The Final Post

I'm sure somebody will correct me if wrong.  But thirteen days has to be the longest I've gone without making a blog post.  No, it is not because I no longer care, or because the Council drama has consumed me.  Pure and simple, I've started another blog: the Grand Ronde Post.
It is not live right now, though I've made some posts.  Right now I am just getting comfortable with the hosting company, Wordpress.  I like Blogger, but Wordpress has impressed me enough to give it a go.  I like many of the features, and my research has indicated it to be one of the better if not best blog-hosting sites.  I plan to make it live this weekend, if not sooner.
I will not be eliminating this blog.  If anything, I plan on keeping it around.  Kind of like an archive.  Not sure how many bother to read this blog anymore, it has tapered off somewhat, and maybe a change over is what we need.  I hope to add other authors to the Grand Ronde Post, but it will all depend on who is willing.
Anyway, after three years plus year, we can all agree a little change will hurt nobody.

Details, Details

It seems like forever ago that we hired ECONorthwest to advise us on how better we might conduct our business.  In actuality, that was only four years ago.  But in Council years it might was well have been a lifetime.

In the very end, we did not accept all of ECO's recommendations.  I might more accurately say we didn't accept even a majority of their advice.  But what we did accept, and have since then molded and fashioned according to our tastes and preferences, is the Tribal Council Operating Procedures.

We had a very constructive, if scattered, meeting on those guidelines again today.  The last time we tackled the operating procedures was back in autumn, but enough has transpired recently to merit another look, in particular how we make decisions.

The still infamous Polk County Sheriff's Report/Leno Letter sparked a series of Records of Instructions.  The first was to mail the PCSR to the General membership.  The second was to somehow include the entire report in an issue of Tilixam Wawa.  The third was to allow those named in the report the chance to include a response in original mailout.  The fourth was to send out the original audit that was turned over the the police.  Only the first one passed.

This is not the first time multiple committee sheets have been circulated regarding the same issue.  In 2007 while trying to manifest some sort of decision on a Constitutional amendment on enrollment we ended up doing at least four, maybe even five different ROI's on the exact language.  We ended up going with the one with five signatures.  What was different this time around was only one got five signatures, as there was a noticeable lack on nine signatures on most of them.  One ROI disappeared briefly, for what seemed like a couple of days.  I am still not sure what happened.

Numerous questions abound.  Can one ROI supersede the other?  Do Council comments affect the intent of the ROI?  Can a Council member remove the ROI from consideration?  What if a ROI, like the one calling for the release of the audit, fractures a Tribal law?  Should the requestor be required to list their name as the requestor, instead of just generically Tribal Council?

It was an interesting discussion, to say the least.  In the past we adjusted the language so that committee sheets could only be introduced during a formal meeting, eliminating the practice of Council members drafting and ROI and collecting signatures in private.  There still appeared to be flaws in our system.  Ultimately, we decided to reserve nearly all votes, including ROI's, for Tuesday mornings, where they could be vetted and discussed openly.  There will be exceptions in the case of emergencies, which I'm sure at one point will be tested.  Tuesdays, already with Legislative Action Committee, have become legislative holy days.  Right now, I am okay with it.

It's true, that whole thing about the devil being in the details.

Law Enforcement

Laws, no matter how intelligently written and how much they account for unforseen circumstances will inevitably fail if they overlook one fundamental, and that is the enforcement of those laws.  I've been thinking about this a lot lately for several reasons, one being the inconsistency of how we've dealt with the now infamous 2008 anonymous letter (aka the Leno letter) and others, the other being having to deal with an agreement for police services in Grand Ronde through the Polk County Sheriff's Office.  As of this morning there is now a third reason:  the resurrection of an Exclusion Ordinance that little did I know was written years ago only to languish up until now.
The Leno letter debacle and subsequent involvement of our auditor and police have rightly raised questions about fairness, e.g. why weren't past letters where somebody had clearly used a mailing list to which they shouldn't have had access also turned over to legal authorities?  For reasons that shouldn't be vague, I think you are reaching an ethical black hole when the decision to turn over the knowledge of probable illegal activity to police comes down to a vote of Tribal Council.  If there are laws and ordinances that clearly define illegal activity, do they do any good if there is going to be picking-and-choosing when to enforce those laws?
There is right and wrong, and then there is legal and illegal, with some overlapping of the two, but not always.  Right becomes wrong, and possibly illegal, when it is selective.  A state highway patrol officer is right to pull over drivers who are going 75 in a 55 mph zone, because then there are laws clearly being broken.  That same action becomes wrong, though not necessarily illegal (however I'm sure a case could be made), when the same officer decides that he will only pull over and ticket speeders that are either strangers or enemies, or he doesn't like the color of their skin, or age, or that they are women, etc.  My real point:  Tribal Council is not the best body to be making that kind of decision, because we don't have to justify our selectivity.  The reasons could be purely political and purely personal for deciding on whether to subject somebody to the hammer of justice.
Now my second point:  Our dealings with the Polk County Sheriff's Office have revived the idea of starting our own Tribal police force, because then we would have more control of the policing on Tribal lands, and the officers could even be Tribal members.  Frankly, this would be the ultimate excercise of our Tribal sovereignty, and in theory it is a not a bad idea.  But I think it's rife with pitfalls.  The first thing that occurs to me is what does a Tribal police officer think as he receives a phone call about a crime in which a distant or close relative is implicated?  What about when he must arrest a Tribal Council member, knowing full well this person will decide whether to continue to approve the police department budget?  Will "Other Business" on Wednesday night meetings become the venue where Tribal members talk about how police are corrupt, or present one-sided stories of their innocence and how Council must interceded on their behalf?  I've read of Tribal police, and judges for that matter, getting caught up in the storm of Tribal politics and crises.
This morning's meeting on an Exclusion Ordinance raised similar red flags, especially when the rough draft read that Tribal Council would make the decision on whether to move forward with banishing somebody from Tribal property.  I understand the need for staff to have a means to enforce ordinances, and the fact that people have been caught dealing drugs or promoting gang activity on our lands and are allowed back into housing and near our children has to be a cause for concern.  But I don't think that kind of decision needs to come before us.  Law enforcement needs to be independent.
Years ago, we appointed several former Council members to form an ethics task force and rewrite our ethical standards.  In the end, their recommendations, which included establishing an ethics commission, were not accepted, being viewed as just an additional layer of government.  In sitting on SMGI and getting to witness how the gaming commission polices Spirit Mountain Casino, with the ability to sanction anybody from frontline employees to the CEO, I understand now more than ever the need for that extra layer.  Run correctly and free of political influence, it works.

