Hard Times

Earlier in the year former Council member Angie Blackwell told me she would be the subject of an Oregon Public Broadcasting series. The series is titled "Hard Times" and Angie has been one of numerous people covered. I've always thought radio is one of the most under-appreciated mediums for communication. I also think Angie deserves some credit for doing this. The series has been running since last spring.
There are both written and audio versions of the story. Angie still has a memorable laugh:

Hard Times Part 1
Hard Times Part 2
Hard Times Part 3

Getting Around

Several weeks ago we hosted staff from the Salem-Keizer Transit district, one of whom, by the way, is my mother. Our mutual goal is to increase ridership from Salem to Grand Ronde, the bus route having begun more than a year ago. The numbers have been below expectations, meaning unless things pick up, we could have to cut back on the service.
I have sat on the Mid-Willamette Valley Area Commission on Transportation since my first year on Council. It was one of those appointments nobody would ever volunteer for, so rookie Council members are next in line I guess. I also sit on the Yamhill County Transportation Authority board, which like SKATS started a new route from McMinnville to Grand Ronde. Oddly, it is one of our busiest, if not the busiest, routes. Considering we have more casino and governmental employees from Salem than McMinnville, all I can say is go figure. Of course, the YCTA line runs through Sheridan and Willamina, which might offer some explanation.
Public transportation is hard to figure out. I've seen places where it thrives, like in Europe or in Eugene where I went to college at the University of Oregon. But it has also been non-existent in and around Grand Ronde until now, so maybe the idea of being able to catch a bus from the front of our Governance Center to downtown Salem might be slightly daunting. Seeing a gleaming shiny Salem bus in a predominantly rural community just takes some getting used to.
So just what are we going to do to get people to buy in? Well, we can promote it. Find an event in Salem where everybody on Council who attends can hop on the bus. The downtown bus center is on the same block as the Marion County Commissioners offices, where MWACT meetings are held. It is also two blocks from the Capital, for when we have meetings with the governor. Our state lobbyist's office, where we've held many a meeting over the years, is just across the street.
We can also develop a Tribal policy making allowances for employees choosing to use the bus, as the bus schedule doesn't match up with our usual office hours. Could SKATS offer discounts to Tribal employees or community members? Maybe.
I would hate to see this bus route fail. It is a good example of how the Tribe can partner with local governments and companies. Plus many of our housing residents don't have cars. That is why adding sidewalks to Grand Ronde Rd. was so important.
Like a lot of things, it comes down to awareness I'll wager. Let people know they have options, and invariable they'll opt to use them.

Under the Radar

I've been seeing a lot of red recently, an observation hardly surprising given the holidays and all. What is surprising though is that the color red has taken on a whole new twist following a meeting this afternoon on a problem I never thought we would have to deal with in Grand Ronde: gangs.
Several weeks ago there was a shooting over in Keizer, one in which a young man lost his life. He was a man connected to the Grand Ronde community. I won't get into details like his name or the circumstances of the shooting, those can be found on the internet anyway.
Two years ago we offered a lunch-time presentation to our employees. A police officer with expertise in gangs provided a Powerpoint presentation that featured photos of hand signs, graffiti, tattoos, you-name-it. There is a culture amongst gangs. He explained to us what IPO was, among others. And he told us that it will be a problem in a few years. He was right.
I think everybody knows about the tagging that has been going on for a while. The presentation given us today made me wince and shake my head. Because we got into details that the police didn't want made public that meeting was held in executive session, but I must say what we were shown was stunning. Most of the photos were gathered from the world wide web, MySpace is very popular. A number of the photos were young men in red, with bandanas, some with facial tattoos. They were flashing the numerous gang signs, hands made into W's for Westside, or CK for Cryp-Killer. Every time the portions of the faces were whited out so you couldn't completely identify who they were. Sadly, that didn't stop me from recognizing a few of my fellow Tribal members.
What is worse, I slowly recognized the backgrounds in many of the shots, including our Tribal gymnasium, Community Center, Housing, and even at our Pow wow. In other words, under our noses.
Indian communities have been dealing with gangs probably before I even knew they existed, that is certain. But until now, there had always been a distance between them and the world I know. I knew gangs from television and media, and the wannabe's who infested my North Salem High School in the early 1990's because the gangster "look" was considered cool. But to see people I actually know doing this, and even taking it seriously, was very sobering. There is just something grotesque and disturbing about it all.
We're starting a gang awareness program in Grand Ronde. It will be a new challenge for our community.

Thresholds

Sunday's General Council meeting at the onset seemed destined to be short. Our program presentation on the Spirit Mountain Community Fund elicited almost no questions. The nominations for the Elders' Committee, the one committee where members are elected by peers and not Tribal Council, went smoothly. We entered Other Business 15 minutes before the lunch hour.
But a new former Council member seems to have 1) learned of the terrible unintended consequences of both the 1999 and 2008 Constitutional elections on amending the membership requirements; or 2) is already looking ahead to the 2010 Tribal Council elections. On Sunday he stepped forth to propose then and there an advisory vote of the General membership on whether to move forward with another Constitutional election on the same subject, but focusing especially on the "parent on the roll" portion of the requirements. At the risk of sounding a little bit skeptical, the whole stunt rang of electioneering, because I served on Council with this individual and he was hardly a champion of this issue. At least two others made the same observation on the record Sunday. I would not be surprised if some others thought it.
That individual aside, it sparked debate on the topic, and who knows, maybe even hope. This issue has become dormant. But is it an issue that will every really die? I don't think so. Anyway, a few people rightly observed that focusing on only one portion of the enrollment requirements didn't seem to make much sense as at least in regards to split families it would help some but not all. There was also still the issue of the definition of Grand Ronde blood.
The vote, if you could call it that, went something like 25 to 5, with a number of people present obviously not voting as there was more than 30, and with several people stepping up to clarify that their "no" votes weren't opposed to revisiting the issue, but they opposed focusing just on the one section. Even with what I felt like healthy discussion, there had to be a good degree of confusion still on the subject even as the conversation waned.
Looking back, I wouldn't blame anybody if they asked if 25 votes at a General Council meeting was the new standard necessary for Council action.

Iceland

I spent my Thanksgiving weekend in a most unlikely place: Iceland. For most of my life I've had had a preoccupation with islands. Not sure why, but the idea of a small piece of land surrounded by water has always fascinated me. Doing Robinson Crusoe for a year on some tropical island somewhere was practically a childhood dream of mine.
Iceland is far from tropical. But it is isolated, located in the north Atlantic closer to Greenland than anywhere else. One word stands out when I think of this place: elemental. Water, lava, wind, snow, ice, rock--it is a fierce but not deadly environment. I took tons of pictures, as you can see below. And I learned a lot, some points which include:

• Iceland is heated primarily by geothermal energy, with geysers everywhere, a system decades in the making but bearing fruit now in that the average resident pays anywhere from $50-80 per month in electricity and water.
• Iceland has the world's oldest parliament, founded in 930.
• The Icelandic language is darn close to what the Vikings who settled the island spoke. It has changed so little that literature from the Viking era can still be read pretty easily by modern-day Icelanders.
• Iceland has the highest literacy rate in world at 99.99%. They've only roughly 300,000 people, but still that's impressive. Most Icelanders speak English.
• Reykjavik is the quite possibly the cleanest city in the world. I'll attest to that.
• They eat some pretty interesting stuff, like sheep heads and testicles, pickled fish, reindeer, and ptarmigan (a traditional Christmas food).
• There really isn't much wildlife there, nor trees. Still, there is a beauty all its own.

