The Ojibwe News (Bemidji, Minnesota), 1997-02-14

              Suppressed 1994 MCT Housing audit found
rampant misappropriations
By Gary Blair
According to a 1994 procedural
audit obtained by the PRESS, the
Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, (MCT)
Home Loan Program's (HLP) management problems were pervasive by
the time they fired director Larry
Glass more than two years ago.
MCT's executive director Gary
Frazer said last December that Glass
was terminated because of theft.
However, former HLP staff Terry
Michaud and John P. Smith say Frazer
himself also benefited from Glass' illegal activities.
The procedural portion of the audit
outlined numerous HLP administrative problems and made recommendations for corrective action. The audit was conducted by Joseph Eve and
company, a CPA firm from Billings,
Montana whose company performs
audits nationally. The procedural audit report that was sent to the MCT's
Tribal Executive Committee was
dated September 1994.
Katherine Hadley, Commissioner of
the Minnesota Housing Finance
Agency (MHFA), says her organization never received the 1994 HLP
audit report until the PRESS' first article in Dec. 1996, which finally cast
light on the troubled agency . "You
can make your interpretation of that—
and I am sure you will," an angry
Hadley said on Wednesday. The
tribe's HLP receives nearly $3 million
bi-annually from the MHFA.
Hadley also stated, "We monitored
that program (HLP) just like we do
the others that we administer. Once
they receive the money from us, they
can do what they want with it; they're
responsible for the management of
those funds—we're not. We have to
respect their sovereignty and autonomy," she said.
"Yes, I met with [TEC President]
Norman Deschampe last week. We
had that meeting set up a long time
ago. And yes, we're concerned as to
why they (MCT) did not send us that
(1994) audit report sooner, but things
are all right now with that (HLP) program," Hadley added.
Apparently, Hadley has not seen the
procedural portion of the audit, which
points out the untold trouble spots and
avenues for theft that were found
within HLP's operation. The 1994
audit was requested by the TEC and
was based on an agreed upon random
Audit cont'd on 3
1994 MCT Housing audit found rampant misappro.
St. appeals court to hear arguments on sovereignty
False-arrest claims against Keweenaw Bay police
Tribes struggle with casino profit-sharing issues
Sell the BLM's public land - commentary/ pg 5
Voice of the People
Attorney files false-arrest claims against
Keweenaw Bay tribal police
Fifty Cents
U.S Postage Paid
BULK RATE
Permit No. 40
Bemidji. MN 56601
Ojibwi
By Vanessa Dietz
Marquette Daily Mining Gazette
, Three men who were the recent
targets of Keweenaw Bay Indian
Tribal Police have in turn targeted
officers for excessive force and false
arrests in claims filed with the
Department of Interior.
Joshua Emery, Scott Rutherford
and Colin Van claim they received
injuries during a Dec. 17 early
morning raid into buildings on the
site of the former KBIC Tribal
Center. Fight For Justice, a group
which questions the current tribal
government's policies, took over the
tribal center in August 1995.
Representing the trio of claimants is
Hancock attorney Mark Wisti..
Emery, a tribal member, requests
$50,000 for injuries to his eyes. He
says he was in the former tribal
center when one tribal police officer
sprayed mace in his face after telling
him to move out of the way, an order
with which he said he complied.
Emery, who has asthma, reportedly
reacted severely to the substance and
screamed in pain. Emergency
medical technicians later treated him
at the scene. Police also reportedly
sprayed mace at Emery's mother,
Colleen McSawby.
Rutherford is asking for $ 1 million
for personal-injury damages
including emotional distress.
Rutherford, a member of Witnesses
for Non-Violence, has been on the
site since summer.
He says he was falsely arrested
by KBIC Tribal Police officers who
forcibly entered the room in which
he was sleeping in the former tribal
center. He said police officers told
him to lie face-down on his bed and
hand-cuffed him. The officers
removed the handcuffs before they
left the site, Rutherford said.
Non-tribal member Colin Van's
claim is for $1,020,000 for damage
to his car and for injuries to his right
and left wrists, neck and back and
for emotional distress. Van says not
only did the police falsely arrest
him, they used excessive force to do
so.
Van said police ordered him to
leave the tribal center and escorted
him out. He got in his car and was
Arrest cont'd on 3
News
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Volume 9    Issue 18        February 14, 1997
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Copyright, The Ojibwe Mews, 1 997
Indian tribes struggle with casino profit-
sharing issues
By Pat Doyle
Minneapolis Slur Tribune Staff Writer
Many American Indian tribes with
casinos face a tough question: How
should profits be disbursed when
nearly as many members live in distant
cities as on reservations?
That reality forces some tribes to
choose between sharing profits
directly with members and using the
money to run tribal programs and
services.