Yakima

Last weekend marked the second straight year we've gone to Yakima, Washington, as part of our annual Community Meetings. Of all our meetings, this one is without a doubt the most remote, the longest drive, and for what it's worth, the most interesting at least in terms of meeting new Tribal members who've set up lives elsewhere, which of course is most of the general membership.

Yakima is fascinating for sure. As you drive from the Columbia Gorge north and enter the Yakima valley, there almost seems to be a climate shift, as everything gets warmer, sunnier, and slightly humid. As a couple of Tribal members explained to me, the area is vegetable heaven, and they know what times of the year to buy which vegetables. Every major temperate-climate vegetable flourishes here, or so it appears.

Grand Ronde and Yakima have a history. This was where many Tribal members drifted to, perhaps for work, perhaps for other reasons. We've roughly 130 members in this area, one of the greatest concentrations outside the state of Oregon. There are several families who could just as easily enroll in Yakima as Grand Ronde. They are also considered a gorge tribe, whereas we would like to be a gorge tribe.

The attendance this year was smaller than last year, but still on par if not better than Eugene and Portland. Some might say we need to do away with this non-local community meetings altogether. I think we simply need to promote them more, by sending flyers and invitations, maybe even giving out more door prizes. You can announce stuff in the "Smoke Signals", but if you're like me it is not hard to lose sight of something amidst the obituaries, birthday announcements, and other advertisements.

While we might have had only 20 different Tribal members show up this year, I conversed with almost all of them on some level, even just superficially. Since I was one of four Council members, divvying our time, especially during the one-hour meet-and-greet prior to lunch, was not difficult. The breakout sessions went reasonably well, and overall those attending were polite, asked good questions, and inthe case of Council, were genuinely interested in talking to us. The only complaint is that Red Lion, as opposed to other businesses, would not let people take the leftovers home, which is different from the other places we've use to host these meetings. Since less the half of the food we ordered for 80 people got eaten, that is a criticism I agree with.

I hope we don't give up on the Community Meetings just yet. Maybe it was because I had as good a time yesterday as I've had at one, sparsely attended though it was. The people who come really enjoy themselves. Plus I was told "See ya next year!". I am still unsure, however, why some still confuse me with Mark Mercier.

