Native American Press / Ojibwe News (Bemidji, Minnesota), 2000-02-11

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Wal-Mart
to promote
Sacagawea coin
DQ3
Commentary
Our greatest enemy -
alcohol
pg4
Commentary
Tribal leaders
and the new
McCarthyism
pg4
1 Vernon Bellecourt
j threatens to take
1 over Native
I American Press/
fi Ojibwe News
ti I     1 pg 3
INDEX
News Around Indian Country
News Tidbits
Mille Lacs Band seeks
jurisdiction in criminal case
pgi
Commentary/Editorials/Voices
Smoke Signals of Upcoming Events
Classifieds
Protestors, tribal council
face-off on Pine Ridge
pg 1
Mille Lacs Band
seeks jurisdiction in
criminal case
By Julie Shortridge
The Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe
was allegedly seeking jurisdiction
in a criminal case involving two
Band members, but after several
weeks of discussions between Mille
Lacs County and the Band, the
county will retain jurisdiction in the
case, under state law.
LeeAnn Benjamin is reportedly
being charged with 5,h degree assault and disorderly conduct for an
incident involving Irene Wade Benjamin. The alleged incident reportedly occurred at the home of Larry
Benjamin and Irene Wade Benjamin
on Mille Lacs Band trust land.
Normally, the state has jurisdiction over all criminal matters on the
Mille Lacs reservation. The Band
has jurisdiction over civil matters
involving tribal members.
When this reporter asked Mille
Lacs solicitor general Adam Altman
in a phone interview if the Band had
sought jurisdiction in the case,
MILLE LACS to pg. 5
Red Lake family services director fired,
banished, denied hearing
By Bill Lawrence
On Feb. 4, Rebel Gale Harjo became the 6th person to be banished
from the Red Lake Reservation by
Red Lake Tribal Council chairman
Bobby Whitefeather during his 5 &1/
2 years in office.
Here's how it happened. Harjo, who
had been Director of Red Lake Family & Children Services for the Red
Lake Reservation for approximately
three years, had gone to the Red Lake
tribal office on "Feb. 4 to bring a letter to chairman Whitefeather. The
letter was a request from Harjo to the
Red Lake Tribal Council asking that
she be allowed to appear before them
and ask their consideration of a severance package for her at its regularly
scheduled monthly meeting Feb. 8 —
a request that Harjo said Whitefeather
had suggested and agreed to Feb. 3.
During a 30-minute phone interview, Harjo told Press/ON that as she
entered Whitefeather's office area to
deliver the letter, she was met by his
special assistant Daryl Seki. When
Harjo explained to Seki why she
wanted to see Whitefeather, Seki told
her that the Council had considered
and denied her request at a meeting
Feb. 3 —the same day Whitefeather
had first suggested that Harjo bring a
written request to him about die specifics of her severance package to put
on the agenda for the Feb. 8 tribal
council meeting.
While Harjo was expressing her
outrage to Seki, Whitefeather entered
the room and she shifted her displeasure to him. Harjo told Press/ON that
she told Whitefeather he was a man
"without honor," a "coward" and he
ought to be ashamed to let an employee ofhis be so badly treated.
Whitefeather, shot back that she was
no longer welcome on the reservation and called to have the tribal police remove her.
Fortunately, the Red Lake tribal
police officer who came to remove
Harjo is the son of fair-minded tribal
member who would not let her son
remove Harjo. She was allowed to
remove herself and personal belonging on Feb. 5, with the help of her
children who had flown in from Ari-
RED LAKE topg.5
County approves White Earth law enforcement pact without
public hearing or reservation vote
By Jeff Armstrong
While White Earth tribal members
spoke passionately against a proposed state-tribal law enforcement
system, Becker County Commissioners acted as ifthey had heard it all
before, which, despite their best efforts to the contrary, indeed they had.
The commission voted 4-1 at a Feb.
8 meeting in Detroit Lakes to approve an agreement allowing RBC-
appointed police officers to enforce
state and tribal laws against White
Earth members and to arrest non-
members on the reservation within
the county.