One Foot Forward

Early today, we had a work session on the "Tilixam Wawa". I requested the meeting myself, because over much of the last month we've talked about reviving the publication, and constantly ask staff to put such-and-such in the Wawa.  But as is often the case, we don't always follow up, and in this instance that is what happened.

So I requested the meeting today in order to start putting together a plan for how the publication will be produced. We talked about deadlines, how often, who would contribute, what would be written, etc. all the normal things those producing a publication talk about. Nobody appeared to have a problem with Council members submitting articles, or expressing opinions, provided they don't go completely beyond the present editorial policy. I think people like hearing from their Tribal leaders.

But the publication cannot be completely Council driven, a point I raised in my attempt at a staff report. I think people will start to view it as grandstanding and campaigning.  In the event that only a few Council members submit anything, stretching that out to an 8-page issue might be difficult. It can't all be Tribal Council meeting minutes because then it becomes too dry to read. So we talked about staff producing articles, and some issues being themed, where we might cover certain topics that members would like to know about, like off-reservation gaming, like culture and history.  And oh yes, enrollment.

At the same time we have formed an informal working group whose main purpose is to stay on top of the Tribal website.  I love the "Tilixam Wawa". Don't get me wrong.  But print media is starting to fade away.  Not that it will completely die out, and for many of our Tribal members who don't get their news by the internet, getting the Wawa and "Smoke Signals" will continue to be how they stay updated on Tribal affairs.  But our website has flexibility and potential that can't be beat.  "The Seattle Times", for example, has gone completely digital.  The instant nature of e-news is hard to resist.

What are our plans?  For starters, we are looking at e-newsletters, press releases, and electronic versions of Tribal publications all accessible by Tribal members who provide us with their email addresses.  We've also discussed the idea of feeds.  In the brainstorming phase is a possible blogging section, one for not only Council but different departments.  Eventually, what I hope for is that any letter, publication, brochure, etc. mailed out or available to the membership can be found as a PDF file on the members-only website.  

I suppose this qualifies as a tangent. That's alright.  A lot of members have complained about keeping them in the dark, and in a lot of ways they are right.  But now, we can't be faulted for not trying.  Not anymore.  A lot remains to be done, for sure, but we've put one foot forward.  

Lean Times

Earlier this week, we sat down with Spirit Mountain's CEO and went over their budget. Despite some predictions of an economic turnaround, we are being more cautious in our projections. That is probably for the best.
I was surprised at last week's General Council meeting, not with the Canoe Family issue, but that more members seem to be indicating they understand that times are tight. In general I think locals have a much different take on the financial situation, probably because they can access more services than non-locals, who usually get the core services of per capita, health care, timber, and Elders security, and not too much else. I look forward to seeing what kinds of comments we get from the General membership during the budget period. We always get some, a few dozen at least, sometimes near a hundred or so.
The two that stick out most from last year were contradictory. One member asked that we eliminate the "Elders only per capita" while another proposed we double the payment. A Tribal member from Portland has come to multiple meetings so far this year to ask that we incorporate a COLA to the Elders Security payment. One Council member last week told us last week this same member was down at the Elders' mealsite urging some of our Tribal Elders to picket. That seems kind of overboard but I suspect we'll hear more about it.
It is strange having to deal with this budget. In years past the casino always improved year after year, thought the annual increase in business got smaller. I personally expected some kind of plateau after 2007 but nothing like this. Economics is an odd science.
Plenty of other gaming tribes are dealing with the same kind of budget setbacks, which is some relief. While we are experiencing clear declines in revenue, it is hardly a cataclysm. Gaming, and vices in general, never suffer that much in recessions. Thus far, alcohol sales are higher than ever at Spirit Mountain, I'm sure because of the new sports bar and nightclub. Our long-delayed decision of serving alcohol on the floor might need to be dusted off.
The casino will be asked to make more cuts. Some of my co-workers say that needs to be in the marketing department but I'm not sure I agree. This is what I feared most about tough times, areas to be cut start getting singled out, and there are debates about what is more deserving. You caught a glimpse of it at the Eugene General Council meeting. At least one member asked why employees, and not Tribal Elders, were getting a COLA/merit increase. Those kinds of discussions, given enough time to go on, could get really ugly.
The two biggest increases on the governance side have been in the Tribal health plan and the Elders Security/SSI, more than $4 million between them. We are having to pick and choose. I knew that eventually our health plan would amount to more than per capita. I just didn't know it would happen so soon.
Warren Buffett, who I remember last year said the downturn in the economy would be worse than expected, is predicting a recovery. I hope he's right.

Primary Problems

It was the second such meeting since the election. We know what we want to do. What we don't know is how to do it.

I am talking of course about a primary election, or run-off, or whatever. Watching 18 people vie for three Tribal Council seats during the 2009 elections, one of the highest totals ever, split the votes. Our voter turnout to start is embarrassing. But watching elections go on without any candidates ever able to obtain a majority vote is more so, especially considering we are a democracy.

What we talked about Monday November 2 was how to conduct an election where candidates are elected with respectable vote totals.  It's quite possible that we may never get a Council member to win and be elected with a majority of votes.  The question is though, what is the solution.

A run-off election seems to be the most logical answer, as primaries are really when political parties endorse candidates.  The follow-up question is how would the run-off work?  To what kind of number would we reduce the candidate field?  Our election administrator threw out the idea of reducing the candidate field to six, or double the number of at-large spots.  I've some reservations about that, because it would seem to be encouraging a two-party system, which right now is being questioned even on a national level.  Plus it might disenfranchise voters who cast their ballots for candidates not making the cut, though that problem will exist in a run-off system regardless.

This is a good case of where there appears to be consensus that a problem exists, but arriving at a solution is harder when you roll up your sleeves and get to work.  Personally, I like the idea of narrowing the field down to nine.  But I'm sure even that would be problematic.  What if only 10 people run?  Seems kind of funny to hold a run-off to eliminate one candidate.

One Council member likes the notion of elections being held per Council seat, almost like running for a district position.  The problem I see with that is some seats might be more hotly contested or have a bigger vote turnout than others, meaning that second place in one election could be more than first place in others, kind of like how in sports the team with the second-best record in the league could fail to make the playoffs because they play in the same division as the first-place team.  Of course, such a system would be perfect if one's intent is to unseat a Council member.  Simply stack the ballot with tons of candidates and you can dilute the vote.  

We plan to survey the membership on what they might like to see, specifically if there is an overall desire to change how elections are run.  Guess that buys us some time, which is good because I sure don't have the answer...yet.

Sonny & Cher

A Sense of Humor

As you can see above, Steve Bobb and Val Sheker (Sonny and Cher) were in Halloween mode today, the only Council members to do so. Both have in fact done this multiple times, for which I give them credit. They even wore these costumes during tonight's Council meeting, for which I give them additional credit.
We couldn't help but discuss the last time a member of Tribal Council decided to bring such a sense of levity to a public meeting. I am quite familiar with it because the Council member was me. While Chair I donned an Elvis wig at the November 2006 General Council meeting, and did my best vocal impersonation to kick off the session. People laughed.
At the December 2006 General Council meeting, I was accused of disrespecting the position and not taking it seriously. There was even a picture in the "Smoke Signals", one I have on my wall. It was only one person who raised the issue, but they laid into me, generating applause on other points. In hindsight, it is one of my least favorite memories as a Council member.
Val and I have a bet as to whether somebody will complain. I don't personally see it happening. the political climate has changed since then. It never hurts to have a sense of humor in this job, I might add.

