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A new ‘edge’ at Indian Market this year

People crowd the streets surrounding the Plaza during last year’s Santa Fe Indian Market. The market last year brought in an estimated 150,000 visitors, and had an $80 million economic impact on the city and state. (Marla Brose/Albuquerque Journal)

By Jackie Jadrnak, Albuquerque Journal

Bouncing back from financial and staffing controversies last year, the Santa Fe Indian Market this August is promising a newly contemporary flavor.

It’s not that the standards are changing substantially for the main market on the Plaza, although last year and this year some rules have been loosened to allow some non-traditional materials and techniques – variations that must be disclosed, said Dallin Maybee, chief operating officer for the Southwestern Association of American Indian Arts.

“We want to protect the collectors, as well as the artists,” he said.

More important, this year’s market will see a new expansion called Indian Market Edge, which will offer indoor spaces at the Santa Fe Community Convention Center to galleries and Native American artists who create contemporary fine art, he said.

“I’m particularly excited about this,” Maybee said. “We can present some contemporary artists who don’t show with us now.”

While some artists who produce works in a contemporary style have complained in the past that they didn’t feel there was a place for them within the traditional bounds of Indian Market, Maybee said he felt that he had seen many artists include innovative works in their booths. Adding this contemporary showcase, though, will shine a spotlight on modern works being produced by Native artists, he said.

“The people I’ve approached about the concept are really excited,” Maybee said. “This will help us stay fresh. We have to change with the times or we lose aspects of our culture.” Contemporary art is an aspect of tribes’ cultural evolution, he noted, adding that he creates some contemporary works himself, as do many of his friends.

“I’d like SWAIA to be known not just for traditional mediums,” he said.

Shoppers look at Zuni fetishes at last year’s Indian Market on Santa Fe’s Plaza. Many Native American artists earn a substantial portion of their income during the two-day event. (Marla Brose/Albuquerque Journal)

The idea is to offer 12-15 spaces to galleries that represent Native artists to show their works, while SWAIA will review applications from independent artists and choose about six to eight to showcase in its own space. He said the IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts has expressed an interest in participating.

Altogether, Maybee estimated that 30 to 40 artists will have their work in Indian Market Edge. Booth fees won’t be charged, but SWAIA will take a “small percentage” of any sales, Maybee said.

Some 900 artists take part in the outdoor Indian Market, slated for Aug. 22-23 on the Santa Fe Plaza. Those artists keep the proceeds of their sales, but pay a fee for their booths.

SWAIA, the organization that makes Indian Market happen, went through some turmoil last year when former operating officer John Torres Nez left with two other staffers to form the Indigenous Fine Arts Market, which presented artists in the Railyard on some days overlapping Indian Market and promised a greater voice to artists in how the market was produced.

According to its website, IFAM intends to present a market again this year Aug. 20-22.

That split came about when SWAIA was experiencing financial troubles and reduced work hours of some of its staff.

Maybee said this week that the organization no longer is experiencing financial woes. It paid off its loans after last year’s market and hasn’t taken out any new loans since, he said, partly due to the fact that last year’s gala auction raised a record amount of more than $400,000.

“We got a groundswell of support among the artists,” who donate artworks for the auction, Maybee said. “They wanted to support and protect the legacy (of Indian Market).”

And the Winter Market, which usually doesn’t make money, came out ahead this year, he said, “between the Festival of Trees and good business decisions.”

The Festival of Trees was a program in which various businesses and artists decorated Christmas trees that were auctioned off as a fundraiser.

Eventually, Maybee said, he would like to see Indian Market go from producing events to being a year-round presence – about 50 acres would be a good size for a site to establish a permanent presence with art on display and for sale, not unlike the Indian Pueblo Cultural Arts Center in Albuquerque, he said.

That’s all still in the talking phase, though, and would require a considerable amount of fundraising, Maybee said, adding that a new development director should be coming on board in a month or so. Santa Fe would be the location for such a project, if it came to fruition, he said.

Meanwhile, Maybee said this year’s Indian Market, in its 94th year, also will include:

The Native Cinema Showcase, starting earlier that week, along with the Classification X winners for submitted films.
A Thursday-night private preview reception where donors and tribal leaders can mingle and view the Best of Show winners; jeweler Raymond Yazzie, whose family currently has a show at the National Museum of the American Indian in New York City, will conduct a book-signing.
The Native American Rights Fund, a nonprofit law firm from Denver that defends Native sovereignty and other issues, will offer panel discussions exploring various Native issues in Cathedral Park on Saturday and Sunday.
Fashion events to showcase both contemporary and traditional fashions produced by Native designers.
An auction that will feature many artworks, including a four-place table setting that will be auctioned off en masse with everything from place mats to wineglasses produced by a bevy of Native artists.
A farewell party, by ticket purchase, Sunday night at La Mesita Ranch past Pojoaque, organized in collaboration with Buffalo Thunder Resort and Casino, with music, food, wine, spirit tastings and more.

History, Biology and Purpose – what it means to be member of a Native community

Gyasi Ross, keynote speaker at Tulalip Wellness Conference.Photo courtesy of Gyasi Ross. — Gyasi Ross, keynote speaker at Tulalip Wellness Conference.
Photo courtesy of Gyasi Ross.

By Micheal Rios, Tulalip News

As part of the Community Wellness Conference that took place on May 11 at the Tulalip Resort, keynote speaker Gyasi Ross gave an impassioned speech directed at Tulalip’s high school youth. Ross is a member of the Blackfeet Nation of the Port Madison Indian Reservation where he resides. He is a father, an author, a speaker, a lawyer and a filmmaker. TV, radio and print media regularly seek his input on politics, sports, pop culture and their intersections with Native life. For those who were unable to attend the conference and as a result were unable to hear Ross’s keynote address, the following is the most powerful message he delivered to the Tulalip youth on their history, biology, and purpose as a member of a Native community.