A Feb. 4 letter to the Becker
County board signed by seven tribal
members stated that "we remain resolutely opposed to the implementation of this agreement in the absence
of an independently-monitored tribal
referendum vote and continue to be
highly skeptical ofthe state's authority to subject White Earth to a law
less state-tribal police system against
the will ofthe people of die reservation." [See full text of letter, pg 4]
"One of my concerns is that this
has not been brought to the people
for an open debate," said Roxanne
Claassen, a White Earth member residing in Detroit Lakes, at the meeting. Claassen predicted that the
heavily-armed tribal police force
would be used more to stifle political
dissent than to combat serious crime.
Refusing to engage in dialogue
with grassroots Anishinabeg to the
end, the commissioners were as
oblivious to the threat of legal challenges to the agreement as to the
likelihood of civil rights violations
arising from it.
"The potential for a lawsuit always
exists, no matter what we do," said
commission chair Marjorie Johnson.
But Marvin Manypenny, director
of the Aniishinabe Center, said the
state and county were skating on thin
legal ice by intervening in internal
tribal affairs.
"Unless or until the federal government by act of Congress or otherwise
transfers jurisdiction to the state, the
state has no jurisdiction" to dictate
the terms of tribal law enforcement,
said Manypenny.
"I've struggled many years to get a
fair, just court system," Manypenny
said. "There has been no change. Setting up a law enforcement system is
going to be used to abuse tribal members."
Attorney Ed Peterson said the agreement may serve to shield police officers from the jurisdiction ofthe state
Department of Human Rights, which
he termed "a serious violation of equal
protection rights."
White Earth attorney Zenas Baer
denied that the agreement granted any
additional jurisdiction to the state and
said the federal government would not
have extended the RBC a $ 1 million
COPS grant if there were any question
of its constitutional authority.
Protesters, tribal council face-off on Pine Ridge
Excerpted from Steven Barrett
Associated Press
PINE RIDGE, S.D. (AP) - On its
surface, the three-week occupation
of the Oglala Sioux tribal headquarters building here is about money.
The hundred or so American Indians who have kept round-the-clock
vigil at the headquarters since Jan.
16 say they are unhappy with the
handling of the tribe's finances.
So far, they have succeeded in getting the tribal council to suspend
Treasurer Wesley "Chuck" Jacobs,
whom they accuse of mismanaging
funds. They also have persuaded the
council to order an audit of tribal
financial records from the past five
years.
But many ofthe protesters say the
fiscal squabble is only the latest
nanifestation of a form of tribal
governance that has not worked
>ince it began more than six decades
igo. And they say the current government is simply resisting change.
Tribal council members counter
that they are not opposed to productive change. But they say the protest
has taken an inappropriate form.
Among the protesters' broader
grievances is the tribal council system set up after the 1934 Indian Reorganization Act. Under the system,
council members are elected from
the nine districts on the Pine Ridge
Indian Reservation. They serve two-
year terms.
The brief tenn of service on the
council is part ofthe problem, protester Webster Poor Bear argues.
The rapid change of focus every
time a new council comes in is contrary to both Lakota tradition and
common sense, Poor Bear says. No
business could survive if it radically
altered its goals and business practices every other year, he said.
Floyd Hand suspects he knows
why [the council is nervous]. He and
others at the meeting - including
some veterans ofthe 1973 uprising
at nearby Wounded Knee - see this
occupation as a defining moment. It
is a fulfillment ofthe promise of
Wounded Knee, Hand said.
"When this thing was attempted in
Wounded Knee 27 years ago, we
weren't quite ready," he said. "It's
been spiritually planned for 27
years. ... We have just begun to
fight."
The 71-day Wounded Knee standoff drew international attention to
the reservation when members ofthe
American Indian Movement seized
control ofthe town to protest reservation conditions and the federally
backed tribal government. When it
was over, two protesters were dead
and a federal marshal was paralyzed.
JoAnn Tall, a protester from Porcupine, said the desire to reconfigure
tribal government has been growing
for years. Shannon County, which
makes up most ofthe reservation, is
believed to be the poorest county in
the nation.
"This ... government hasn't
worked, and it isn't going to work,"
Tall said.
