Things Get Interesting

Elections have a way of bring out the worst and occasionally the best in people. More often, however, it tends to be the former. This year in particular doesn’t seem to be any different, but over time I guess I’ve learned to live with it.
Honestly, my intentions when starting this blog were to keep a running journal of what happens to Council members in their jobs on a daily basis, and especially during elections. In that respect, I wish I’d started it after first getting elected. Last summer I made my push for having blogs as part of the Tribal Council portion of the tribal website, since it just seemed one of the best ways for leaders to communicate. That idea of course went down quick. One Council member, I remember quite distinctly, told me it would be unfair because of course I would be posting more than others. I was later reminded that I am more of a computer person, and not everyone on Council is comfortable or used this way of life. And of course one Council member shot it down because… get this “It could become political”. We know how taboo that is in our line of work, for anything to become political.
In hindsight, my suspicions are that some Council members 1) don’t like to put anything in writing, lest they be held accountable for it (verbalizing everything is the easiest way to cover one’s behind, you can always say “I didn’t say that!” and unless recorded the matter rests), and 2) don’t want to add any extra work to their jobs, and a blog would be extra work. Either way, I lost the blog battle one summer ago and haven’t raised the issue since. My one true regret is not starting this blog earlier, but I guess the light didn’t go on in my head until recently.
I don’t really have a major point to make today, other than to appreciate how interesting life as a Council member gets during election time, and how the internet is such a great invention that allows me to communicate some of that experience to those who are interested. In no particular order, here a few anecdotes from election time life as a Council member:

Tuesday morning a rather hostile message was left on my office voice mail. In keeping with the format of much of what I’ve posted here, for something like this names will be omitted, even though this person made sure there would be little mistake as to who left this message. Basically, earlier in the year this person called me repeatedly, under some admittedly grim circumstances, and made a request that legally I really saw no way to honor. When I explained my reasons for not being able to help her she unloaded on me. That is basically an understatement, but I don’t know quite how else to put it.
After that incident she called two separate times, one time breaking down and screaming a message onto my voicemail that meant nothing good. A second time she called and left yet another message, this one subdued at first but basically lapsing into a tirade like earlier.
The message she left for me Tuesday was pretty simple. I have power of attorney over five family members, she hissed into my voicemail. That’s five votes, she said, and I’m gonna make sure none of them go to you!
It was not the best way to start my day.

Also Tuesday morning, a Tribal Elder called me, with a rather unusual question. Well actually, two questions. The first one was “How’s the campaign going?” To which I responded in past campaigns I always seemed to have more time. The Elder understood, working full-time leave little room for campaigning.
I am hoping that this Elder will read this post and correct me if I’m wrong, because here goes the second part, from memory. Another Elder stopped by her house, evidently doing a little bit of campaigning, and not on my behalf. The story was that Council members don’t pay taxes on their salary. Naturally, the Elder who called me promised them this couldn’t be true, but to the other Elder it was evidently gospel truth. Not only do they not pay taxes on those Council salaries, but doesn’t that seem like a lot of money for some of those young Council members?
The obvious way to resolve this issue was just to put in a call to me, which is what happened. Because I usually do Direct Deposit into my bank account, my paychecks are sitting around collecting dust since they are basically just receipts. Having one handy, I simply ripped it open and read off, line by line, what taxes are taken out of each paycheck. The Elder thanked me for my time. I had to chuckle, because what gets taken as fact out there sometimes baffles me.

I’ve actually already gotten some feedback on my first campaign letter. Knowing that detractors rarely respond, it’s no surprise that the emails I’ve gotten are supportive and overall encouraging. One though I especially liked because this person had read my blog and offered some advice on how to handle a few things, mainly Chairing meetings. His advice made sense in fact I plan to try a thing or two. But he also made a very good point, one that I kind of knew but could ever put into words, and that is that for running meetings Roberts Rules of Order works if people are respectful, polite, and deferential. In other words, the people in the meetings matter just as much as the system used to run those meetings.

All this and it’s just Wednesday.