“I want to acknowledge the staff who put this event on. Most school don’t have stuff like this because there is no money for stuff like this. We all know money is important, which means the tribes is investing in you all by putting this money forth; they are saying you all are important. How do you know when something is important to somebody? Unfortunately, it’s because they spend money on it. That’s what people value in today’s society.

All of us come from a history and a culture, a culture that acknowledges where we are. History is a fancy word for ‘this is where I come from’.

One of my favorite quotes in the world is from an Okanogan woman named Christine Quintasket. She was the first Native woman to ever publish a written book. She had an amazing outlook on life where she viewed life’s function as a part of the natural world. She liked to talk about the relationship of human being to nature, to trees and plants and to the animals. Christine Quintasket said, ‘Everything on Earth has a purpose, every disease an herb to cure it, and every person a mission.’ If this quote is true, and I believe it is true, then that means every single one of you guys and girls and women and men and me, has a purpose. Every single one of us has a mission. What purpose or mission do you have?

Let’s talk a little biology. If I look at my grandparents, three of my four grandparents were alcoholics. That means I have a 75% of carrying something similar to them that would make me like alcohol. As a result of that both my parents at one time were alcoholics. As a result of that I’ve chose never to drink, I’ve never driven alcohol in my life. It’s not a religious thing, I’m not religious at all, but it’s a practical recognition of history, of Mendel’s Grid, of biology. That’s why it’s important to understand biology and to understand our history. It’s because that helps informs who you are.

Going into biology a little bit more, how many of you have ever said or heard someone say, ‘I didn’t choose to be here!” How many of you have said that yourself, that you did not choose to be here? I know I’ve said that before. I’m going to tell you why that statement is dead wrong. Biology. Every time a baby is conceived a man releases from 80 to 500 million sperm cells. It’s fact. That means that for every single one of you, before you were conceived, you were in BIG competition. You were in competition with 80 to 500 million other sperm cells trying to get to that egg…and YOU won. Every single one of you are that special little sperm cell that was stronger, quicker and more agile than everyone else. You wanted to be here! I’m not talking religion. As a matter of biological fact, every single one of you wanted to be here.

That means anytime you say or you start to say, ‘I didn’t choose to be here’ you are lying, you are not telling the truth. With that we are going to go into some history.

The function of tribes, of Native people who lived in small, intimate communities who lived in distinct places. The reason we chose to live in these small, intimate communities was for survival. For no other reason than survival. It was based on interdependency. Everyone in the community had a role, a function within the community, and those communities were successful because each member was able to depend on the other members to live up to their roles. The hunters, the fisherman, the gathers, the clothes makers, those who were able to make medicines…whatever their responsibility within the community they had to live up to it because everyone else’s survival depended on them.

Going back to the notion of Christine Quintasket saying, ‘Everything on Earth has a purpose, every disease an herb to cure it, and every person a mission.’ It is inherent, inherent is a fancy word that says it’s written within out DNA and it’s in our blood, it is inherent as Native people to have a mission. Every single one of us, every single one of you, has a mission. Once again, what is your mission? Going back to the historical times, our ancestral communities, those missions were hunting, gathering, medicinal herbs, being a warrior, seam-stressing, etc. This is something that is also historically proven, every single one of you are necessary. You are necessary to the betterment and survival of the whole. This is what we are talking about when we say culture.

On Monday, May 11, and Tuesday, May 12, the Tulalip Resort Casino hosted the 3rd Annual Community Wellness Conference. The target audience this year was our tribal youth. Photo/Micheal Rios — On Monday, May 11, and Tuesday, May 12, the Tulalip Resort Casino hosted the 3rd Annual Community Wellness Conference. The target audience this year was our tribal youth.
Photo/Micheal Rios

A lot of people think culture is this fancy thing that you wear, it’s a pendent or beaded necklace. One of my heroes, his name is John Mohawk, said ‘Culture is a learned means of survival in an environment’. That’s all it is. At one time when you were trying to survive as that special little sperm cell, you were kicking and fighting and elbowing all these other 80 to 500 million sperm cells because your means of survival was getting to that egg by any means necessary. As we developed and we became tribes, our means of survival was by finding what the need was within our community. We all come from need-based communities. From both these perspectives, historically and biologically, you are necessary, you are important, and you are beautiful.

A side note to the historical piece. I don’t get into the morality of drugs and alcohol, the morality of it and spiritual part is between you, your family and your creator. However, there is a practical part.

The practical part is historically our people couldn’t afford to do things that weaken themselves. You couldn’t do it as a practical matter, not as a spiritual matter. You couldn’t be weak. Why? Because when you are coming from a small community and there are only so many hands that can go out and hunt, or so many hands that could go out and gather food and medicinal herbs, or so many hands that can seamstress…every person is a commodity. Every person is incredibly important. For every single person who is unable, because they are weakened by drinking alcohol or doing drugs, that isn’t able to fulfill their function within the community is making the entire community weaker. Not morally, but practically because that makes their family and their community weaker by that individual’s decision to weaken themselves, because now they can’t be relied upon to carry word or to go fish or to hunt. So now the community as a whole is weaker. Every single one of you are necessary in a community.

You need this place, your community, your home…and it needs you. The reason why you need this place is because history and biology. Right now, you have the privilege of breathing the same oxygen, drinking the same water, eating the same fish as your ancestors have for 20,000 years. Nobody else in this country can say that. There’s not one single person in this nation who can say that other than Native people. That’s it. That’s a huge privilege. Your community has that sense, that longing, it’s that Mother Land that says, ‘I need you, but you also need me’. When we look at the history, the biology of these communities there is a DNA there and you are the living embodiment of that DNA.