PINE RIDGE topg.5
Tribal court dismisses Mystic Lake
lawsuit against Prescott, Johnson
Associated Press
A tribal appeals court has dis-
nissed a lawsuit filed by Mystic
_ake Casino and the Shakopee
vldewakanton Sioux Community
igainst former tribal executives
^eonard Prescott and William
ohnson.
In a decision filed Feb. 1, the tribal
tppeals court threw out the remain-
ng two counts of the original law-
nit, after a tribal judge dismissed
he other counts last April. Attorneys
or Prescott and Johnson said Feb. 3
hat the decision ended six years of
itigation.
The lawsuit had accused Prescott,
he former tribal chairman, and
ohnson, the former chief executive
ifficer and president of Mystic
.ake, of conspiring to control the
asino's operations without tribal
lirection. The tribal government
nd the casino had sought damages
if more than SI million.
Prescott and Johnson denied the
negations and claimed the lawsuit
ms based on politics.
Leonard Prescott
Tribal Judge John Jacobson threw
out most ofthe claims last year except for two claims: that Prescott
had misrepresented that he had no
felony conviction, and that both
men had misrepresented their salaries. But the appeals court ruled that
those statements, even if the defendants made them, were made in
good faith.
Voice      of      t he      People
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Volume 12 Issue 17
February 11,2000
FBI arrests former
tribal leader on
embezzlement charges
Milwaukee (AP)—The former
chairman of the Mole Lake
Chippewa tribe has been arrested on
a federal warrant for embezzling
tribal funds, the FBI said Feb. 7.
Arlyn Ackley, 48, was arrested in
Milwaukee, Wisconsin as he was
about to board a flight to Washington as part of a tribal delegation, FBI
special agent David J. Williams said.
Ackley is charged with using about
$40, 000 in tribal funds for his personal use. He is also charged with
making unauthorized cash withdrawals on his credit card, which
was supposed to be used exclusively
for tribal business.
Ackley was elected chairman in a
1993 write-in campaign, two years
after he was released from prison. He
had resigned in 1989 after a conviction for selling cocaine.
The Mole Lake tribe unanimously
voted to oust Ackley from office in
1998 after the National Indian Gaming Commission ordered the tribe' s
ACKLEY topg.6
Ojibwe artist
Joe Geshick
unveils new
painting Feb. 19
"The Feeding ofthe Spirit" to be
unveiled at February 19
reception in St. Paul
By Julie Shortridge
In his large, comfortable studio,
with soothing background music and
expansive windows over looking the
state capitol, Joe Geshick uses bold,
muted colors to create his strikingly
beautiful paintings. Rooted in his
Anishinabe spirituality, Geshick, his
art and studio exude warmth and
calm.
As we sat on big, comfortable furniture in the portion ofhis studio serving as a living room, Geshick explained the meaning behind his
painting "The Feeding ofthe Spirit,"
one ofhis recent pieces depicting a
man in a canoe offering tobacco to
the spirits.
"It's something we do all the time
in our family. It goes way back.
Something 1 decided to share with
other people. It's our way of showing
respect to the Creator - offering tobacco. For example, as a thanksgiving ceremony when we go out and
harvest wild rice, before we go out
and hunt ducks, before we go out
fishing, or when we go out and pick
blueberries."
Geshick, an enrolled member ofthe
Bois Forte Band of Chippewa in
northcentral Minnesota, explains,
(top) "The Feeding of the
Geshick
"Everything has a spirit, including
tobacco. Everything we say, feel and
think goes into that tobacco, and
then when you release it, it's released
into Gitchie Manitou, die Great
Spirit. So tobacco is very important
to the Anishinabe people."
"The Feeding ofthe Spirit" is
Geshick's first painting to be reproduced as a Giclee, which is a canvas
water-based ink reproduction process
most near to an original. The process
is only a few years old.
At a reception to be held Sat., February 19lh, the original piece and
Giclee reproduction of "The Feeding
ofthe Spirit" will be unveiled, and an
edition of 250 signed and numbered
reproductions will be available for
purchase at $848.50. (The original
painting has already been purchased
for S8,000.) The reception is at 500
Robert Street North, #738, St. Paul,
Minnesota (651) 291-2479. To attend, enter the 10"1 Street door and
use the elevator.