The Gap

Yesterday I drove down to Eugene in order to give a presentation at the Osher Lifelong Learning Center, which appears to be somehow linked to the University of Oregon. This presentation had been a year in the making, as they contacted me last October, but due to some miscommunication and inability to concur on dates, it never materialized until yesterday though even then I was booked months in advance.
Most of those who attended were retirees and, I assume, older alumni. When they contacted me I tried to press them for more specifics as to what sort of topic to lecture on. Gaming? Enrollment? Sovereignty? There weren't any. They just wanted to know about the tribe, period. Evidently one of the center's volunteers had read about me in the UO Alumni magazine and that was good enough.
The lack of specifics meant a certain amount of flexibility in developing a powerpoint, and in the end I just provided a rough guide of...everything. Because we were scheduled to have a Q & A session afterwards my assumption was that something would spur interest and thus spawn questions. There were plenty of questions.
Steve Bobb joined me, which helped. I've gotten used to speaking publicly, just not for an hour. In the end I went past that, even with Steve stepping in to speak about life in Grand Ronde during termination.
We were scheduled for two hours, and after that many of the attendees came up and told me they had learned a lot. I learned quite a bit too, namely that if this crowd, many of them well-read, know so little about Grand Ronde and tribes in general, what must the general public know? I got asked questions like whether our benefits were taxed, or if we were also US citizens as well. What is basic knowledge as a Tribal member is news to many outside. There is a noticeable gap.
To this day I still wonder why many members are so paranoid about letting tribal information slip to the outside. I can think of some worst-case scenarios that justify the thinking. But when people can live for so long in Oregon, especially in our ceded lands, yet know so little about who we are, there has to be some sort of halfway point. It's like not knowing your neighbors' first names.

Tribal McCarthyism

Early in September, we had a meeting to discuss the amount of the 3^rd quarter per capita distribution. Our Finance Officer brought us a preliminary number ($504) that was laughable. So we set about to doing what we could to boost that number. That led of course to a discussion about fears of backlash from the membership if the distribution number was too low. I and another Council member remarked that we thought the membership would understand that in the present economy expectations couldn't be too high.

I didn't think too much of that conversation until several days later when a Tribal member, one with whom I've had a mostly adversarial relationship, decided to distort our talk that day and repeat it during Other Business, in a way not made to make me look good. Last night at our Wednesday night Council meeting another Tribal member raised the same issue, though not mentioning me by name, but still maintaining that there might be Council members who didn't exactly support per capita. A similar letter to the editor appears in this month's "Smoke Signals". All three of these Tribal members are cousins, which I think explains a lot.

During my first year on Council I, along with Angie Blackwell and Buddy West, had to deal a lot with rumor control, specifically that we were part of some conspiracy to lower and/or eliminate per capita. I can remember two Tribal members confronting me at the casino, telling me a former Council member had informed them I supported cutting per capita. One individual went so far as to mail out an anonymous flyer in September 2005 about how the Tribal Council would be "capping" per capita at $4000, in addition to scaling back other benefits. Supposedly we were just mean people.

As a Tribal member I can't deny liking per capita. I don't turn away those checks. But it saddens me that there are a number of Tribal members for whom this issue will decide how they vote. And it frustrates me that spreading rumors about Council members and potential candidates not supporting per capita has become the equivalent of McCarthy-era Communist accusations. It reminds me of those trying to paint Obama as a closet muslim or how mainstream candidates try to paint opponents as anti-American and unpatriotic. Except the per capita rumor theories are solely about money.

Last I checked one in four gaming tribes engages in per capita distributions, a number that I found initially surprising. When you grapple with how to equitably serve your membership, per capita is a no-brainer. But then again I've met leaders who've sworn to never do per capita, and those who said if they could go back in time…Of course, not all per capita plans are the same. At a recent training in Las Vegas an instructor informed how some tribes' distributions aren't equal for all members. Younger members get less. And then again there are those rare tribes where the per capita is so high the members probably don't even need to work, in fact they are millionaires. I have a hard time imagining that.

I can't help but wonder if the "per capita killer" rumors run rampant in their elections.

TME

Wednesday night's Council meeting featured what has become a regular occurrence, Tribal member employees broadcasting their complaints. I think it safe to say that this has always been an issue, but as we've allowed more and more of them to use our public meetings as a forum to talk about their respective problems, appearing before Council, either in private or public, has virtually become a part of the chain of command. That is not a good thing.

I remember in a meeting earlier this year, following a Tribal casino employee griping about something, Toby McClary, pre-Council obviously, stepped up to make the observation that it seems now we are encouraging workers to come to Tribal Council when they don't get what they want. We'll fix whatever problem you got. That mentality reached a new level on September 16, when an employee who has become almost a fixture on Wednesday nights was clearly dissatisfied with how her situation was being dealt with, told us Council didn't "have my back", and could fix her situation with a simple phone call.

Last year we actually allowed employees with beefs to appear before the SMGI board, with staff present. That seemed to make all the difference in the world. When Tribal members corner us with their issues/problems, we are given a compelling case for why we should supposedly interfere. But at this particular SMGI meeting, with the right staff there on hand to shed light on the situation (I'm being polite), it was remarkable how key facts had been omitted from the version we were told. I had to wince.

Which is precisely why I hesitate when a Tribal member brings me their employment concerns. We rarely get the whole story. I don't mean to say some of my fellow members fib when they have their time with us, but to sell us on an incomplete picture is wrong, made worse by the fact that we shouldn't be dealing with personnel matters anyway. But like Toby said, in the mind of many Tribal members we really are another de facto court of appeals, even though we can do little. I do wonder though if in the past, before my own time on Council, coming to us didn't yield some sort of gain. I wonder because this has practically become a part of the organizational culture.

I guess we will be looking at the possibility of creating a Tribal Employment Rights Ordinance and office, the purpose of which would be to deal with and advocate for Tribal member employees who are facing discrimination, harassment, glass ceilings, etc. My first guess is this would be another sounding board, which would cut back on using our public meetings as theater. So that would be good. And maybe some of these employees really could get their issues dealt with and not go through us, which is also good because we by the nature of our position can politicize anything. How it might fail, though, is if employees who are being treated fairly but are still not getting what they want will be right back at the podium Wednesday nights, harping on what a failure TERO is, and they've got to bring their problems before us, again.

Budget Time

Tomorrow, after Legislative Action Committee, we begin a three day series of meetings to "go over" the budgets for the Tribal governance. Although we have put aside several days to do this, it would not surprise me at all if the whole thing goes beyond that. We've been lucky to pass a final budget before the last week of December. Come to think, I'm not sure if we ever have, least not in my time on Council.

Because this is the only position I've ever worked in where part of my job was to deal with budgets and line-items, our practices never seemed that unusual. Grueling and tedious and distracting? Yes. Odd? No. That is until working with the Mid-Willamette Valley Council of Governments provided a comparison, and I was embarrassed to learn that many of the local governments complete their operating budgets for the following year before the summer. So it is unusual.

Our system consists of large binders several inches thick, with budgets getting so detailed I could tell you what the Gaming Commission spends on magazine subscriptions, and managers and staff sitting in to answer whatever questions arise from nine people going over the complete governance operation. As someone constantly hungry for knowledge, in a weird sort of way I like knowing that kind of stuff, just for the hell of out. What I don't like is the sheer amount of time committed to going over these budgets. My first year in 2004 it went weeks.

In 2006 we tried a different approach, mandating an organizational message of "hold the line", that meant no major increases, and committing a minimal amount of time to the budget. Managers got that. Over the last two years, we've gotten back to the more time-consuming, and in my opinion nitpicky, budget process, one that to me seems geared for those who like to micromanage. That might be the real issue.