I want to end with Christine Quintasket. ‘Everything on Earth has a purpose, every disease an herb to cure it, and every person a mission’. What is your mission?”

What’s Lurking Behind the Suicides?

By Joe Flood, New York Times

PINE RIDGE, S.D. — OUTSIDE the Oglala Lakota tribe’s child protection service office, staff members updated a police officer on the latest emergency: An 11-year old girl had texted her cousin that she wanted to kill herself and then had gone missing.

A damp breeze swirled smoke from the caseworkers’ cigarettes, and the sun flitted between mottled clouds, the advance guard of an approaching spring blizzard. The officer jotted down some specifics on the girl and the remote area where she was last seen, then pulled away from the curb. They didn’t want to lose another child.

Since December, nine people between the ages of 12 and 24 have committed suicide on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation — home to Crazy Horse’s Oglala band of the Lakota — in southwestern South Dakota.

They come to Pine Ridge every few years, these suicide epidemics, with varying degrees of national media attention and local soul-searching. What the news media often misses though, and what tribal members understand but rarely discuss above a whisper, is that youth suicides here are inextricably linked to a multigenerational scourge of sexual abuse, with investigations into possible abuse now open in at least two of the nine recent suicides.

I’m a wasicu (Lakota for “white person”) from Massachusetts, but I’ve spent about half of the past decade living on the rez, working mostly as a teacher and archery coach. Within two weeks of starting my first job teaching high school English here, a veteran teacher told me something he thought was critical to understanding life on Pine Ridge: By the time they reach high school, most of the girls (and many boys, too) have been molested or raped.

His anecdotal observation seems to track with the available statistics. According to the United States Department of Justice, Native Americans are 2.5 times more likely to be sexually assaulted than other Americans, and the numbers on Pine Ridge, one of the largest, poorest reservations in the country, appear to be even greater. “We started two clinics for reproductive health in the largest high schools on the reservation,” said Terry Friend, a midwife who works at the year-and-a-half-old Four Directions Clinic, which specializes in sexual assault and domestic abuse. “When I take a sexual history of a patient, I ask, ‘Have you had sex against your will?’ At the high schools, girls answered yes more than no.”

Numbers are harder to come by for boys, but local medical professionals estimate that they are also high, and that such rates of abuse can translate to high rates of suicide. One recent study found that nationally, teenage boys who were sexually assaulted were about 10 times more likely to attempt suicide, girls more than three times more likely.

At some point, most local child sexual assault cases cross the tribal prosecutor’s desk. “Unfortunately, many of those same kids have suicidal ideations and attempts,” said the tribe’s attorney general, Tatewin Means. “I definitely think there’s a strong connection between sexual assault and suicide here on the reservation.”

Continue reading the main story

THE BOY LOVED the sweat lodge. He was a troubled student but took solace in the traditional Lakota form of prayer, with steam hissing off big glowing rocks in the center of a small lodge made of bent saplings and canvas tarps. School and tribal officials said the boy showed up to school one day last spring when he was supposed to be on suspension, climbed a pine tree in the schoolyard and hanged himself from a thick branch. Teachers and students saw him, and he was quickly cut down. Struggling to breathe, he sprinted for the school’s sweat lodge, where he took refuge until the police and a relative calmed him down.

It wasn’t the first time he had attempted suicide in or around school grounds, administrators said. He’d been depressed, and behaving erratically, with signs that he was using drugs and “huffing” gasoline. There had also been signs of sexual abuse, involving not only him but also a younger brother and male cousins he lived with. Every time one of the boys showed new signs of abuse or talked about suicide, school officials said, they called the tribe’s child protection unit, and every time they were told the same thing: “It’s still under investigation.”

The child was not removed from the home. Then in December, two weeks after his 14th birthday, the boy hanged himself at home and became the first in the recent string of nine suicides.

His case was lost, it seems, in the web of tribal bureaucracies and federal oversight bodies that are long on backlogged cases and short on funding. The tribal child protection unit, for instance, currently has two investigators for the entire reservation, which the federal census puts at more than 18,000 total residents (though tribal officials say is closer to 40,000). The two investigators are responsible for handling upward of 40 new cases a month, and hundreds more in the long-term case management system.

About a month after the boy died, a 14-year old cheerleader killed herself. Soon after, rumors of an all-too-familiar detail started to spread: Before her death, the girl told friends that her stepfather, a longtime teacher and coach at her school, was sexually abusing her. What followed broke the usual mold, though: Her friends came forward to tell school officials. Charles Roessel, a member of the Navajo Nation and director of the federal Bureau of Indian Education, which oversees the school, said administrators acted quickly to suspend the accused teacher and refer the case to federal investigators. No charges have been brought.

Shortly after his suspension from the federal school, the cheerleader’s stepfather was brought on, according to school officials, as an unpaid intern by the reservation’s Shannon County school system, which is overseen by the state. His job was to shadow one of the system’s principals so that he could learn to be a school administrator. The stepfather did not respond to requests for comment.

TRIBAL LEADERS and experts are struggling to understand the recent suicide epidemic (specifics on many of the cases aren’t widely known), but there’s general agreement on one underlying cause: the legacy of federally funded boarding schools that forcibly removed generations of Native American children from their homes. Former students and scholars of the institutions say that the isolation and lack of oversight at the mostly church-run schools allowed physical and sexual abuse to run rampant.

“My grandmother used to tell me that she didn’t think she was pretty,” said an E.M.T. friend of mine who responds to a suicide attempt every week or so, “because when the priests used to sneak into her dorm and take a little girl for the night, they never picked her.”