The Ho-Chunk Nation of Wisconsin
has struggled with the choice. Many
of its 5,556 members live in the Twin
Cities, Milwaukee and Chicago. Two
years ago such members led the drive
to elect a president - Chloris Lowe Jr.
- who promised bigger profit-sharing
checks.
All Ho-Chunk members receive a
share of profits, but Lowe's message
struck a chord with members living far
from tribal communities, social
services and casino jobs in western
Wisconsin.
But members in western Wisconsin
feared that the bigger paychecks
would jeopardize tribal emergency
assistance, housing, health care and
other services.
"They said, 'We need to take care
of elders, our children,'" said tribal
member Barbara Blackdeer-
Mackenzie, a former Bloomington
resident. She initially favored Lowe's
plan for bigger checks, but moving
back to the Ho-Chunk community in
Wisconsin changed her mind.
Last month tribal members ousted
Lowe from office by a narrow margin.
Profit con't on 5
On left, Ogi-chi-chaa-naa-be'o, or Spirit Speaker, more commonly known as Leonard Butcher.
State appeals court to hear arguments on
sovereignty, treaty rights in disputed White
Earth territory
Counties seek delay of Indians'treaty rights
By Dennis Lien, Staff Writer
St. Paul Pioneer Press
A federal judge has been asked to
order the Mille Lacs Band of
Chippewa and seven other Indian
bands to refrain from exercising their
hunting and fishing rights until after
an appeal is completed. The request
came from nine counties that, along
with the state of Minnesota and various
landowners, have contested those
treaty rights.
In late January, U.S. District Court
Judge Michael Davis ruled the bands
could begin hunting and fishing across
a 12-county area of east-central
Minnesota. Davis determined the
bands' conservation code and
management plan governing member
activities protects the natural resources
and does not pose public health or
safety problems. As a result, he said
the state cannot impose its fish and
game rules on them.
The ruling dealt with a 1990 lawsuit
that asked the federal court to affirm
the Mille Lacs band's rights under the
1837 treaty with the federal
government. In 1994, a federal judge
ruled those rights continue to exist and
scheduled a second phase to address
allocation issues. The other bands then
intervened.
Davis ruling took care of all
remaining issues and eliminated the
need for a trial in March. The groups
plan to appeal to the 8th U.S. Court of
Appeals.
In their request, filed in U.S. District
Court in St. Paul, the counties sought
an order staying Davis' ruling.
Not only are there serious legal
questions, they said, but they and their
citizens would experience greater
hardship than the bands if the status
quo is changed. "Delaying any special
harvest in the counties pending appeal
would not be an undue hardship on the
bands given that they waited some 140
years to file this litigation," the motion
said.
Landowners were expected to file
their request late Monday. The state is
to file Wednesday.
This article is reprinted from the
February 10, 1997, edition of the St.
Paul Pioneer Press.
By Jeff Armstrong
The Minnesota Court of Appeals set
a March 6 hearing date for oral
arguments over whether White Earth's
territorial boundaries, regulatory
jurisdiction and treaty rights extend
into four reservation townships also
claimed by the state. Attorneys for the
State of Minnesota had sought to deny
a defense motion for the hearing.
At issue is Leonard Butcher's
conviction last year in Clearwater
County for hunting within the
northeast four townships of the 36-
square mile White Earth Reservation.
A traditional Anishinabe hunter,
Butcher was tracking deer within the
Lawsuit over trust funds is ruled class action
By Tracey A. Reeves
Washington Bureau
St. Paul Pioneer Press
In a major victory for tribes, a judge
ruled Thursday that American Indians
can sue the federal government
collectively for mishandling hundreds
of millions of their dollars.
The ailing means that any Indian
owed money by the government for
past land and natural resource claims
automatically is part of a lawsuit
a heady filed at the federal court in
Washington.
Attorneys estimate that as many as
300.000 people now are included in
the suit, which makes it the largest
class action brought by Indians against
the government. U.S. District Court
Judge Royce Lamberth also ruled that
the descendants of Indians who had
claims can join the lawsuit.
"This is monumental for us," said
Elouise Cobcll of the Blackfoot tribe
of Montana, the lead plaintiff. "This
is good news for every Indian, and all
our ancestors who now can be
represented."
The lawsuit names Treasury
Secretary Robert Rubin, Interior
Secretary Bruce Babbitt and Bureau
of Indian Affairs director Ada Deer as
defendants.
Stephanie Hanna, an Interior
Department spokeswoman, said
officials there were not happy with the
ruling.
"We oppose this action," said Hanna.
"But this is one step in a long series of
steps and the judge ... could choose to
revisit it if his decision does not make
sense down the road."