I've been reading a lot about how tribes deal with trying to create a free press for their news reporting. They can pass all the resolutions and make all the public statements. When a disagreement happens between the tribal governing body and the tribal media, even though there might be laws or ordinances preventing the councils from interfering with the publication, a loophole exists for passive-aggressive "revenge" if you will through funding. In other words, they suspend, revoke, eliminate, whatever, the budget for the media, citing all sorts of reasons, but the real one being the media somehow offended them, usually through reporting on something they didn't want reported.

I've seen that kind of behavior manifest itself through our budget process too. Whoever went afoul of certain Council members would suddenly find their budgets gutted, new positions they needed disproved, or something like that. You could never get those Council members to admit it, but sometimes ulterior motives are way too obvious to be denied. So I guess this budget period is a chance to see who is mad or dissatisfied with whom.

The additional factor this year is that some of my co-workers are angry about per capita being too low, and thus blaming managers, the casino, etc. I don't think we'll see layoffs, but we'll see cuts for sure. And we'll hear complaints about those cuts too. Because no matter how loud people holler for cuts, in the end you'll get those comments which amount to "we need cuts, but don't cut that".

Worst Case Scenarios

• Once again, another Tribe provides a good example of how bad things can get. Check out this story on the Snoqualmie, who show a tribal government virtually disintegrating.
• Also from the American Indian Report blog, here is an interesting story on the Mashantucket Pequots, a tribe with more money than some countries because they own the Foxwoods Casino.
• Lastly, on a local level, here is an update on Lisa Brown, formerly of the Siletz Tribal Council, who was removed from her position earlier this year right after being elected.
  

Knowing

I guess there was a movie released earlier this year called “Knowing”, which had Nicolas Cage.  This film involved a time capsule  with predictions and beyond that, I am not really sure what it is about.  But I liked the title as a blog post because after spending some time today sorting through the years of paperwork that has piled up around my office, it was eerily appropriate.  I’ve put aside a plastic portfolio in one of my drawers, one that can be locked.  In it is five years of work from our Audit Director that I’ve managed to save.

Today I found an old report that was probably talked about but for whatever reason I never really got around to reading.  Before I get accused of “teaser journalism” anybody reading this right now can be forewarned that the contents of the report will never be known to readers unless they somehow get elected to Tribal Council.  It was that kind of report.  Though years old, there were names mentioned of people I knew, some not in a way anybody would consider flattering.  Of course, that is the case with many audit reports.

Earlier in summer, July 8 to be exact, at a Council meeting a number of the attendees demanded we let them know the contents of the report on the so-called “Leno Letter” from last year.  What I find interesting, and probably sad, is that some of those demanding the report seem to have little if any interest in any other, which is a sure reason to question their motives.  One person pointed out that by then just about everybody in the audience had gotten some idea of whose name was mentioned, so that people were adamant about knowing didn’t make perfect sense.  The point was a valid one, but lost on the ones who needed to get it.  Public shaming, and maybe worse, is what they really cared about.

Anyway, the point I made at that Council meeting, and being made now is simple:  while I’ve always stood for openness and transparency, there has got to be some standard, one that takes into account the potential embarrassment and humiliation which could come with releasing some of our reports indiscriminately.  I say that mindful of the fact in many of the reports we get there are records of people being bad, breaking rules, and doing stuff they shouldn’t.  In other words, they shouldn’t be completely let off the hook.  But we should leave that to the appropriate staff.  Leaving the “punishment”, if you will, up to Council is something we shouldn’t do, because then dispensing justice becomes political.  And that’s not really justice.

There is more than just the reports we get from our Audit Director.  We have access to just about any record in the tribe.  While I don’t seek some of this information, inevitably a lot of it comes to us anyway, usually instigated by a Tribal member with some sort of beef.  We end up learning about a “situation” that we would not normally be apprised of in the course of our everyday work.  Much of this knowledge is eye-opening to say the least, and on many occasions will give you cause to look at some of our fellow Tribal members differently.  Funny thing is, do those members know we know?

I’ve learned over time who owes the Tribe money, who isn’t paying their utilities, who didn’t follow through on a Tribal scholarship.  I know why somebody didn’t get a job they thought was theirs, and worst of all, I know why somebody’s prescription wasn’t refilled because they came to Council seeking help.  I know sometimes too much about what goes on around me, and many times too little.

It might qualify as a paradox.  I know this most of all.  When somebody stands up in a Council meeting and says something untrue, misleading, and inaccurate, the hardest thing of all is to say nothing because to say anything will only make it worse. 

What Went Wrong

The General Council meeting following our Tribal elections is traditionally unpredictable. I’ve seen meetings, like 2002 and 2006, where the tone for the oncoming election was laid out unmistakably, if even only by a few individuals. Other times, like 2005 and 2007, it seemed people either didn’t care or weren’t sure how to act. Today, 2009, was more like the latter than the former, but just barely.

I won’t pretend to be surprised, because the 2009 Tribal Council elections were, for all the tension and ugliness that occasionally manifested itself, deflating. I can’t say that the partisan politics we’ve dealt with for the last few years have died out. That will never happen, and I use the word “never” sparingly. But something seems to have happened over the last three years to change the nature of Grand Ronde politics. When the three Council members who scored record votes in 2006 are three years later registering record losses in votes (690, 630, 608 in 2006 to 337, 324, 338 in 2009), one can’t help but wonder what, for them, went wrong.

We’ve seen this before. One Council member in 1999 would drop close to 150 votes in 2002. Likewise two of the ABC’s went from 604 and 462 respectively, to 400 and 291. Our Vice Chair, who many see as the most influential Council member of the last ten years, went from 591 in 2005 to 468 in 2008, the first time in any of his re-elections where he lost votes. Personally, I myself can’t help but wonder how the numbers will turn out for me next year. Will I see similar drops?

When you think about it, the concept is hard to digest because you don’t see that kind of extreme fickleness expressed that often in other elections. Can anybody imagine a President, Senator, or Congressman getting less than half their original votes during a re-election bid? Even Ted Stevens, the Alaskan politician who was on his way to prison as an incumbent, was barely beaten. So even an extremely negative and embarrassing incident doesn’t equate to loss of votes, not always anyway. But there has to be some explanation.

Which brings me to the the original question of what went wrong. Why was it that 18 people decided to throw their hats into the election this year, with many of them campaigning on “change”? How did incumbents who looked absolutely unstoppable three years ago come to be such lame ducks yesterday, each of them garnering less votes than a first-time runner?

I don’t really know the answer, but have some theories, because really 2009 wasn’t all that different from 2007, the year I survived. For one, political loyalties, meaning votes, can easily shift elsewhere based on feuds and disagreements among voting group leaders, often family heads. I think that made a huge difference this year. Two, people expect revolutionary changes following electoral sweeps. Democrats are dealing with that right now. Anything less than major changes will turn supporters sour, which is a double-edged sword because too much change will galvanize and unify opposition. So it has to be done carefully. Lastly, eventually, supporters look elsewhere for candidates who embody or uphold what they would like to see, which might explain why this year was the most number of candidates we’ve had since 2000, when 23 Tribal members decided to vie for three positions. This year 15 people aside from the incumbents sense, correctly I might add, that voters would be wanting some sort of change. The election results don't argue.

That year, like 2003 when 17 people ran, 350 votes was the magic number, which is interesting because anytime over the last five elections such figures would have made you a runner-up. Not so in 2009, not that I’m complaining about the results. I think Grand Ronde needs somebody like Toby McClary right now.