Left untreated, such sexual abuse can lead to elevated rates of drug and alcohol abuse and suicide, said Dr. Steven Berkowitz, director of a center on youth trauma at the University of Pennsylvania.

One sad irony of the recent suicides is that they come in the middle of new initiatives to address sexual assault. The Four Directions Clinic is treating young abuse victims who were previously sent to distant hospitals off the reservation. Tribal and federal law enforcement officials now confer regularly to better coordinate investigations. High school students recently petitioned the Pine Ridge school board to create health classes for vulnerable middle school students, and the board unanimously voted to find necessary funding.

Still, the challenges are enormous. Six days after the 11-year-old girl went missing, protection services still hadn’t located her, though a caseworker says the hope is that the girl and her mother have gone to a domestic violence shelter somewhere — the reservation doesn’t have its own.

Shortly before the 14-year-old boy committed suicide, a school administrator tried to counsel him. Lakota tradition, she told him, teaches that a spirit set free by suicide is doomed to wander the earth in lonely darkness. “You don’t want that, do you?” she asked. He looked her in the eye, a minor taboo for Lakota children to do with their elders, and said, “Anything’s better than here.”

Tiny House Movement builds success

Tulalip students put skills to use for the homeless

Students in the Tulalip Construction Training program are building two tiny houses to help the urban homeless population in Seattle. Photo/Mara HIll — Students in the Tulalip Construction Training program are building two tiny houses to help the urban homeless population in Seattle.
Photo/Mara Hill

By Mara Hill, Tulalip News

An old, rusty building left over from a time when Quil Ceda Village was the Boeing Test site hides a treasure. You walk inside and you’re surrounded by people hard at work. The sound of drills buzzing, hammers banging and voices raised in a friendly hello.

The workers are students of the Tulalip Construction Training program. They each come from a tribal nation, some as far away as South Dakota. Their dreams vary, one wants to build a patio for his son’s grandmother, others want to join a union, or add to their skills for do it yourself projects or to improve their qualifications for work. Currently, they’re building their skills through a “tiny house” project that will assist with a subject near and dear to my heart, homelessness.

I have been homeless. Not sleeping on the ground in the rain kind of homeless, but staying at a friend’s house, couch-surfing kind of homeless. I was anxious and depressed. It was the darkest place I’ve ever been in my entire life. I write this with tears in my eyes as I remember striving for some kind of normalcy for my daughter. I was willing to do anything to have a home of my own.

I’m on my way to that normal life. Through the Tiny House Movement, with the help of the Tulalip Tribes, the urban homeless population of Seattle will also have a chance to change their lives.

Tiny house encampments evolved out of tent communities. These encampments are increasing in popularity due to the rising cost of housing. Tiny homes generally don’t exceed 500 square feet, and can be easily moved from one location to the next.

Instructor Mark Newland, and his students of the Tulalip Construction Training program received the housing materials on May 7 and began construction of two approximately 8’ x 12’ Tiny Houses on May 11, 2015. The homes have no amenities, just an open floor plan. However, residents have a roof over their head, a single window, front door with lock, and a single light switch. Each home also features a state of the art fan to control humidity and keep the homes livable during hot weather.

Each house will take between five and ten days to construct. The homes are basic, but simply having a locked door and a safe place to sleep is a game changer for many homeless citizens.

These houses are being donated to Nickelsville, a homeless encampment in Seattle named after former Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, in protest to the way he handled the homeless situation.

“Making homelessness criminal, that’s kind of the way a lot of towns go. Running people out of town doesn’t settle the problem. It’s not a human solution. Unfortunately we need a lot more [resources] for the homeless than we have, both here on the reservation and elsewhere too,” explained Sandy Tracy, Manager of the Tulalip Homeless Shelter, about the stigma that homelessness carries. Many of those in need don’t receive help because of perceptions about their character, rather than their situation.

The approximately 8’ x 12’ structures each take five to ten days to complete and will be delivered to Nickelsville on June 9. Photo/Mara Hill — The approximately 8’ x 12’ structures each take five to ten days to
complete and will be delivered to Nickelsville on June 9.
Photo/Mara Hill

This donation is a great way to remind us of our humanity, that those too are people. It’s a great way to express to another community that we care.

Tribal communities experience homelessness but not always to the point of sleeping under underpasses and camping in the woods. Many tribal members are interrelated, or know each other, so there is more couch-surfing homelessness on Tulalip than in the outside communities.

Tracy called the tiny house movement a useful tool for the homeless.

“I’ve seen the little houses where someone is at least out of the elements and have a good door between them and whoever is wandering around. I think those are very good things.”

The dedication to Nickelsville will be Tuesday June 9, 2015 at 1001 S. Dearborn in the International District of Seattle.

Contact Mara Hill, mward@tulaliptribes-nsn.gov

Strengthening resiliency for our tribal community

by Micheal Rios, Tulalip News

On Monday, May 11, and Tuesday, May 12, the Tulalip Resort Casino hosted the Tulalip community as we came together to partake in the 3^rd Annual Community Wellness Conference. The event was a two-day, all-day occasion that took place in the Orca Ballroom. Sponsored by the Tulalip Tribes’ Problem Gambling and Stop Smoking Programs, this year’s conference was particularly special for all attendees, as we were invited to hear the motivational words and experience the remarkable talents of Native celebrities from across North America.

The target audience this year was our tribal youth, to ensure tribal youth engagement all the students of Heritage High School were bussed to and from the TRC in order to participate in the Wellness Conference. With an open registration, all members of the Tulalip community were welcome to attend. There were approximately two hundred attendees on each day.