Cobell filed her lawsuit last June,
saying she was fed up with the way the
BIA has handled tribal trust funds -
accounts set up decades ago to manage
government royalties to Indians for
such things as mineral and timber
rights and land sales on reservations.
Although the government managed
the funds, Indians could make
withdrawals at any time. But several
studies have shown that, the Indians'
money has been so poorly managed that
officials don't know how much is there.
Independent auditors have found
that the BIA cannot account for $2.4
billion that is supposed to be in Indian
trust funds.
"Our people have been cheated out
of their money," said Cobell, a board
member of the primarily Indian-owned
Blackfoot National Bank in
northwestern Montana. "I decided to
do something about it."
The money isn't necessarily missing.
Rather, auditors are having difficulty
tracking which tribes and Indians were
paid by the government and how
much. Indians and their lawyers liken
the problems to a bank's being unable
to produce canceled checks or deposit
slips to back up its statements.
"If it were anybody else managing
someone's money, they would be in
jail," said Cobell. "It's a crime."
This article is reprinted from the
February 7, 1997, edition of the St.
Paul Pioneer Press.
1867 Treaty reservation with a tribal
license during the 1994 White Earth
season, when a state DNR agent
confiscated Butcher's gun, later
charging him with driving after
cancellation, taking deer in closed
season, obstructing legal process and
driving with an uncased firearm.
Butcher maintains that the
Anishinabe people never agreed to
give up ownership of or jurisdiction
over the land in question, which was
taken under the guise of the 1889
Nelson Act. And even if the territory
was ceded, the defense argued, treaty
rights to the land were neither
relinquished by the people nor
extinguished by Congress, as federal
law requires.
For Butcher, however, the issue goes
beyond territorial and legal claims and
to the heart of what it means to be
Anishinabe. "I was doing what I had
to do, what I had the right to do. There
are treaties my elders have signed. I
am not from this nation that's called
America," said Butcher. "The Indian
people have something to teach
America. They think we're savages,
but we're not. We were put here for a
reason."
But state district judge Paul
Rasmussen disagreed, striking down
Butcher's motion to dismiss for lack
of subject matter jurisdiction. While
acknowledging that federal courts had
Appeal cont'd on 3
Tribes exempt from some labor laws
SANTA FE (AP) _ The growing
number of jobs tied to Indian gambling
has raised questions about whether
state and federal employment and labor
laws apply to tribes.
The answer: some do; some don't.
State laws dealing with
unemployment compensation and
workers' compensation for injuries
don't apply to' tribes; tribes aren't
required to withhold state income
taxes; the 1964 Civil Rights Act and
the Americans with Disabilities Act
exclude tribes; federal courts have
issued conflicting rulings on whether
the Occupational Safety and Health
Act applies; tribes aren't excluded
from the federal law governing
retirement.
Tribal casinos employ about 4,300
people in New Mexico, about 60
percent of them non-Indians.
A look at labor laws, many of which
were reviewed by Kevin Wadzinski, a
Washington, D.C, lawyer who
represents tribes in employment law
issues, and William Buffalo in a 1995
article in the University of Memphis
Law Review:
Although state laws on
unemployment compensation and
worker's compensation don't apply to
tribes, seven of the 22 tribes in New
Mexico voluntarily participate in the
state unemployment compensation
program and six have filed certificates
of workers' compensation insurance
with the state. A tribe also can have
such insurance without filing with the
state.
"Just because federal law doesn't
apply and state law doesn't apply
doesn't mean employees are without
protection," Wadzinski said.
When a job 57-year-old Mary Ann
Kisner sought as a bingo caller at
Casino Sandia went to a younger
woman, she filed an age discrimination
complaint with the U.S.  Equal
Exempt cont'd on 3
Clinton wants more money for Indian programs
WASHINGTON (AP) _ Following
through on a promise to tribes,
President Clinton proposed a 6 percent
increase in spending on federal Indian
programs next year.
Clinton's 1998 budget includes $1.7
billion forthe Bureau of Indian Affairs,
an 8 percent increase over this year,
and $2.4 billion for the Indian Health
Service, a 3 percent rise.
Other Indian programs, including
housing subsidies, would rise 8 percent
to $2.3 billion.
Congress cut the BIA's budget from
$1.65 billion in 1996 to $1.6 billion
this year.
Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt told
tribal leaders recently that he would
"be out on the point" fighting for more
federal aid for them and that they
should be exempted from spending
cuts that are being made to balance the
federal budget.
The extra money that Clinton has
requested for BIA next year would
allow tribes to maintain 1,250 more
miles of reservation roads, hire 400
additional people for law enforcement
and to repair an additional 75 homes
for needy families, said Ada Deer,
assistant Interior secretary for Indian
affairs.
Overall spending at the Interior
Department would drop $300 million,
to $7.1 billion next year.