Tribes

Yesterday morning, I went into Salem to attend the Oregon State Fair. It was work related, because the Western Oregon Tribes were giving a presentation, a demonstration if you will, of our cultures. So you had all the Tribal Chairs, and even a few others, like Council members, Vice-Chairs, etc. For whatever reason, the exhibit was held at 10:00 a.m. which meant it was not as well-attended had it been say, an evening affair.
I number of people attending, in response to a question from Cheryle Kennedy, were members of the respective tribes, with a small minority being Fair-goers who happened by. We tried best we could to do a mini-grand entry, which wasn't very easy given that we had about 50 feet in which to do it. Our march was slow lest because the amount of time it would take to two-step to the stage and the length of a drum song were not congruent. Overall, it didn't seem like we were given a whole lot of space in which to present any sort of exhibit on a tribe, much less five. As a rule of thumb though, we always jump at the opportunity to educate the general public on who we are.
Different Oregon tribes have their respective beefs with eachother. I was told recently by a Coos Tribal member who worked on their restoration effort that the Coquilles opposed them way back when. Why that is didn't seem clear to me, but it was hardly surprising. There appears to be conflicting views of traditional territory amongst many Tribes, much pre-dating the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, a policy shift that added a new edge to these disputes. Suddenly, this was about money, lots of it. Indian gaming has made Tribes into business competitors. I am not sure we can ever go back.
Right now, we have issues with the Siletz tribe. At the eleventh hour last year they sent a representative before the Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife Commission to request our new ceremonial hunting rule be postponed until they could work out their own. It didn't make much sense because those kinds of issues would be dealt with individually with Tribes. Maybe they knew that and were just trying to get our goat. They were kind of mean to us too during the hearings of Cascade Locks last year, their Vice-Chair calling us "unreasonable" during his testimony. I can't remember what their Chair said, but I don't remember it being kind. Though I didn't hear the remark, multiple people informed me that during Tribal Information Day at the Oregon State Capitol in May the Siletz Chair referred to Salem and the Willamette Valley as their historic lands. It gets kind of petty, I suppose.
This is funny to me because as being part of the Oregon Tribal Gaming Alliance, we all get along just fine. They are nice to me anyway, at least to my face. For all I know, they are laughing behind my back. I doubt it, but still wonder.
Our issues with Warm Springs are well-known. And Cowlitz. We are cautiously supporting the Chinooks in their recognition effort. I bring all this up because years ago, this idea was put out there of a casino run by all the nine Oregon Tribes. A mega-casino, the first steps of which would be tribes agreeing on a slot-machine leasing model. A tribe like the Burns-Pauite, who are located in the middle of nowhere, could benefit greatly from such a proposal. At one point we were even talking with them, their Chair making the long drive to Grand Ronde to discuss the concept with us. But they have political turmoil as well. We rarely hear from them anymore. Whatever has gone on has paralyzed their ability to work with other tribes. Maybe that will change.
It will be interesting to see if tribes can ever buck their feuds and start working together productively, kind of like we do through the OTGA. But even that might fall apart because some of my co-workers do not see the value, which I take to mean they dislike the ability to completely steer the alliance, lack of authority to completely control something new outside of the Grand Ronde Council bubble.
I will say this for Siletz though. At events like the State Fair, their Council goes all out with the regalia. The Vice-Chair and Secretary led the cultural presentation in traditional garb, namely leather pants and bone and antler chest-pieces. You won't see any of our Tribal Council going shirtless in public.

Community Standards

I wasn’t present for yesterday’s Legislative Action Committee. What I’ve been told is that Executive Session was called, staff left, and Council went into a lengthy conversation about whether one of the questions boxes for the Candidates’ Forum on August 22 was “compromised”. A Record of Instruction was drafted and signed by six Council members to conduct an investigation into the allegations, as supposedly a Tribal Council member was the culprit and he now wants to clear his name.

I am in the hotel lobby of the Tuscany Casino & Suites in Las Vegas, Nevada, while typing this blog post. The training I attended here, Falmouth Institute’s “Tribal Constitutions & By-Laws” ended earlier than expected, leaving me a few hours of down time before catching my flight back to Portland. There are times I wonder what goes on back in the office, and when it is stuff like this, what more can a person do but wince and smile?

With smaller and more intimate meetings, I tend to favor conferences and trainings like this because it allows me some one-on-one time with other Tribal leaders. That means swapping “war stories”, which are basically anecdotes of our experiences doing what we do. Not all here are Tribal Council members, some are administrators and managers. One is a consultant. I am tempted to share this most recent story of the hand in the question box. It is on par with much of the story-telling we’ve engaged in here, the kind that seems right out of a movie or banana republic.

It will probably take me another posting to get into the specifics of this training. Informative it has been. But I will share one nugget of information, the kind most of us already know but never truly grasp until we see it laid out before us objectively, concisely, and almost academically. I learned about “community standards”, which relates to this most recent fiasco.

Some Tribes won’t allow their leaders to be or have been convicted felons. Others eliminate you from seeking re-election if you’ve been found guilty of misconduct while in office. They have constitutions with specific language for both. We are neither one of those types of tribes. Our standards, that you must be 18 years old and an enrolled member, are pretty basic. We’ve at least one convicted felon in office, and Council members have been re-elected right on the heels of being found guilty of violating our ethics ordinance. I am tempted right now to throw out some sort of opinion here, but am not sure if that’s necessary.

Two years ago, prior to the advisory vote on SMGI, one of our Wednesday night meetings went longer, and nastier than usual. Our consideration of removing board members started a fire. We explained the reasons, the Council/board member ordering buffalo meat be bought from his friend, the Council/board member ordering a staff give surveillance footage to a friend so they could file a lawsuit, notably. But the audience there were die-hard loyalists. Nothing would change their mind. We were the villains.

There are a handful of Tribal members who I remember from that night. I’ve never looked at them the same. They defended wrong-doing out of political allegiance. They indicated then and there that they would support their chosen leaders and political allies no matter what. It was, as I saw Jesse Ventura admonish FOX News’ Sean Hannity several weeks ago, politics at its worst.

I am not sure how much steam the question box scandal will generate. It might be very little, which would be sad, but hardly surprising. There could be some outrage. What there will definitely be is defense of the instigator, even if it had been caught on camera. That he has been suspended for unethical behavior before matters little. Grand Ronde has at times shown way too much tolerance for misconduct of its Tribal leaders, so much that this kind of stuff can be doubted, defended, blown off, and even forgotten. I am curious, and hopeful, to see if our voting membership favors raising the community standard.

Here’s one story that was swapped to me. A regional tribe hosted an election for its Chief. The position was voted on separately. Two well-known and respected Elders sought the position, as well as a younger man with a known drug problem. The two Elders siphoned enough votes from each other that the younger man won the election, the position which by the carried a ten-year term. He had attendance problems from the start, refused to remove his cap during invocation, and was in office for one-fourth his term before they were able to unseat him by means I am not clear on. His election was both an indictment of community standards and the present electoral system, both of which I presume have changed since.

Making a Difference

It would be a lie to say that I’ve become a video pro. I haven’t. But I’ve learned a lot over the past two months, due mainly to my new hobby of filming videos. In fact, I’ve already gone and added Corel Video Studio Pro x2 to the on-line shopping cart right before typing up this blog entry. It may be one of the biggest non-video game computer purchases I’ve made in a long time. After the election, I plan on possibly investing in an even bigger and better camera, one better than my $700 Sony Camcorder, a better microphone for sure, in order to improve what has been started.

Before doing all this I must ask myself if it is, as one person posted on my blog last month, making a difference. I believe it is, it’s just hard to say how much. YouTube thankfully allows a number of options that give you a sense of how often one’s videos are being viewed. A few have gone over 100 views, which in the YouTube world seems paltry, but given how little publicity these have been given, and that our Tribal community is so small compared to the general population, I have to take solace in the fact that somebody is watching them.