Day one was highlighted by keynote speaker Gyasi Ross, author and lawyer, an aerial performance by Andrea Thompson, and our very own Rediscovery Coordinator Inez Bill teaching how to make smudge kits and lip balm. Day two was highlighted by keynote speaker Vaughn Eagle Bear, comedian and actor, and a special performance by DJ crew A Tribe Called Red. The two-day Community Wellness Conference kept everyone engaged, kept interests peaked, and provoked much self-reflection while we learned how to channel our energies into positive experiences.

Conference coordinators, Ashley Tiedeman and Alison Bowen, reflected on the success of the Wellness Conference after it was over, saying the conference was successful not just because they had more attendees than the previous two years, but because of how each Native speaker managed to address and engage audience members on a spiritual and intellectual level. All of the amazing Native speakers shared their story and how they overcome their hardships to get to where they are now, successfully following their passion.

Day two keynote speaker, Vaughn Eaglebear, gets the crowd going with his comedic antics. Photo/Micheal Rios

A simple, but powerful message expressed to the youth by Gyasi Ross was “It gets greater later.”

“We come from a faithful people,” expressed Ross to the tribal youth. “We come from people who have genetically coded DNA that says, ‘It gets greater later.’ We don’t give up. We don’t ever give up. That’s not what we do. Every single one of you come from that strong, enriched lineage of perseverance and resilience. That DNA is still within you, that blood is still within you that makes you strong. That makes you willing to work by faith and realize ‘It gets greater later’.”

This message wasn’t planned, but hit home with all and was repeated throughout the conference. Alison Bowen, Family Haven Program Manager and co-coordinator of the conference, hopes that every single tribal youth takes this message to heart. “It becomes greater later. Each and every one of you has a purpose. You are all needed and loved.”

This is an ongoing article.

Contact Micheal Rios, mrios@tulaliptribes-nsn.gov

Bureau of Indian Affairs, Department of Interior release final rules regarding Osage minerals estate development

By Samantha Vicent, Tulsa World

The Bureau of Indian Affairs on Monday released their final rules that revise government regulations relating to development of the Osage Nation’s minerals estate.

BIA Director Michael Black told the Tulsa World on Friday that the release comes nearly three years after a $380 million Osage tribal trust settlement resolved litigation alleging the U.S. mismanaged the tribe’s minerals.

The new rule, which was made available for public inspection in the Federal Register that day, clears issues that Black said the Bureau and Nation couldn’t remedy through the 2011 settlement, in which a federal judge said the U.S. “grossly mismanaged” the nation’s oil and gas money.

The document says the regulations will take effect July 10, and include developing and implementing standardized reporting to manage production and accounting; improving methods for calculating quarterly oil and gas royalties for headright holders, and rental rates’ implementing technological enhancements to better manage the mineral estate; identifying best practices for development and conducting onsite inspection programs; and documenting formal communication needed to most effectively manage the mineral estate between the Osage Nation, Osage Minerals Council and the U.S.

Headrights, or mineral estate shares, were given to 2,229 Osage tribe members after the nation signed off on a 1906 Allotment Act. The Department of the Interior will now use the New York Mercantile Exchange price settlement point in Cushing to determine quarterly royalty payments.

“We do believe the rules balance the various interests of producers and service owners, and it does ensure the Osage mineral estate will be developed for the benefit of the Osage,” he said. “We’re also increasing the standards of safety.”

However, the new rules also state there may be additional upfront costs to oil and gas producers’ operations to ensure they comply with the new regulations, and that while the BIA will consult with the Osage Minerals Council about matters relating to the mineral estate, the BIA will be able to take “corrective actions” against lessees who violate the regulations up to and including terminating leases after consultation with the council. The document also lays out financial penalties for violations of lease terms and operating regulations.

Shane Matson, president of energy company Bandolier Energy LLC, works extensively in Osage County and has said few, if any, wells have been drilled there this year because the BIA has not approved permits while working on these rules and also a new environmental assessment of the county, which could take until the end of 2015 to complete. Producers in the meantime would have to complete 72-page environmental assessments on individual well sites before receiving a permit, and the Osage Minerals Council has called a proposed new permitting requirement “vague and confusing,” according to Tulsa World archives.

When asked about that issue, Black said the fluctuating economy and falling oil prices have played roles in the county’s production decline. He also emphasized surface land is owned separately from the oil and other minerals beneath, and that the BIA has been governing the county under existing regulations and will do so until the new rules take effect.

“There have been some questions with the applications for permits to drill and some of our procedures, and (the rule and permits) are two separate and distinct issues,” he said. “The rule isn’t really directly related to whether or not there is drilling going on out there.”

The Osage Producers Association and Osage Minerals Council have not yet commented on the final rule, which Black said they received over the weekend, and have publicly spoken little on the pending environmental assessment, which BIA officials previously said was in the works before a class action lawsuit was filed against the agency and oil producers last year.

But Matson said most of those who drill in the county, instead of large companies such as ExxonMobil, are simply “guys pumping our own resources in Pawhuska and Skiatook and Hominy,” and that the new regulations have the potential to negatively affect production and income due to the government agencies’ admission that additional costs could be incurred by producers.

“This business requires regulatory stability because you’re planning the deployment of millions of dollars in very complicated engineering processes,” he said, but added that producers hoped the negotiated rule-making process committee would have been more inclusive of everyone who could be affected.

That committee was comprised of four employees from federal agencies and five members of the Osage Minerals Council, a BIA spokeswoman said Friday. The Department of the Interior, in its response to comments requesting it restart the rule-making process, said it wasn’t necessary to do so because it provided “extensive opportunity” for public comments and gave notice for committee meetings at least 30 days in advance.

“The Osage Producers Association board will meet later this week to evaluate the code and determine a path for it,” Matson said.