PACT Distraction

Back in my freshman year of high school, I read a book which contained an interesting story. In the early 20th century an asteroid came close to hitting the Earth. It was big enough, I remember reading, to have caused an unheard of amount of destruction, probably killing millions. What I found funny about this story was that aside from the scientific community, and even then probably mostly astronomers, nobody really knew.
Google asteroids heading toward Earth and you'll get a number of interesting stories. Supposedly we might be hit by an asteroid again at some point in the near future. I suppose it is hard to forcast such a thing. What is not hard to do is to be so distracted as to forget how tenuous our existence might be, so enveloped are we with everyday life.
On Friday I drove down to Eugene to hear the oral arguments in a case of significance that has been simmering for years since 2003. The organization People Against a Casino Town (PACT) has filed a lawsuit against the State of Oregon arguing that Indian casinos are a violation of our state constitution. From a legal standpoint, of course it is infinitely more complicated than that, as the 90 minutes of arguments atest to. And this matter has been making its way through the legal system. But if I have to condense my interpretation to one sentence, that would be it. The PACT makes their points here.
We've been monitoring this lawsuit the entire time I've been on Council. The Coos Tribe have been the primary targets of this effort, but if the PACT were to win their suit that would obviously have repercussions for every tribe in Oregon. So for as much of a longshot as this case may seem, it has the potential to pull the rug out from under all of us. I don't believe that is going to happen. Even if they were to win this case I cannot for the life of me picture police and government agents showing up and forcing us to close shop like they did bars and speakeasies during Prohibition. There would have to be some sort of mediation, some middle ground.
We have a tendency to take our sovereignty for granted. So much so, we get sucked into things that in the grand scheme of Indian country and our Tribe are really kind of silly. Some time this next week, members will be getting a large envelope. In it will be a brief letter from our Director of Development talking about potential identity theft, and attempting to update members on an event that took place two years ago, for which nobody is being charged with anything. There will be a 16-page police report that casts suspicion on several people.
I am not sure how many members will care or even remember what this is about. But there will a number who will pack the room Wednesday night, provided they get it by then, demanding action, accountability, and maybe even ask me why I didn't vote to mail out this packet. My reason will be, among others, that we've spent too much time, energy, and money on something that really amounts to mudslinging. That answer probably will not satisfy them.
It saddens me that this will be such a hot topic in the near future, because while some might think the decision to send out this packet will hopefully bring the still-simmering incident to a close, my hunch is the two-year simmer will reach a boiling point, with more heated meetings and accusations flying. I could see this going another two years. I also see it getting uglier, much uglier.
I question the role we play in all this. After six years I think we create more problems than we solve by immersing ourselves in situations that are political and personality driven. Worst of all, this kind of "stuff", informational junk food, distracts us and our membership from the things that matter more, the possible asteroids heading our way-- the PACT lawsuits, the Supreme Court decisions, the things infinitely more important, and relevant.

NIGA

The National Indian Gaming Association didn't impress me much back in February. Then, the conference was held in Washington, D.C., right before that epic snowstorm. I was battling the usual insomnia that gets me every trip east. It was hard to keep focused, much less awake during some of the speakers. And overall, the conference just didn't seem that organized, as some of the speakers talked more about the upcoming NFL conference championships and the upcoming Superbowl than Indian gaming. At least they seemed to.
The NIGA conference this past week, in San Diego, was infinitely more informative. I might even say too informative. I knew it would be interesting when the keynote speaker on the first day was, of all people, NBA legend Kareem Abdul Jabbar, who entered the convention with BIll Walton, also legendary. Abdul Jabbar was also accepting the NIGA Chairman's Award for his work in bringing basketball camps to numerous Indian reservations. The photo op caused chuckles as Walton stepped in, two seven-footers amongst several Tribal leaders, the tallest maybe six feet tall.
This week was a celebration of NIGA's 25th Anniversary, though only the 19th conference. It was also half conference and half trade show, as the lower level of half the San Diego Convention Center was a cacophony of new slot machines, booths, giveaways, lounge areas, and networking opportunities. I haven't really been to this kind of convention before. The trade show seemed geared more toward casino managers, name a casino department and there were multiple booths peddling some sort of novelty or software designed to make Human Resources and Restaurant management easier. The "bait" in many of these booths were young attractive women, complete with SoCal tans. Given all the older men in suits, that makes sense.
I sat in a number of workshops, most of which were useful, one not so much. Many of these workshops seem like "ins" for the company putting them on. I sat through one on the value of Social media for Tribal casinos. Facebook and Twitter were the focal points, with some recognitionof LinkedIn and MySpace. Facebook totals more than 450 users I learned, with Twitter following behind at 70 million. However, 14 million Twitter users account for more web content generation than all of Facebook. Also, the quickest growing demographic of social media users, over the past year anyway, has been the 55 and over population, who have increased 1000%. Given that same demographic contribute more to Tribal casinos than anything, it is only logical that this company helps marketing departments incorporate social media into campaigns.
The most interesting workshop I attended was the last, and titled "Different Generations, Different Challenges...Dude". It was basically a leadership/managerial course that got into generational differences. I understood Generation X and Baby Boomers, but knew little about Generation Y, the Greatest Generation, the Good Warriors, and the Boomer sub-generation the Joneses. The man hosting the workshop runs a company in Seattle, and although a Boomer, said in all his work Baby Boomers tend to cause more problems around the workplace than other generations, chiefly on account of an unwillingness to turn the reins over to younger generations and not coping well with the proliferation of technology in all aspects of life. Gen Xers, which I am one of, prefer to work unsupervised, don't believe in hierarchies, and were the first generation raised by single moms, which thus created our independence. We also lived through Watergate, IranContra, the gas crisis, Three-mile island, church sex scandals, all of which have made us cynics. Generation Y, they are the chronic texters, the most culturally diverse, and most needing of praise, though money isn't everything. The workshop was, to say the least, fascinating.
There was another workshop that resonated with me, but more on that later. As demonstrated below, I'm starting to use the video capabilities on my phone more.