To date my brother and I have interviewed 10 of the 18 candidates for Tribal Council this year, including the Chair Cheryle Kennedy. One other incumbent gave me a verbal commitment more than a month ago, while the third has not so much as mentioned it to me. I am starting to wonder if that is deliberate, as in maybe they’ve been “advised” not to participate in this new campaign medium. I say that because at Pow Wow my brother and I spoke to a candidate while in one of the fry bread lines, and this is a candidate who has always been cool to me. But despite our pressuring, she clearly did not want to do an interview, even though all I needed was 30 minutes of her time. I might be reading into this the wrong way, but it just seems kind of odd to turn down what amounts to free campaign publicity with little time commitment. But truth has a way of being stranger than fiction. In the era of partisan politics, sitting down with me might be the equivalent of a Democrat going on Fox News, or a Republican on MSNBC.

Like many things, I look forward to the challenge of sustaining this new hobby after the fervor of the election has died down. Of course, things might get really interesting then.

Parking Lot Conversation

This morning we had a meeting, the same as every Tuesday. Two Tribal members, relations of mine, came in to speak before Council regarding an employment matter at Spirit Mountain Casino. In hindsight, we probably should have gone into Executive Session, as names were thrown out, a hiring decision discussed. On thinking, I'm glad we didn't.
Our Tribal Vice-Chair left just as this discussion ended (Normally I avoid mentioning names, but since he is also Chair of SMGI and that is one reason why this matter got brought before us). A fellow Council member seated next to me leaned over and passed me a note, saying that he would probably wait outside for the two members and tell them who knows what, probably something I don't want to hear. I walked out to my pick-up during the ten minute break, and sure enough, as she predicted, there he was, bending their ears. If only I had Superman hearing.
In the big picture, or from the 30,000 feet view as a consultant told me years ago, I don't like to fret over this kind of stuff. That doesn't stop me from doing so, as this kind of activity is rampant and contributes greatly to the rumor mill and community wide misconceptions. Today it irritated me not so much because these were cousins of mine, but because I've been in this position long enough to know that probably little if anything will be done about the employment matter. But matters like this are jumped on and people are told something is being done, all because there are votes to be gained, and in an unpredictable election like this, two votes are worth a little time on the side schmoozing. I personally think this has more to do with why Council is so attentive to casino employment matters; with between 160 to 200 Tribal member employees, the vast majority voting age, there may not be a more accessible contingent of voters than SMC workers. There are votes to be had there.
My first year we had an audit done on our Tribe's Legal department by an outside consultant. Everyone on Council was interviewed. After my own interview, I sat with one of the consultants and shot the breeze. We both chuckled because I'd only been at this job for two months, and his firm had been hired right before I got elected. The organization was new to both of us.
"There seems to be a lot of parking lot conversations around here," is what he told me. I remember the phrase vividly, and even knew what he meant. My appreciation for that concept has only deepened with time. What he was saying, really, is that information gets passed around not always by memorandum or email, but conversations on the side, in the hallways, in parking lots, always off the record, and hard to trace back. With so little vital information in print, Tribal members go directly to the source, Tribal Council, and whether what they get told is truth or fiction will remain a mystery forever, or a few years. There are some of my co-workers, I believe, who like this system. Unwitting allies can get made.
Late last year at a Wednesday night meeting, a Tribal member form Portland stood up and made comments about our salary. That is hardly new, but what was unusual was that this person was a staunch and vocal supporter of the Council majority party. Yet here she was being unabashedly vocal in her criticism of us. The meeting ended with two Council members puzzled and hurriedly walking after this Tribal member as she left chambers. I could hear their conversation as I shuffled by "What's up with that? I gotta go talk to her." And much like this morning, who knows what was said or passed on.
I got my first real taste of the parking lot conversation theory early, at a Wednesday night meeting. But the one anecdote that stands out the most was later into my first year. A well-known employee was making what I thought was a reasonable request of Council. I was okay granting it, but for whatever reason getting buy-in form others wasn't so easy. He confronted me in my office later that day after learning the news, hoping to know what happened, or so I thought. Evidently he had already been given one version of the story. We didn't always make decisions in writing then, and the meetings weren't recorded. I explained to him what happened, i.e. who didn't support his idea. Angrily, he looked at me, breathing heavily, and said without hesitation "Yeah. Well, I heard you and Angie were the ones who were shooting this down."
He has never really trusted me since, even though I told him the truth. Say what you will about parking lot conversations, but in Grand Ronde they can have a bigger impact than anything said on the record.

Spoiling

Years ago, back in 2003, I ran for Tribal Council. The 270 votes I received in 2002 were something to build on, or at least that's what many told me. More importantly, given the incredible unpopularity and maybe even infamy that surrounded one Council incumbent that year, one seat seemed up for grabs. There was no way he would be re-elected, because too many people disliked him.
Now there is an old Monty Python movie that came out in the early 1970's, called "The Life of Brian". It is about a young man born at the same time and within the same area as Jesus, leading to a lifetime of confusion. One part of that movie stands out more now than when I viewed it as a teenager, the fueding rebel movements in old Israel. The Judean People's Front and the Peoples' Front of Judea all have the same goal, to destroy the occupying Romans. The problem is they also hate each other, and both break into the Roman stronghold intent on assassinating the Emperor, only to run into one another, scuffle, and botch the dual efforts, while the Roman guards arrive at the end of the melee to stare confusedly at bodies everywhere. Of course it is all depicted in the usual zany Monty Python comical style, not to be taken too seriously, if at all.
Enough time has passed since 2003 that I can honestly see the parallels between that old film and what happened during the Tribal Council elections that year. So many people wanted to see a certain Council member gone. But his support was more united than the opposition, and he was re-elected with the lowest vote total in close to a decade. You see, 17 people decided to run that year. I was one of them, and fell short by 40 votes.
Ultimately, some good did come of that debacle of an election. We ran a much more unified and organized campaign the following year, sweeping all three seats, though ousting two Council members who, while many might argue were ineffective, were harmless compared to some of the sitting members not up for re-election. It has been a roller-coaster ride since then.
But what 2003 introduced for me was the concept of a spoiler in elections, a Ralph Nader or Ross Perot if you will. There are candidates who might make a decent showing, but in the end their biggest impact is siphoning votes away from people who have a better shot of being elected. In times when you need serious change, the spoiler does more harm than good. They aren't the villains who spark calls for sweeping change, but they are obstacles.
Which brings me to this year's election. This may be the most uncertain I've ever been about an outcome. I hear the calls for change, but like in 2003, way too many people are answering that call all at once. It seems unlikely the incumbents will earn the record votes they did three years ago. Having 18 candidates all but assures that. But with 18 people in the race, votes get split, and a person might be elected with maybe less than 400 votes, which has happened only once since 2003.
I respect whatever the members decide. But I do believe we need to a run-off election or something similar. I don't generally take much stock in rumors, but if this year we really do have people running just to dilute the vote, then we've got to change our present system. Sooner or later, we've got to realize that getting leaders elected with a majority vote is a good thing. I can't be the first to think so.

34, part two

Continued...

34

Today is my birthday, 34 to be exact. We all know what that means: in one more year I can run for President. But it also means I am halfway through my 30's, which ten years ago seemed impossible.
I left work early today. Although I may not party it up in as in years past, as a habit I try to do something special and out of the ordinary. At this point I'm halfway there.
Also out of habit I still carry my new digital camera in my pick-up. You never know when something cool will appear and you'll wish a camera had been handy. Here is a medley of those moments from the last two months. Some of these photos are from the spectacular Tulalip resort north of Seattle, which makes Spirit Mountain look like an also ran. I've also included a sneak peak at our plankhouse, which should open up some time this year. The others are from the ride between Bend and Salem, a route I drove last week on the way to Sisters for the Candidates Forum.