Nisqually Wildlife Refuge would be renamed for civil rights hero Billy Frank Jr.

Billy Frank Jr. poses for a 2014 photo near Frank’s Landing on the Nisqually River in Nisqually, Wash. Frank, a Nisqually tribal elder who was arrested dozens of times while trying to ‘assert his native fishing rights during the Fish Wars of the 1960s and ’70s. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren, File)

By Joel Connelly, Seattle PI

The state’s congressional delegation, showing rare bipartisan unity, plans next week to introduce legislation that would rename the Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge in honor of Billy Frank Jr., champion of native fishing rights and a Washington civil rights hero.

The bill would create a National Historic Site to mark the 1854 Treaty of Medicine Creek, which took land from natives but did guarantee them the right to take fish “at all usual and accustomed stations . . . in common with the citizens of the territory.”

“I loved Billy Frank: He was one of the greatest men I have met in my life,” said U.S. Rep. Denny Heck, D-Wash., the principal author of the legislation. “He is our Martin Luther King, our Desmond Tutu, our Nelson Mandela.”

Frank was viewed differently when he launched Indian fishing rights protests on the Nisqually in the 1960′s. He was arrested 50 times, starting at the age of 14, for “illegal” fishing on the Nisqually River, where he was born and lived, and where his ancestors lived.

He died last year, at 83, as a recipient of the Albert Schweitzer Humanitarian Award, a person of vast credibility who began with a simple message. “He said simply, Treaties are the word of America, and America should keep its word,’ ” ex-Gov. Mike Lowry recalled.

The struggle for fishing rights became a seminal — perhaps THE seminal — episode in the modern history of Native-American rights.

“I have a particular view of how this impacted ‘Indian Country,’ ” said Heck. The issue of treaty rights to fish gave Native Americans a platform on resources. It gave them standing on other issues, and led to the National Indian Gaming Regulatory Act. And that act led to the fastest drop in Indian poverty we have ever seen.”

In this 1960′s photo, Billy Frank Jr., left, fishes on the Nisqually River near Olympia, Wash., with his half brother Don McCloud. Frank, a Nisqually tribal elder, was arrested dozens of times while trying to assert his native fishing rights during the Fish Wars of the 1960s and ’70s,. (AP Photo/Courtesy Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission, File)

How so? “Billy was the spear point in treaty rights,” Heck added.

An historic moment in Northwest history came in 1974, when conservative U.S. District Judge George Boldt ruled for the Native Americans, that treaty Indians were entitled to 50 percent of the salmon catch and could fish in “all usual and accustomed grounds and stations.”

When he was 14, Bill Frank had told game wardens who arrested him: “Leave me alone, goddamn it! I live here.”

In later years, Frank would replace confrontation with cooperation in restoring the salmon runs that help define the Pacific Northwest.

“When a bunch of Really Important People get together in a conference room, you can always tell Mr. Frank even from afar,” author Timothy Egan once wrote. Amid the government and corporate executives, all tasseled loafers and silk ties, he’s the one with the long pony tail, the gold salmon medallion and the open necked shirt.

“And he’s the one with the scars — nicks, cuts and slash marks — from a lifetime of being harassed by people who don’t like Indians, and from an all-season outdoor life.”

The Nisqually Wildlife Refuge is a suitable honor. Frank lived to see levies and dikes come down at the mouth of the Nisqually River, with estuary habitat restored where salmon can grow up, and where visitors can witness a multiplicity of shore birds.

“The absence of natural estuaries like this is part of the reason why the region is still going backwards rather than forwards on Puget Sound salmon,” Heck noted.

Heck has done his homework on the bill. He has lined up as a cosponsor influential Oklahoma Republican Rep. Tom Cole, a member of the Chickasaw Nation. He has also signed up Alaska’s crusty Republican Rep. Don Young.

Canada geese in the Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge, a sanctuary for birds and a place where young salmon can grow up.

A cosponsor from this state, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, is a usually hyper partisan member of the House Republican leadership. “Her signing on says to the leadership, ‘This is O.K.’,” said Heck.

He has also secured backing from the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission — long headed by Billy Frank — and the National Congress of American Indians. Brian Cladoosby, chairman of the Swinomish Tribe, is currently president of the congress.

The legislation, officially “The Billy Frank, Jr., Tell Your Story Act” creates an opportunity for the Nisqually, Muckleshoot, Puyallup and Squaxin Island tribes to tell their stories. The U.S. Interior Secretary will coordinate with then creating materials for the Medicine Treaty National Historic Site.

Bill Frank made his last appearance just over a year ago, at a meeting in Suquamish with U.S. Interior Secretary Sally Jewell.

Just over a week later, he died. “When Billy spoke, you listened: We saw that firsthand just last week when he commanded a room that included tribal leaders, fisheries officials and the secretary of the interior,” U.S. Rep. Derek Kilmer, D-Wash., recalled of the meeting.

Not bad for a guy with a ninth-grade education.”Today, because of the Boldt Decision, the state and tribes are partners in the management and preservation of resources that are foundational in the economy of the state,” Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., said in eulogizing Frank.

Just as Frank spoke of cooperation and conservation, the wildlife refuge at the mouth of the Nisqually speaks of Billy Frank Jr.

Seattle Port Lacks Permit for Drilling Rig, Mayor Murray Says

One of Royal Dutch Shell's massive oil rigs, off the coast of Port Angeles. The Port of Seattle signed a lease with the oil giant in February. Foss Maritime tugs would pilot the rigs through Puget Sound to ensure their safety.BELLAMY PAILTHORP KPLU — One of Royal Dutch Shell’s massive oil rigs, off the coast of Port Angeles. The Port of Seattle signed a lease with the oil giant in February. Foss Maritime tugs would pilot the rigs through Puget Sound to ensure their safety.
BELLAMY PAILTHORP KPLU

By ASSOCIATED PRESS & BELLAMY PAILTHORP

Seattle Mayor Ed Murray said the Port of Seattle can’t host Royal Dutch Shell’s offshore Arctic oil-drilling fleet unless it gets a new land-use permit.