And if you've ever wanted to see a Cuban cigar made, here you go:

Mounds of Memories

In late 2006 I helped myself to an oak shelf that sat in the Executive Office's meeting room virtually unused. No, I didn't steal it. I just moved transferred the shelf to my own office, because by then an obscene amount of paperwork was starting to accumulate on my desk and table. Rather than buy a new shelf I simply swapped a smaller cherry wood one for a larger oak version. Weeks went by but somebody noticed, and after coming and chewing me out (albeit in a friendly way) a replacement was ordered. So my attempts to save the Tribe money went for naught.
Since then the shelf has become overloaded. I save everything piece of paper, every report, memorandum, etc. possible. Some people think it excessive, and I cringe when watching that cable television show "Hoarders" because if there is ever an office or workplace version somebody might turn me in. But you never know, I always say. Electronic records can be manipulated and conversations, I learned by sitting through some of the Pearsall hearings, can be mysteriously forgotten no matter how important. Hard copies, with my own notes, are the way to go, my proof of history.
I've started making a dent in paper mounds by learning how to scan, double-sided, much of these reports and packets and converting them to PDF's. Thus I now have photocopies of my notes and can scrap the originals. It has been somewhat liberating.
Some people know this but I've requested all of our reports be emailed to me in PDF's, including SMGI paperwork. I download these to my netbook or laptop and scroll through them during meetings. Foxit Reader, a PDF reader that is downloadable for free, allows me to type notes onto the reports and memos. At first I would get a lot of looks during meetings, some guy sitting on a laptop during a meeting, but people are catching on. I take some solace in the environmental part, today's work session packet was 90 pages long. The longest one in recent memory was nearly 150 pages. With nine Council members you can guess how much paper we go through. I am tempted to compute how much the paper costs weigh over two to three years versus a netbook with a 2-3 year lifespan.
Sorting through many of these older packets as I scan them has been akin to strolling down memory lane. I've always considered myself having a good memory. But in looking over many of these packets it is obvious that much has happened that I've almost forgotten. My notes or the agendas trigger floods of memories, some of which must be embedded deep in the back of my mind. It is almost overwhelming.
The agendas will often just list a meeting we had, at what time. Depending on the topic I either draw a blank or relive a session that got very heated. I came across many on enrollment, and I can recall that a crowd of people showed up. I can remember when somebody got upset and stomped out. Some things I can remember I wanted to remember, but obviously did not.
Years ago National Geographic featured on article on memory. There is a woman in California, who now prefers to be unnamed. She possesses an extremely rare condition called hyperthymestic syndrome. She remembers every waking second of her life, of what she has read, of what she watched on television. People thought her a freak or phony, and would harass her to prove her condition wasn't real.
She said in the article it was more of a curse. Not sure if I agree. This job has tested my memory like no other. I would love to remember everything. As I close in on the end of my second term, and who knows maybe even final depending on voters, there has been, as all the notes and packets remind me, quite a story to tell.

Representing

Back in 1997 I was lucky enough to do an exchange program to Ecuador. A by-product of that was having to learn about some South American history while there and in my Spanish classes. Interestingly, I continued to take Spanish upon returning for one final term at the University of Oregon, not wanting to lose my grasp of the language. The last language professor I ever had was Chilean. More importantly, she was a Chilean refuge, having fled the country with her family in the early 1970's when Augusto Pinochet ousted the democratically elected Salvador Allende in a military coup that was backed by the CIA.
Until then, I'd never quite understood why the CIA was viewed with so much suspicion by many Americans, despite being a part of our government and presumably advancing our causes and beliefs. I've read that the CIA supported (though how much support isn't clear) Pinochet out of a fear that under Allende Chile would become another Cuba. Ironic then that Pinochet would become a notorious dictator under whose regime thousands of dissidents and political opponents would be murdered, tortured, and disappear. Not ironic or unexpected is that people would come to be so critical of the CIA after being involved in something so ugly, and according to my old professor, devastating.
I've thought about this a lot over the last few days. Democratic governments are supposed to represent the will of the people, and when you start dealing with cases like the CIA-Chilean Coup of 1973, one has to wonder if we are being accurately represented. I'm sure somebody might know more about this than me and could present a compelling argument to justify what happened. But right now I've not sure anybody could convince me.
One of the main reasons I've reflected on this is because while having lunch recently with a Tribal member and spouse the conversation of this year's Oregon Governor's race came up. I told them we would be meeting with several candidates over the next few weeks who are seeking the Tribe's support, both Democrats and Republicans, and they asked me if they could be allowed to sit in. I wasn't sure because nobody has ever expressed an interest. But then again, how many really know?
Several months ago one of my posts about supporting the Chinook recognition drew some comments. In the past we've received a few comments about our decision to pour money into the 2006 Governor's race. The issue that seems to be a real lightning rod is our strategy to oppose the Cascade Locks casino, which of course puts us at odds with the Warm Springs Tribe, and has even drawn criticism from several of our early Council members who feel we are hurting a tribe who helped us get restored. The problem of course in all of it is that while we have heard from Tribal members expressing discontent, the numbers have been small. But I still can't help but wonder if we need to re-evaluate how we make these decisions, or if we need to keep making them at all.
One thing I've learned is that there are costs to getting involved. Monetarily we've spent millions on our off-reservation strategy. Some would make arguments we've thwarted competition that would have cost us even more. Others have pointed out the collateral damage that is hard to fix a cost to, like souring relationships with other tribes and elected officials.
Economically, times are tough enough to where I think our ability to have influence is not what it was several years ago, and realistically money plays a huge role in creating that influence. Also, the issues are getting cloudier. A candidate, be it Senatorial or Gubernatorial, might line up with the Tribe on one issue but be an opponent on the next. One might oppose off-reservation gaming on moral grounds, which is fine for us, but oppose environmental stances, which isn't fine with us.
This much is true: I'd be darn curious to know where many of our members stand on some of these issues. Thankfully, we don't have anything resembling the CIA. But that doesn't mean we won't make a decision which years later could come back to haunt us.

