos as a result of mismanagement or fraud. But in a report in
February, the inspector general concluded that Minnesota and Wisconsin
casinos lost $11.5 million. And the
inspector general is investigating allegations that Minnesota BIA offi-
CASINO/ Page 3
Fifty Cents
Ojibwe
News
We Support: Equal Opportunity For All People
1
Founded in 198B Volume 5   Issue EB        December E4, 1333
A weekly publication.
Copyright:. The Ojibwe Mews, 1993
Gaming negotiations reach impasse
Gaming law changes delayed until next year
By Bunty Anquoe
Reprinted with permission
of Indian Country Today
Washington - Negotiations
between tribes and states to find a
compromise on changes to the federal-
Indian gaming law may have reached
a stalemate.
The negotiating team of tribal
leaders and state officials failed for
the fourth time in six months to meet
a target deadline for consensus
legislation amending the Indian
Gaming Regulatory Act.
Senate Indian Affairs Committee
chairman Daniel K. Inouye, D-
Hawaii, had said a draft bill was
expected by mid-November, although
he insists that negotiations are still
making steady progress.
The senator and committee vice-
chairman John McCain, R-Ariz.,
began the talks with the competing
interests in an effort to hold off a full-
scale legislative war in the escalating
political battle over who controls
gambling in Indian country.
"There is no stalemate," Sen. Inouye
told Indian Country Today. The
governors submitted a proposal for
amendments and tribal leaders are
looking at it. "The process is still
working and will go on."
But according to a Nov. 15 letter to
Sen. Inouye and McCain, the National
Governors Association and the
National Association of Attorneys
General insisted that tribes make
concession on game-specific language
in any amendments to the Indian
Gaming Act or they will leave the
negotiating table.
The "scope of gaming" has emerged
as the threshold issue, both sides
have agreed.
Since the embattled gaming law
was enacted in 1988, tribes and states
have clashed in legal and political
squabbles over sovereignty and
jurisdiction.
States, with financial and political
support from the private gambling
industry, want more control over the
scope of tribal gaming. They argue
that the gaming law, as currently
applied, infringes on states' rights by
forcing tribal casinos within state
borders.
They have been seeking
amendments that would limit tribes
to specific games authorized unH«'
state law and regulations.
"There is an outline for an agreement
between state and the tribal
governments that includes potential
IMPASSE/Page 3
riewly Elected Prairie Island Dakota council members. From L. to R. Curtis Campbell Sr., Bryan White, Michae
Childs, Allen Childs, Spiritual Leader - Chris Leith, and Darelynn Lehto, Prairie Island Tribal members am
drummers at the traditional Indian style celebration following the swearing in cerempny at tribal headquarters oi
Saturday, December 11,1993.
New Prairie Island Tribal Council takes office
Biographer pleased with Geronimo movies
despite historical flaws
By Bill Kaczor
PENSACOLA, Fla. (AP)~
Geronimo biographer Woody Skinner is pleased that two new movies are
rekindling interest in the Apache
warrior, although both contain historical flaws. -
His biggest disappointment, however, is that neither film depicts the
nearly three decades Geronimo and
his people spent as prisoners of war in
Florida, Alabama and Oklahoma.
"A lot of people are aware of
Geronimo and certainly you've got to
appreciate that," Skinner said. "Just
because they take him out of context
and they have him doing things he
didn't do, not doing things he had
done ..., that didn't bother me."
"Geronimo," the television movie
being shown on the TNT cable network, and the theater version,
"Geronimo: An American Legend,"
are heavy on action. Both give the
Apache medicine man the hero treatment—an Indian freedom fighter who
wins all his battles— that is the antithesis of how Hollywood once depicted
Native Americans.
However, some Apaches do not view
him as a hero, said Skinner, author of
"The Apache Rock Crumbles: The
Captivity of Geronimo's People."
They blame Geronimo forthe 7.7 years
their people spent as prisoners, the
Pensacola historian said.
The nomadic Apaches had been
forced to live on a reservation in
Arizona but small bands would break
out, raiding and killing American
and Mexican settlers on both sides of
the border.
Geronimo, the Mexicans called him
that after St. Jerome, the orator, because he would shout for them to
come out and fight, led the final
breakout of about 150 Indians in
May 1885.
The theater movie, with Wes Studi
in the title role, focuses on this episode. Geronimo's band dwindled to
36 as most returned to the reservation, but more than 5,000 troops were
unable to capture him.
Finally, Lt. Charles Gatewood, interpreter George Wratten, and two
Apache scouts, Kayitah and Martine,
found his camp in Mexico the following year and began negotiating his
surrender. By then the first of about
500 Apaches had already been shipped
to Fort Marion in St. Augustine as
punishment for the breakout.
Geronimo and about half of his
small band later were imprisoned at
Fort Pickens on a barrier island south
of Pensacola. The POWs at St. Augustine included Apache scouts who
had helped the Army fight Geronimo.
"If Geronimo hadn't gone out that
last time, he only went out with that
small number of people, then the 500
Geronimo/Page 3
By Gary Blair
After more than a week's delay, the
newly elected tribal council of the
Prairie Island Reservation was
officially recognized by the BIA and
was installed into office Friday,
December 17, 1993. In a surprising
historical victory on December 6, five
new members were elected to the
reservation's governing body. The
small Dakota community is located 6
miles north of Red Wing, Minnesota,
and has been the site of heated
controversy for more than a year.
On Monday of this week, the PRESS
received a notice from the old council
thatstated, "The entire Tribal Council
of the Prairie Island Community
together with both the tribal election
judge will meet with the press at
11:00 A.M. to present their official
letter of protest regarding the Bureau
of Indian Affairs reprehensible
intrusion into tribal sovereignty and
the internal political affairs of their
community.