Channel Chris

Okay, so it's not really called "Channel Chris". But YouTube, I guess, allows people to set up channels, which are really just like blogs, but rather than be writing-oriented, they are video-oriented.
I know it seems odd to be talking about another website of mine on this one. But it is easier just to go through YouTube for all the videos I've been producing as opposed to embedding them here. Perhaps this, like Twitter, will end up being just a fad or something. Nothing changes that in many respects, this new video thing has been fun, and while I am not ready to go primetime, a lot has been learned, about editing, sound, zooming, microphones, etc. Might end up being a new hobby.

The link:

http://www.youtube.com/user/cgmercier

Idle Hands

This week six Council members were supposed to be in Washington, D.C., for various reason, not the least of which is a meeting with Ken Salazar. I've never agreed with sending that many people on the same trip, especially one that revolves mostly around meeting with elected officials and political appointees. We tried that last year, and that is what turned me off to the idea. Try cramming six Council members and three or four staff along with the person you're meeting with and their staff, and the rooms can get crowded and half the people don't say a word. There isn't time.
And it costs a lot of money. The last time I went to D.C., April of 2008, we all stayed at the same hotel, the Hotel George, which charged roughly $400 per night, per room. Five or six Council members and your suddenly staring at a couple of grand per night just for our hotel rooms, and some of us don't even get in a word edge-wise in half the meetings. But sometimes these meetings turn into contests of who can impress people the most. So there is a little ego involved, which for me is all the more reason to not go.
Weeks like this, no quorum, are for me now a boon. I can catch up on emails, reports, letters, phone calls--all the things that go neglected while away from the office. My new G1, the offspring of T-Mobile and Google designed to provide an industry rival to the iPhone, helps me keep up somewhat; It's a defacto blackberry. But there just doesn't seem enough time, or maybe I'm just not good at rationing out my time. Probably both.
But the lack of a quorum means no meetings, except Wednesday when we will have a conference call to discuss the "Leno Letter" yet again, and that gives me time to try and get organized. But looking through my office, where to begin?
Wink Soderberg thinks I'm crazy to keep most of the reports and try and stay organized. Looking at all my shelves, he might be right. But a lot of this stuff I just can't bear to part with. It is more out of journalistic instincts than anything, I want reminders of past events, statistics that might be useful someday. Plus frankly, I saw a record years ago that looked tampered with, and some of the major decisions made before I got elected there seems to be no record at all, or if there is it might be hidden away who knows where. The words "needle" and "haystack" come to mind.
So this week will not be idle for me, even with the void of meetings and work sessions. I'll plug away at the unstoppable flow of information, file some of it away, shred the rest. Once in a while, I'll come across something important, even disturbing, that I knew about at one time, and then forgot. There is a lot of stuff like that.

Never Back Down

I just watched the 2008 film, “Never Back Down”, which in reality is just an update of a similar movie from my own childhood, “The Karate Kid”.  Towards the end of the movie, the hero and villain are about to slug it out in the parking lot, MMA-style, and the protagonist makes a keen observation while sensing the psychotic antagonist’s hesitancy.  The villain loves an audience.  It is not enough to win a fight convincingly.  He wants to beat somebody’s ass, and do it in front of a crowd of roaring fellow teens, and to have it broadcast on YouTube over and over and over.

He still has issues, that’s not questioned at all.  But he’s the kind of guy who whose hobby is to do exactly what he does in the movie, to pick fights and record the glory.  He goes to some considerable lengths at times too, using a girlfriend to lure the hero to a party where they can rumble.

There are some who will consider this idea far-fetched, but I don’t think it is.  Our Wednesday night Council meetings have become those fights.  The July 1 meeting felt, for all purposes, like a premeditated ambush.  Some of my co-workers already knew what they were going to say, chiming in right at Other Business.  Like the Karate Kid, Wink Soderberg and I happened to be around when others were itching for a fight.  The letter from our Director of Development about last year’s Leno Letter was like throwing down the fighting mats for a match.  Except I didn’t know it at the time.

When the ABC’s first got elected in 2004, that marked I think the start of these theatrical meetings, although the Tribe had its share during that period of legal struggles involving Ed Pearsall, Reyn Leno, Bob Haller, and Jan Reibach.  Poor Ed seemed all alone at some of those meetings, and I guess he was.  But I remember the first two meetings Angie, Buddy, and I had to endure as they were laden with accusations of…where to start, of buying the election, of being owned by “the Michigan Group”, and interfering in a hiring matter.  It took some getting used to, and I’m not sure one really does.

The trend continued into 2005, starting within weeks of Wink Soderberg and Kathy Tom getting elected as some anonymous flyer hit mailboxes describing our mythical plans to cut per capita, Elders’ security, etc.  The following meeting was packed, and there were a number of scripted comments that were also waiting in the wings, including one at me.  From a political standpoint, it makes sense.  There was a large audience then, all the more reason to try and make somebody look bad.

Last year might have been one of the worst, there was the matter of a letter some Tribal member wanted read into the record, a suggestion our acting Chair didn’t bother to mention until the onset of Other Business.  There was also the meeting where our acting Chair had the Tribe’s Human Resources Director stand up, sheepishly I might add, and refute the statements of a rival Council member.  It makes me wonder what will be in store for me this Wednesday, July 8, as we hold one ahead of schedule due to lack of quorum next week.

I ask myself this:  What is worse, that I’ve become so cynical and jaded as to expect these sorts of things, or that more often than not these things, these plotted attacks, can be counted on to happen?

All I can do is roll with the punches.

Council Elections 2009

We have 18 people running for Tribal Council this year, and in all honesty I have no idea what that means. Jokes were thrown around the SMGI Board meeting yesterday that person will be able to get elected this year with 20 votes. That is a gross exaggeration, of course, but at the heart of it all is some semblance of likely truth. We might not see any 600 vote candidates this year.
Every year you always have the three incumbents. And word gets to you of so-and-so is going to throw their hat into the ring. There are of course the people who approach you early for support. Lastly there are the unknowns and last-minute runners, those who think they have a chance, but don't.
I've gotten the sense that political alliances aren't quite what they used to be, which can always change for better or worse over the next month. I wonder if this supposed rift is fueling the bold actions of trying to take over the Tribal newspaper. A member told me the other day that when people in power feel that power slipping away, they resort to extreme behavior and actions.
Check.
And I'm not talking about the newspaper either, as in executive session yesterday I witnessed a Council member just about pop a vein in their head for the second time in a week. There is a lot of tension around Council these days, and I predict you'll see the usual political antics manifest themselves during Wednesday night Council meetings which during elections is almost like a theater. I tried to make plans for tomorrow night, but figured, "why bother?". What is the likelihood we'll have a short meeting, especially in thinking of how last year's election went.
Politics, I'm convinced, transcend gender, race, religion, and culture. I originally lamented that revelation, but over the years have grimly accepted it among the facts of life, even though deep down I still think tribes in America have a real opportunity to be different.
I still hope, and who knows, come September, I'll hope some more.

Memorial Day

Okay so these photos should have been posted a while ago.  But one of the disadvantages of the digital age, like 2GB memory cards, is that you can store so much on one card that you go months without uploading the photos, as I did here.  Our Veterans’ Memorial continues to be one of the best photo ops in the West Valley.  That man with me is Congressman Kurt Schrader.

      

OKC

Observation:  When wanting to survive in the wilderness, the most consistent way to detect water is to monitor local plant life.  A convergence of trees, bushes, and other type of flora can often signal water to some degree.  That explains why there is always water in desert oases.  Without the water, there would be no oasis.  Pretty simple logic.