Coffee Chats

Today and yesterday I participated in series of employee events at Spirit Mountain Casino called "Coffee Chats". These are essentially informal meetings held in conference rooms between management and staff where employees have the freedom to ask whatever they want, to express concerns, and clear up rumors and misunderstandings. There were two yesterday, one in the early morning and the other mid-afternoon. The two today were mid-afternoon and evening. There is coffee, too.
I guess these meetings have been held several times over the past year. Some have told me they can be confrontational at times, and mellow at others. Employees can attend while on the clock, and all attending are given raffle tickets for drawings of prizes that usually go to regular patrons. In this case, those prizes were "rocket grills", which from what I could tell is supposed to be a takeoff and competitor of the George Foreman Grill. Haven't used one, but I can see how they might be handy.
Bottom line is employees are allowed an opportunity to air things out with management, and if they choose can be paid to do so. This has to be a good thing. Personally, I do not ever recall having these coffee chats while being an employee myself, though that was admittedly long ago (2003) and my own work experiences have been mostly pleasant at the casino. Still, I am trying to figure out why there is such a gap between my own experiences and those of people who are drawn by some powerful urge to broadcast their casino workplace struggles at Council meetings or through emails and phone calls to us, like we are the Human Resource equivalent of Don Corleone.
Can't say the two coffee chats I attended provided many answers. For one, most of the workers said nothing. Two, if between these four meetings maybe 100 employees chose to show up, it's hard to take comments and questions as fairly representing any general sentiment of the roughly 1600 workers at Spirit Mountain. Three, most of the questions were innocuous and readily answered. I would be curious to know how the employee surveys play out.
Regardless, they were interesting to sit through, even if some of the faces, and complaints, were familiar.

Team Building

We had a meeting today with our Human Resource Director who came to feel us out for whether a team-building session would be appropriate. Those who were present, all six of us, agreed to give it the old college try, though clearly there was some skepticism. So over the next two weeks we are to complete a questionaire that will attempt to profile us in hopes getting a starting point on how to proceed.
This kind of stuff has been made fun off often in popular culture, including a commercial with the gecko from Geico. I can see why. I am not sure how old these kinds of exercises and workshops are, but my guess is probably a few decades, just young enough to be part of the generation gap(s). Nonetheless, I find it fascinating.
Years ago I took a personality test with the help of a behavioral sciences book. I came from a personality profile called "The Champion", but my score was on the cusp. I could have easily been "The Healer". Titles aside, the profile as read was uncannily accurate. My personality loves championing causes, prefering to see the big picture but overlooking necessary details and having a harder time with follow-through but always eager to brainstorm. There were other qualities too, but those are what I remember from almost a decade ago.
I think having our personalities objectified and classified so brazenly bothers people, because in this age we aren't supposed to stereotype and everybody is unique, like snowflakes. That might account for some of the skepticism exhibited today. But that doesn't change that there are patterns of human behavior that are prevalent across time, cultures, religions, and races. There are differences, for sure. But above all, there are enduring similarities.
Some of my co-workers' concerns were that as a group we are too political to be helped by what will probably be a half-day workshop. People aren't going to change their politics. By "politics" what I gathered was meant was sabotaging, backstabbing, undermining, rumor-spreading--all the unsavory things we hate but accept about modern day political science. There might be some truth to that. Personal agendas and vendettas certainly exist, but good luck getting people to admit it. And if we're not going to be completely honest in an exercise like this, how effective could it be?
We won't really know unless we do it, is my take. Plus I think individually we will all take something away from it. Some will just take more than others. But I think if Obama and Republican leaders are willing to sit and talk about differences, can't we? After all, we fancy ourselves as being different from mainstream politicians. Now is our chance to at least try and prove it.