"Tribal Chairman Freeman
Johnson, Vice Chair Johnny Johnson,
Treasurer Vine Wells, council
members Edith Pacini and Lu Taylor
and election judges Geraldine Walker
and Ronald Johnson will present a
letter to the BIA on the steps of the
BIA in the Midland square building
at 331 2nd Ave. S. in downtown
Minneapolis.
"The letter will state the position of
the tribal council on the unjustified
and illegal action of the BIA in
ordering the installation ofan illegally
elected tribal council."
The press advisory also included
the following: "For more information
contact election judge Geraldine
Walker..." and it listed her phone
number. The notice appeared to have
been drafted on tribal stationary with
the letterhead blanked out. The letter
had the number 30 typed at the bottom
as through it was part of larger
document.
Shortly after the tribe's election top
voted getters who are employed at the
reservations' casino were demoted.
Curtis Campbell, who defeated
Chairman Johnson, was one of those
forced into a lesser job. Campbell was
the casino's general manager. In that
same action, Freeman Johnson
promoted his son, Ronald Johnson,
who was an election judge, from head
casino janitor to assistant general
manager.
According to PRESS sources, the
first order of business for the newly
elected council was to rescind all the
old council's orders made shortly after
the electionand that included restoring
Campbell and the others to their
former positions at the casino.
Other formal business included
election of officer. Curtis Campbell was
elected chairman; the vicechair position
went to Darelynn Lehto; treasurer is
Allen Childs, Sr.; secretaryisnowByron
White; and the assistant secretary/
treasurer is Michael Childs, Sr.
Vine Wells, who didnt seek re-election,
is quoted in the Red Wing Republican
Eagle newspaper as supporting the newly
elected council and was highly critical of
theoldmembershehadservedwith. Wells
served on the council offand on for nearly
forty years.
Just before press time it was learned
that two ofthe old council members had
removed theirbelongings from the office
building. PRESS sources say one of
themsaid, "Wewereplanningtoprotests
the election, but we have changed our
minds. I will be looking for a job very
soon." Another stated, "This is the
first chairman I have respect for; I
want to work with him."
The National Indian Business
Association elects Minnesotan as
co-chairman
At a recent meeting ofthe directors
of the National Indian Business
Association in Albuquerque, New
Mexico, Altin Paulson of St. Paul,
Minnesota was elected Co-Chairman
ofthe board.
Paulson is an enrolled member of
the White Earth Band ofthe Minnesota
Chippewa Tribe and current chairman
of the Minnesota American Indian
Chamber of Commerce. He is the
senior partner in Marketplace
Productions, a trade show promoter
and conference production company
located in St. Paul.
Paulson attended St. Cloud State
University and graduated from the
University ofMinnesota. While at St.
Cloud State from 1961 to 1964,
Paulson was  a member of the
University's hocky team.
Stewart Little, owner of DBT, Inc.
with offices in Virginia and New
Mexico, and a Colorado River Tribe
member, was also elected Co-
Chairman. Eighteen other Indian
business owners or Tribal business
representatives from across the United
States make up the NIBA board of
directors.
The National Indian Business
Association is headquartered in
Albuquerque, New Mexico. Its
mission is to promote Native
American business development
nationally and internationally through
education, communication and
advocacy. NIBA serves as an advocate
for Indian owned businesses
concerning national issues and
I
COUNCIIV Page3
New gaming commission leadership expected
Submitted photo
New co-chairman Altin Paulson.
facilitates communication between the
Native American business community
and the public and private sectors.
For more information, contact the
NIBA Executive Director at
505/ 256-0589 or Al Paulson at
612/645-6061.
By Bunty Anquoe
Reprinted with permission
of Indian Country Today.
Washington, D.C. — One of two
vacancies on the National Indian
Gaming Commission may soon be
filled.
Peter Goelz, former campaign aide
to President Clinton, is the
administration's likely choice to
succeed current commission
chairman Anthony Hope, a Bush
appointee whose three-year term
expired in May.
Mr. Hope, considered a nemesis to
Indian gaming by many tribal leaders,
will continue in the post until a
successor is confirmed by the Senate.
Mr. Goelz is a longtime Democratic
political consultant and was an adviser
to Kansas City Mayor Emanuel Cleaver.
According to the Kansas City Star,
he previously worked for the riverboat
gambling industry.
Gaye Kingman, spokeswoman for
the National Indian Gaming
Association, said Mr. Goelz recently
attended a tribal leaders task force
meeting on gaming in Reno, Nev.
"The tribes really put him through
the hoops," shesaid. "We think he got
a really good education about Indian
gaming."
The association, which represents
96 tribes, has not endorsed Mr. Goelz
to the chairmanship position which
pays $115,700 per year.
The three member gaming
commission is an independent federal
entity that is responsible for
formulating and enforcing federal
regulations over Indian gaming
operations. It also approves
management contracts for tribes that
have high-stakes gaming compacts
with states.
Tribes belonging to the National
Indian Gaming Association had
submitted three names to the White
House for consideration for the
commission chairmanship.
These included: Tim Wapato, a
member ofthe Colville Confederated
Tribe and current executive director
of the Indian Gaming Association;
Harold Monteau, a Chippewa-Cree
whose law practice is based in Great
Falls, Mont.; and Gwen Margolis, a
non-Indian Florida state legislator
who has worked with gaming tribes
in the state.
Commissioner Joel Frank's position
is also now open and the Indian
gaming association has suggested Mr.
Monteau orMr. Wapato as candidates
for the position, Ms. Kingman said,
adding that more names will be
submitted in the near future.
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