Present day Observation:  Looking for an electrical outlet in an airport, always seek out laptop-users.  They converge on outlets like plants do to water in the desert.  This is so common that I am starting to think when we teach our kids etiquette, you should never claim one of the seats or chairs right next to an outlet.  Like offering your seat to the elderly or handicapped on a bus, so too should you offer your seat to anybody carrying a laptop case if said seat is in close proximity to an electrical outlet.  This occurs to me more today at Denver International Airport than at any other time.  I am among the horde of laptop carriers drifting among the gates and giving irritated looks to those who’ve camped out in front of outlets, reading books or daydreaming, oblivious to the fact that we are this close to politely, if tensely, asking them to consider moving over a seat.  In Wolfgang Puck’s one fellow and I quietly rush to the same pillar, in here pillars mean outlets, only to find some clod has rudely stack his luggage right over the source.  It’s so rude to us laptop-philes as to be insulting, like double-parking.

I am flying from to Portland via Denver and Seattle en route from Oklahoma City, where this year’s National Indian Head Start Directors’ Association Annual Conference is being held.  Though I am biased against most of the Midwest for reasons pertaining to college football and the Bowl Championship Series—Big Twelve teams always seem to finagle their way into the major bowls and championship games—I am willing to give credit when credit is due.  Oklahoma City is, by and large, a pretty cool town, and left me wondering what else might be found if I had the time to venture out.

It reminds me of Lincoln, Nebraska, where four years ago I attended the Native American Journalists Association Annual Conference.  Red brick buildings, flat views, wide streets, and an almost religious reverence for the local football team(s), mainly the Oklahoma Sooners.  A Sooner is, if I’ve been accurately informed, somebody who came over prior to the great land-grab some 130 years ago and basically squatted on their plots.  They came sooner, get it?

Being an Oregon Duck inevitably leads to talking about the football game between UO and OU back in 2006, when officials blew a call that let the Ducks rally and win by a single point.  It is pointless to try and point out that the Ducks themselves were robbed back in 2001 when the BCS elected to oversee them for OU’s rival Nebraska in the National Championship game, a game in which the Cornhuskers were destroyed only days after the Ducks destroyed the other Sooner rival, Colorado.

OKC has invested heavily in making its downtown area overly pleasant.  There is a series of canals meant to mimic San Antonio’s, complete with boat tours.  And the entire downtown, named Bricktown, is very little but bars, restaurants, nightclubs, and a baseball stadium.  A former Northwest franchise, the Seattle Supersonics turned Oklahoma City Thunder, is supposedly around, but you wouldn’t know because the Sooners dominate everything sport related.  The town of Norman is twenty-something miles away, close enough for students to flood the streets at night, making me realize how long ago were my own college days.

My first night I am awoken at 5 a.m. by a thunderclap so loud everybody else I spoke to woke up as well.  One of my workshop instructors confesses that, like me, after that and with the constant thunder grumbling, sleep was nigh impossible.  The thunderstorm, in hindsight, was a welcome respite from scorching humid weather that makes your clothes sweat-soaked within minutes of emerging from the air-conditioned hotel.  Wednesday reached 99 degrees.

I found time to eat at country musician Toby Keith’s large bar and grill smack dab in the middle of it all.  Overall, a very cool place, and a very big place.  So big that the plates look small, quite an accomplishment given that they are anything but.  The side dishes are mini-meals themselves.  I get about halfway through mine.  One of my companions, Denise Harvey, doesn’t even get that far.  The baked potato alone on her plate would have been dinner.

Of course Oklahoma has its share of Indians too, and they are everywhere, in the artwork, on the flag, in posters, in the streets, even the Will Rogers Cowboy Museum is seemingly half-Indian.  The residents, from what I can tell after four days, integrate the Indian history and culture nicely into a common state identity.  This may be cowboy country, but plenty of Indians remain.  The Chickasaws play the role of host at this conference.

The conference itself would be a whole other posting.  As in years past, as a man I am a celebrity, more so as a Tribal leader.  There are only two others at this conference, and for whatever reason, the very fact we are bothered to show up elicits comments like “Boy I wish our Council was this involved!”  I don’t know if that is a complement to me or a backhand to their own respective Council.  It doesn’t matter.  This year, as in the past, I get a lot out of the conference.  I am reminded that there are parts of tribes that get lost in the swirl of gaming, economic development, enrollment, Council politics, per capita and other assorted things.

 

Interview with Angie Blackwell Part 2

Interview with Angie Blackwell Part 1

The Life of Plants

I like photographing plants. They are good, stable subjects, rarely move, and at certain times of the year, are absolutely beautiful. These are from Woodburn's Tulip Festival held in late April. Further proof that in Spring the Willamette Valley is one of the most breathtaking places on Earth, hands down.

Puyallup

Here are a couple of interesting stories about a fellow tribe up north. It would be interesting to know what the whole story is. I can use my imagination, though.

http://www.thenewstribune.com/news/northwest/story/745137.html

http://www.thenewstribune.com/opinion/story/746627.html

Native Foods Celebration, May 9, 2009

Original Intent

We had another one of those "meetings" today. There was an effort to delay it, which included me. At this point I think any decision that has the potential to go down to a single Council vote might as well have all nine of us there. Not sure that it would have made a difference today in the outcome.
Undoubtedly people will learn of what decision took place today, and while it may have symbolic significance, I must admit the Tribe will as always move on.
But I wonder now the relevance anymore of what is supposed to be a fundamental part of the Tribe's philosophy, one that most if not all tribes I've encountered share. That is putting control of tribes in the hand of the tribal members e.g. jobs, boards, committees, governing (like my position), publications, the gaming commission. Though not always a well-defined goal, it's still a worthwhile one. Today though was almost affirmation of my suspicions that while we may strive to one day have a Tribe, including its governance, business, and judicial functions all run by and for our Tribal membership, a reasonable goal as members are the stakeholders, I'm becoming convinced such a notion is the epitome of idealistic. Sounds good, but given human nature, more fantastic than realistic.
The former General Manager of our casino was a Tribal member, and at least concerning our bottom line, got the job done. But certain people didn't like him, and the basis for their dislike always seemed personal, and on occasions, political. The same could be said for Spirit Mountain Casino's first General Manager, also a Tribal member. I've lost count of all the complaints we've gotten over the years about how bad, supposedly, this Tribe is about hiring its own members, at the casino and the governance center. Often those complaints have come from people who didn't get the jobs or positions they wanted. But as I mentioned earlier, even when a Tribal member is given a key position or promoted, the issue invariably becomes who the member is, and that they are Tribal is quickly forgotten. You can't win.
During my Tribal Government training last year, we were taught about the Allotment Act, and how decades after that historic decision it was considered an epic failure. The Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, now more than 20 years old, was also supposed to be a historic decision, and right not I can't deny it hasn't been. Grand Ronde has, for all my issues, benefited pretty well from IGRA. But there are cracks in the armor.
We too have had to deal with corruption, with strife, and the divisiveness an ongoing struggle for power and resources that enormous and almost sudden wealth brings. We've also had to deal with petty agendas, where whether one is good at their job or not, or whether one has made wise decisions, or whether one is even a shareholder in a key position i.e. a Tribal member, is irrelevant because for whatever reason somebody at the top doesn't like you. When I see this kind of stuff, it depresses me, because aren't we as tribes supposed to be different? Aren't we sitting on a world of opportunity, a chance to be a model organization, to be self-sufficient, the envy of all other governments, tribal or not?
I worry sometimes, that like Allotment, one day the Federal Government will conduct a review on tribes since IGRA. They will see the family feuds, the pettiness, the partisan politics, and that which I would probably get into trouble for writing about. And they, like me, will say "this is not what we intended".