Picture Perfect

Over the past month, I've carried a camera with me everywhere. The first of these photos going up is from the Newseum in Washington, D.C. where a memorial of 9/11 has been built from wreckage salvaged from the twin towers. The "wallpaper" in the back was a collage of the front pages of dozens of international publications. The second was perfect timing in Pacific City, during a rare February sunny day at sunset. The last two are from the Eagle Creek hiking trail near Cascade Locks, also during that stretch of weather. I found it surprising that at there were no rails of the other side of the trail, considering the drop would have been several hundred feet. At one point the trail was so narrow if somebody else was coming the other way, one had to step aside. Proud to be an Oregonian.

You Never Know

I haven't done much blogging lately. On February 18 at around 10 in the morning, my dad Bryce Mercier succumbed to pancreatic cancer. It was not unexpected, but a little sooner than I anticipated.
On Wednesday we held his funeral at the Tribal Gymnasium in Grand Ronde. On Thursday there were graveside services in Newberg, a smaller and more intimate setting for those who knew him well. I think he would have been happy to see the turnout on Wednesday. There were quite a few friends of his from way back, probably before I was even born.
A number people spoke, though my own speech was probably the longest. I admitted to not having had much of a relationship with him throughout his life. We weren't complete strangers, but without a doubt neither of us would have been able to put together a one-page biography of the other. I took the opportunity to get up on my soapbox and explain how far too often in our lives we let relationships fall to the wayside, and it's not always clear why. Some go sour for reasons that are legitimate, but more often than not, be it some long-running feud, a grudge, or a lost phone number, there are seldom good reasons to say to ourselves "I'm never talking to that person again". Relationships are, I said, what nourish the soul.
My brother and I both for the first time met our half-brother Damian, who has resided in Houston almost his entire life. We also met our uncle Mike, who has carved out a life in Alaska the last few decades. It's odd, but back in the days when the Election Board would allow us access to the mailing list, I can remember looking at their names on the label sheets, and pausing.
Most everyone who I see on a regular basis is aware that my dad and I had a relationship which was different from that of most father-sons. But that hasn't stopped all the condolences from pouring in, via email, Facebook, phone calls, cards, face-to-face. One group of people sent me a potted plant larger than any other I have. People seem to recognize regardless of the relationship, losing one's parents is always that, a loss. It's never easy.
The good that has come of it is the opportunity to renew old relationships, and start new ones. You never know. I chose those three words, because a blogger whom I follow on a regular basis says it's never a bad thing when those three words are involved. I tend to agree.

Worth the Price of Admission

The first thought that crossed my mind after watching "Avatar" was a mental chuckle. Many people right of center politically are going to snort, huff, and sneer in disgust from behind their 3D glasses. A friend of mine from way back in middle school whom I've re-connected with via Facebook (a story in itself) posted on his status update "Until watching Avatar I never realized how evil Americans are, and how noble all non-Americans are", to which a number of his friends agreed.
Personally, I never quite got the anti-American angle, and if the ol' memory is working correctly Avatar's hero is American. Not sure if he was by the end of the film, but he sure looked, talked, and acted like one. Until...well, no point in spoiling the ending, but if you've seen "Dances with Wolves" or "The Last Samurai" and films I probably have either forgotten or am ignorant of, then it doesn't take much to see how "Avatar" is going to end. Perhaps if they make a sequel, the Na'vi will get casinos and then things really turn interesting.
There is a thinly veiled ecological message throughout the film, which might have more to do with what rankles conservatives. But what I felt, watching this extraordinary film, was a re-telling of the settling of the New World. When the hero is introduced to a large group of Na'vi, they are riding horse-like creatures. And wearing skimpy leather loin cloths. It was kind of like a cross between New World indigenous people and Star Wars, which would make sense because Director James Cameron had been holding on to the idea of Avatar since the 1970's, or so I've read.
I guess this post isn't really going anywhere other than to illustrate that while cliched, Avatar is still very thought-provoking. If you agree with or at least don't mind the politics of the film, this is a movie going experience. While more people seem to have 40 plus-inch TV's and home theater systems, you'd still be missing out to wait for the DVD. That may be the real point of this post. You have to see Avatar in theaters, in 3-D. The total immersion cinematic experience is so intense that leaving the theater is almost depressing. Pandora, the planet, had so much to offer.

More News & Notes

Several months ago, we were in the dark as to what was going on with the Klamath Tribe. I had heard from multiple sources that the entire Council had been ousted and replaced. Given what happened with the Snoqualmie Tribe in Washington, among others, such a scenario would surprise but not shock me. I went so far as to try Googling the Klamath in hopes that perhaps some local paper had covered the story, kind of like what happened with Siletz last year. I found very little, and then these stories were forwarded to me last week:

The first one:
Modocs start separation movement from Klamath Tribes

The second:
Opposing group says it should control Tribes

On another note, I really liked these opinion pieces from Indian Country Today:

Justice Crucial to Tribal Sustainability

Trahant: Transparency as a tool for reform

Not that I have nothing to write about. But I do believe there are plenty of example throughout Indian Country from which we could take ideas.