Shell has been hoping to base its fleet at the port’s Terminal 5. Environmentalists have already sued over the plan, saying the port broke state law in February when it signed a two-year lease with Foss Maritime, which is working with Shell.

At a breakfast for a clean-energy group on Monday, Murray said city planners reviewed the planned use of Terminal 5 as a base for the drilling fleet and found that it would violate the port’s land-use permit, which allows a cargo terminal on the site.

Shell has argued that its planned activities at the terminal — such as docking, equipment loading and crew changes — are no more environmentally risky than loading or unloading shipping containers.

Dozens of environmental groups including Greenpeace and Climate Solutions have been campaigning against the plan and training for direct action on the water using kayaks and chanting, “Shell No!”

Murray says he thinks the Port of Seattle is in serious trouble, if oil drilling rigs are the only way for it to be competitive.

The oil company wants to base part of its Arctic Drilling fleet at Terminal 5 in West Seattle, before heading to Alaska’s north slope. One rig, the Polar Pioneer, is already in Port Angeles and is waiting for a green light to come to Seattle.

The mayor says the deal is not in line with the region’s values. And the money to upgrade the terminal should be available from other sources.

“This is a city in a region where businesses are developing and choosing to locate here , where international investment is interested in participating. We should be able to build a vigorous port based on other than bringing (drilling) rigs into the city, for just a few years.”

In February, The Port and Foss Maritime signed a two-year contract worth millions of dollars that would be used to upgrade the terminal.

Healing Lodge: The next step in our journey to fight addiction

Tulalip drummers and singers bless the Healing Lodge with a traditional welcoming song at the grand opening on Friday, April 17. Photo Micheal Rios — Tulalip drummers and singers bless the Healing Lodge with a traditional welcoming song at the grand opening on Friday, May 1.
Photo Micheal Rios

by Micheal Rios, Tulalip News

The much anticipated grand opening ceremony of Tulalip’s qʷibilalʔtxʷ Healing Lodge was held on Friday, May 1. Tribal members, Healing Lodge staff, and community members traveled to the Stanwood property to attend and observe the cultural blessing and welcoming songs, heartfelt Board of Director speeches, and ribbon cutting ceremony that officially marked the grand opening. Tulalip has now decisively chosen to take the next step in fighting the addiction problems in the Tulalip community by providing a transitional home facility for tribal members who are seeking a sober and clean lifestyle.

“I want to welcome you all here to this beautiful Healing Lodge of ours,” said Diane Henry, Recovery Home Manager, prior to the ribbon cutting. “I’m going to get emotional because it’s been a long time and we’ve been working so hard to get these doors open. We’ve worked really hard to try to uphold our values as a tribe, to bring in the programs we want to offer here that can contribute to our community and help those folks who come here to transition back home in a good way. We want to have this facility truly being what that name means, Healing Lodge. It’s a beautiful facility and this truly is a great day for all of us.”

For years now, the tribal membership has been pleading for more services located on the reservation to combat the steadily growing disease of addiction. Instead of sending our members to off-reservation facilities that are unable to relate to their needs culturally and spiritually, they should be able to stay close to home while receiving healing and recovery treatments that they will not only respond to, but that can become part of who the person is at their cultural and spiritual core. The Healing Lodge is the first of many facilities of its kind that we hope to see to built to meet the needs of the people.

“Today, more than ever, addiction is so real in our community,” explains Tulalip Treasurer Les Parks. “It’s an epidemic, not only in our community, but in this entire country. What better way to help our addicted members than to bring them into a place of culture and healing. I am so glad. It warms my heart that we no longer have to send our members to the outside world to transition back into our community. We are sending them to our healing home with our cultural values. This is transitioning our members back into the community. Everything that being Indian means to us rests here in the property. Today is here, it is a good day.”

Outside view of the Healong Lodge, which can accomodate up to 16 residents seeking a clean and sober lifestyle. Photo Micheal Rios — Outside view of the Healing Lodge, which can accomodate up to 16 residents seeking a clean and sober lifestyle.
Photo Micheal Rios

The years of preparation and development that has gone into the Healing Lodge has been meticulously engineered to provide a culturally sensitive transitional home. This home provides a safe, secure, supportive and stable environment for Native Americans seeking to maintain a clean and sober lifestyle. The Healing Lodge’s vision is to extend recovery within the Tulalip Tribal community through quality evidence-based practices, existing programs and continued expansion.

In following the traditions of our Tulalip ancestors, we are ensuring that tribal members are valued and cared for. The Healing Lodge will offer a unique blend of traditional Native, western, and eastern medicines combined with social and psycho-educational modalities of treatment to serve our Native people. Each Healing Lodge client will be adapted into their own client-specific program that is culturally woven with a holistic approach through Red Road to Wellbriety teachings, taking circles, and teaching of Native American drumming and singing. Of course there will be on-site Red Road Recovery meetings and AA/NA outside meetings that will be further supplemented by traditional smudging ceremonies, teachings of equine therapy with on-site horses, and healing through the on-site sweat lodge.