Geshick said it may take him anywhere from days to months to complete a painting, depending on his
mood. "The whole idea of painting
according to moods is to bring out
that spiritual aspect, to do it correctly. If I was to force myself, I
Spirit," (bottom) artist Joe
would most likely mess up the
whole painting. I'd have to start all
over again."
"A strange thing happened. When
I finished my series of 12 paintings
several years ago, they had different
names. After my last year of
sundancing out at Green Grass it
dawned on me that I needed to
change the titles. The names were
too close to the names ofthe ceremonies. So instead of'Sweaflodge,'
I changed it to 'Cleansing.' From
'Shaking Tent' to 'The Helper.'"
The Pipe
Deeply rooted in Anishinabe spirituality, Geshick holds great respect
for the sacredness ofthe pipe. This is
something he learned from his spiritual leaders, most of whom have
now passed away. Out of respect for
the sacred, Geshick shows no pipes
or medicine bundles in his paintings.
Stanley Looking Horse, who was
the keeper ofthe Buffalo Calf Pipe
until he passed away a couple of
years ago, told Geshick, that as a
sundancer, it's his responsibility to
look after his family, his friends
GESHICK topg. 5
Terms of Hudson casino deal questioned
Excerpted from Pat Doyle
Star Tribune
As they reconsider the bid for a
casino at the dog track in Hudson,
Wis., federal officials are questioning
whether the terms of a deal between a
Miami gambling developer and three
Wisconsin Indian bands are in the
tribes' best interest....
Track owner Fred Havenick, a Miami businessman, has predicted that
his company and the tribes each
could make as much as $20 million a
year from the casino, providing an
"economic engine" for the Lac
Courte Oreilles, Red Cliff and Mole
Lake bands of Chippewa. Each band
would be guaranteed $800,000 a
year under the deal.
The Interior Department says the
partners' projected expenses in their
casino application don't clearly identify the management fees to
Havenick's firm, the repayment of
$30 million in track debt or the cost
of city services....
The tribes, with reservations 80 to
200 miles from Hudson, joined
Havenick after he approached them
in the mid-1990s about putting a
casino at the dog track. He was looking for a way to rescue his track,
which has lost millions of dollars
competing with tribal casinos in the
Twin Cities area.
Havenick's firm, Galaxy Gaming,
and the tribes created the Four Feathers Partnership. They asked the Interior Department to convert the track
to Indian reservation land for the casino. Only once under the 1988 Indian Gaming Regulatory Act have
federal officials converted land far
from a reservation into a reservation
for a casino.
In deciding whether to convert
non-Indian land for a casino, the
agency considers whether the move
would be in the best interest ofthe
tribes while not being detrimental to
the surrounding community.
When federal officials rejected the
Hudson casino proposal five years
ago, they said a denimental impact
on the community couldn't be ruled
out....
The tribes sued die Interior Department, alleging that campaign contributions from Minnesota tribes with
casinos had influenced its decision.
An independent counsel found no
evidence to support that claim last
fall.
In October, the agency agreed to
settle the lawsuit by reconsidering
theproject....
While the impact on surrounding
communities remains an issue, the
Interior Department is now for the
first time scrutinizing whether the
casino would be in the best interest
ofthe three tribes....
One aspect ofthe deal that drew
particular attention was an arrangement in which the tribes would lease
a parking lot next to the track.
"The parking lot lease calls for
payments over 25 years that equal
approximately 15 times the value of
the parking lot land," the agency
wrote. It noted that tribal-state gambling compacts are set to renew automatically in three to four years unless
die state moves to terminate them.
"There is no cancellation clause in
the parking lot lease," the department
said. "It is not prudent to sign a 25-
year lease for a business venture that
may terminate in three to four years.''
The department cited a 1993 inspector general's report that criticized
payments made by tribes in Wisconsin and elsewhere for slot machines
"that could have been purchased for
$3.2 million but [were] instead leased
for $40.3 million."...