Western Oregon Tribes Pow Wow

As usual, when attending a pow wow, I take a camera. I was rudely accosted about taking the photos. A young lady told me I needed permission. In my younger days I would have argued, but not this time. Maybe it's just me, but Pow wow etiquette often seems vague. Grand Entry featured hundreds of flashes, in addition to people on the edge of the procession with tripods and video recorders. But at different points of the pow wow the MC asked people to turn off their cameras. I've always believed, and maybe in error, that when appearing at public events a person has no expectation of privacy. It would be impossible to film an event, like the Superbowl for example, if you needed the individual permission of everybody upon whom the camera fell. And I've seen DVD's of pow wows for sale at... pow wows.
This year's event was well-attended, but from what I've been told not nearly as well as last year. The first annual of anything is probably like that a lot.

Community

We have already started plotting out a schedule for this year's Community Meetings, which have become an annual tradition. I personally advocated for some deviation from what we have done in the past, the priority lists and the sticky dots, but it was not to be. Admittedly I had some vague notions of a town hall style forum where those attending could grill us, and didn't have many details beyond that. I just like the concept, and many of our General Council meetings seem geared for "Other Business" more than any organized presentation. That is my perception anyway.
These Community Meetings have been going on for as long as I can remember. And I have been going to them for as long as I can remember. There are recurring themes raised by the membership, like enrollment, economic development, a recreation center. One year people were deadset on having a swimming pool.
Some might argue that these meetings are just a form of lip service, and I could certainly see why one might think that. But then again I've also seen pressure from these meetings make a difference. I really wonder if a Eugene Satellite Office might not have ever happened had there not been repeated calls during the Community meetings down there.
It wasn't until my first year on Council that we first started to really reach out beyong Portland-Eugene-Grand Ronde. Part of that was due to the fact that a Community Meeting in Bend in 1999 had fewer than 10 people show up. But by 2005 I think things had changed. Members outside of the area were eager to get involved.
I remember distinctly our first meeting in Tacoma in 2005. It was well-attended. We had to rethink allowing employees and committee members to enter the door prize drawings, because only one prize ended up going to a Tacoma local, which was rather embarassing. At the first meeting in Bend one gentleman came up to me and said he'd thought I would have been taller. I also remember in Tacoma 2006 when during a breakout session one fellow in the group told Wink and I he had not voted for us. Later on that day I thought of the perfect comeback, which would have been to point out to him that had we not been elected, since we advocated for expanding the Community meetings, he would have never been able to tell us to our face.
The Bend meeting in 2007 was well-attended as was the meeting in Yakima last year. The all-time worst attendance had to be Tacoma 2008, and I am convinced that was because we chose Monday night. It seems most other weekend nights work fine, though having them Sunday afternoons draw the most people.
For reasons I am not clear on last year Council and for that matter all employees were included on an email thread where evidently some local Tribal members felt Yakima wasn't really part of the community. To them I guess, the local community is the community. I've never really understood that mentality. Actually, I understand it, but can't agree. I've met far too many Tribal members living in Tacoma, Eugene, Portland, Bend and Yakima who care deeply about this Tribe.
People have their reasons for living elsewhere. Some of them have found careers and lives that simply would be much harder to establish in Grand Ronde, if not impossible. I like that we can take a sliver of Grand Ronde to its members, at least those living regionally. They are almost always incredibly grateful, and curious. Perhaps that why I look forward to our outside Community Meetings.

Media Training...again.

For about two-hours on Thursday afternoon, I was on 60 Minutes. Okay, that sounds weird. Really I found myself in a former brick warehouse in Portland's Pearl Disctrict sitting in a bare office with a former TV reporter and his staff conducting an interview of...me. The camera was rolling. For about the third time in my brief Council tenure I was being trained on the nuances of facing, perhaps "confronting" is a better word, the media.
I've mixed opinions about the media. First off, I studied and eventually received my Bachelors Degree from the University of Oregon in Journalism. So for a few years, being a part of the media is what I concentrated on. I also feel that having free and unrectricted media is what makes democracies thrive. In fact, I am not so sure a democracy exists if there is a shutdown, especially by governments, of the media.
Conversely, media and journalists do more than earn their spotty reputation, and I am talking only partially about the extremely biased media like Fox News or MSNBC, or the black eyes like Jayson Blair. The main criticism I lob at the media is more often than not they don't always have the best grip on the stories, especially when dealing with complex issues. I especially see this with sports journalists and political reporters, and often with columnists, who I've concluded are usually more concerned with meeting a deadline or furthering their agenda. And most reporters, producers, and media owners have agendas, political or personal. To me that is fact.
The former reporter-turned-media-consultant who interviewed me for our mock 60 Minutes session told me I was acting more like a journalist than a public representative with a message. I was trying to be objective instead of advocating for a side (he asked about Cascade Locks), and was being too blunt and irreverent in some of my answers. When he asked me about our Tribe's enrollment issues I made a joke about starting a Tribal member dating service and/or a sperm bank. He told me a quote like that was so colorful they would probably make it a soundbite and video clip, which also meant if, say, a reporter didn't especially like me there was a silver bullet. I can imagine the clip or headline now: Tribal Council member mocks enrollment issues. Context matters, a lot.
It is hard not to feel self-conscious while watching a video of yourself on a large (50 inch) screen. You notice your own fidgets, pantomimes, eye-rolling, and suspcious squinting. I normally think of myself as approachable, but in my video I saw somebody slightly stand-offish, weary, and even a little bit irritated by some of the questions. Plus, I understand now why major news networks have their TV guests don make-up. I could almost count the bristles my razor missed that morning.
Having to deal with the media, especially interviews on camera, is truly a learned skill. I can see why people get nervous on live national TV, and how the way a question gets asked, the motives behind reporters, and technical stuff like lighting and editing add up to a certain skill set gained through experience and experience alone. I see now why media consulting is becoming an industry all its own, and why many politicians pay for it without hesitation.

Hard to Avoid

More than five years ago, in what would have been my first week on the job as a Tribal Council member, something happened I'll never forget. It wasn't anything epic, in fact if Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show" for some strange reason decided to increase their coverage of the Tribe it would have been the kind of thing they got a few laughs from.
I had just been elected along with Angie Blackwell and Buddy West. Spirit Mountain Casino was going through the process of hiring a new Marketing Director, and the interviews were to be held right there in Council chambers, and we were encouraged to participate. When you consider the controversy surrounding what happened earlier that year in 2004 with Angie Blackwell and her position in the Community Fund, the repeated talking point was that Tribal Council members didn't get involved in personnel issues. I suspect that was a defense from a story that even made "The Oregonian". So Angie asked the obvious question, which was basically weren't we getting involved in a personnel issue right now? Weren't we about to engage in a hiring decision? Nobody really had an answer, so Angie, packing up her folders and notepad, simply walked out, saying that there were numerous things more important to the membership she could be spending her time on. I'll never forget the look on a couple of Council members' faces. They basically said "Oh man, it's gonna be a long year."
I've thought about that incident a lot over the last 48 hours because an employment issue was brought up Sunday during the General Council meeting, and it wouldn't die. We didn't get into nearly the same level of detail as the person who mysteriously knew enough about it to raise the issue during Other Business, which I must say raises other points about how frivolously confidentiality is regarded around here. But once again the fundamental question is out there: To what degree does Tribal Council involve themselves in employee matters, or more importantly, to what degree should they be involved?
Ethics suits have arisen involving Tribal Council members and their interactions with employees, and not all gave us reasons to believe certain lines don't get crossed. But that doesn't change that we "supervise" a handful of personnel, from the Tribe's Executive Officer to our Finance Officer to our Audit Director. I use the word "supervise" because that is what we do, even though you arrive in the supervisory position by way of elections, while the Directors must apply and meet a number of qualifications from minimum years experience to degree requirements. It seems kind of an odd arrangement, but I guess it would be nigh impossible for us to avoid overseeing somebody.
On top of that, Council approves the compensation for all Directors at Spirit Mountain, which over the last year has been problematic. While we are supposed to simply approve the compensation- we're ratifying a decision already made- there have been instances of Council members trying to quash the compensation for reasons I can't prove but which reek of passive-aggression and/or politics.
Tomorrow we have on the agenda resolutions for approving the compensation for almost all of SMC's Directors. I'm hoping things have changed and employees aren't left to wonder why. Today we also discussed moving forward with a Tribal Employment Rights Office and Ordinance. I hope that cuts back on the politicization of employee matters. Office politics exist as long as you have offices I suppose, and people are people. But there is always a better way, I remain convinced.

News & Notes

I've gotten into the habit of following a number of different blogs. One of them is for the Oregon Ducks through OregonLive.com, another through "Pyschology Today", several through ESPN.com, plus "US News & World Report". Blogging seems to be a journalist's dream, especially if one has a lot of readers, which many do. It would not have been possible with print journalism.
Because many blog posts consist of news, notes and links, I've decided to follow suit today. Here are some interesting stories I've either found or had forwarded to me:

• Gangs in Indian country are gaining national notice, at least enough for the New York Times to run a story here. Nice to know we're not alone.
• Yay for the Shinnecocks back east, who are just about gain their own federal recognition. I found this particularly interesting because while we've publicly supported the Chinook's recognition, word is the bill that would recognize them is dying, and their biggest ally Brian Baird (D-WA) is retiring. Recognition for some but not others.
• Oregon Business Report addresses the decline of casino revenues in our state.
• Jan Michael Looking Wolf stopped by my office today to show me his new video, posted on YouTube. The main young man in the video, Ken Lewis, is one of Looking Wolf's guitarists and also the son of Tribal member Ann Lewis. There are also several other Grand Ronde Tribal members in the video, filmed in downtown Salem. The other guitarist looked vaguely familiar to me at first, and when I saw Jan's CD cover I realized he was, in further proof that the world is a small one, a classmate of mine from North Salem High 1993, Pat McDermott.