The rooms of the common floor are decorated with Tulalip artwork to make residents feel more at home. Photo/Micheal Rios — The rooms of the common floor are decorated with Tulalip artwork to make residents feel more at home.
Photo/Micheal Rios

One of the resident rooms.Photo/Micheal Rios — One of the resident rooms.
Photo/Micheal Rios

Recovery is a life-long process and involves examining personal identity and beliefs, adjustments and changes to family and social relationship, and changing lifestyles to accommodate sobriety. Tulalip Behavioral Health understands that recovery is more than just abstaining from the use of alcohol and drugs. There will be a variety of classes offered to rebuild lives with traditional value. Healing Lodge residents will have an opportunity to learn gardening, Native arts and crafts, and traditional round drum making and songs. Additionally, personalized classes will be offered for the essential life skills to include financial management, anger management, self-esteem building, and education of the disease of drug addiction and alcoholism, classes for relapse prevention, exercise, meditation, and nutrition.

The Tulalip Board of Directors support offering Native American style services to promote healing of the emotional, physical, spiritual and mental well-being of every member who chooses to become a resident of the Healing Lodge.

“It’s truly about all of us as a collective,” says Board Member Theresa Sheldon. “It’s not about sending one person away and making them get better and figuring out how to function back into the community, but about us as a collective getting better and learning how to function together in a healthier manner. So I’m truly thankful for those reasons today, that we are here and will continue to support each and every member of our community. This is just our first step in becoming healthier as a community. I know it’s going to be fabulous and it’s going to have great, great results for our people.”

The Healing Lodge hopes to be the first huge step, of many yet to come, that will provide the Tulalip Tribes with the resources and services necessary to fight the ever-growing addiction epidemic that plagues so many of our people. The three story Healing Lodge includes a dedicated third floor for eight female residents, a dedicated first floor for eight male residents, and a second floor common area that includes a top of the line kitchen, dining room, meeting rooms, and a library. Also, included on the property are two barns, spacious fields where the equine therapy will take place, garden beds, and scenic walking paths.

“I really want this to be a place of healing for our people. A place where they can go to recover from their addictions and to be able to transition back home with a new set of skills,” says Diane Henry. “Sometimes people need more than just learning how to cook and clean, then need a place that can help them figure out how to live a sober lifestyle. Some people have never seen that in their own families. They may have come from families who’ve battled addiction all their life. Addiction become a normal routine. How do you get out of that? How do you stop that cycle of addiction? This place is that next step after treatment that addresses those issues.”

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Equine Therapy for Lodge Residents

Horses at the Healing Lodge will help promote emotional growth in residents. Photo/Brian Berry — Horses at the Healing Lodge will help promote emotional growth in residents.
Photo/Brian Berry, Tulalip News

One type of therapy offered at the Healing Lodge is Equine Therapy. This type of therapy involves the use of horses by professionals to help with the recovery of patients that are affected by behavioral problems, substance abuse, depression, anxiety, autism, traumatic brain injuries, post-traumatic stress disorder, relationship needs and others. When participants interact with horses, it allows them to learn about themselves when they are learning basic equestrian or horse training commands. Some positive benefits or results of equine therapy are trust, boundaries, spiritual connections, increased social skills, and self-confidence.

Pam McMahon, the barn manager for the Healing Lodge, said that participants receiving equine therapy will be “learning life skills to help them adjust back into society with a different perspective.” She said that anytime you spend time around horses, it tends to soothe the soul. It helps people see a better way of life and develops better relationships because “horses tend to mirror the inner feelings of people”, which will be effective in showing the professionals the feelings, behaviors and attitudes of the participants.

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Art at the Lodge

Rare, one of a kind artwork by national and local artists can be found on display at the Tulalip Healing Lodge. And where some of the artwork came from is a curious approach to decorating.

Paddles and drums by unknown artists were rescued from a local Marysville pawnshop, along with a few prints by Michael Gentry, a Cherokee painter whose work has been purchased by U.S. presidents and is known for his Native portrait paintings.

Many of the larger art pieces were commissioned for the Healing Lodge and crafted by renowned Tulalip carvers, Joe Gobin and James Madison. Large carved cedar tables in the common areas tell traditional Tulalip origin stories, such as Madison’s salmon table that depicts our people’s history with Big Chief Salmon.

Incorporating pawnshop finds with newly crafted art may be a bit unusual for decorating, but Healing Lodge staff couldn’t have been happier with the outcome of unique artwork that completes the Lodge.

By Tulalip News reporters Mara Hill and Brandi N. Montreuil contributed to this article

Contact Micheal Rios, ,rios@tulaliptribes-nsn.gov

U.S. DISTRICT COURT DISMISSES LAKE QUINAULT CASE

Source: Press Release Quinault Indian Nation,

TACOMA, WA (5/4/15)—United States District Court Judge Ronald B. Leighton dismissed a lawsuit this afternoon which had been filed in January against the Quinault Indian Nation and the Washington State Department of Natural Resources seeking to revoke ownership of Lake Quinault from the Tribe.
“This quick and explicit ruling was never in doubt,” said Quinault Nation President Fawn Sharp. “As I said back in January, Lake Quinault is undisputedly within the Quinault Reservation. This was a meritless lawsuit. Lake Quinault is sacred to us. It is unquestionably within our Reservation and we take our responsibility to manage it properly very seriously.”
The suit, which was filed by North Quinault Properties LLC, questioned the Tribe’s ownership of the lake. The suit had included DNR for alleged failure to fulfill its management responsibilities. But the challenge actually stemmed from a few local landowners’ reactions to closure of the lake by the Quinault Nation last year, an action taken to protect the lake from pollution problems, invasive species and violation of tribally mandated regulations, said Sharp.
“Our objective is to protect the lake for future generations. We realize it is a popular recreation destination, and we are happy to accommodate those interests, but only as long as the lake is respected and protected at levels we accept,” she said.
“We want to acknowledge the fact that this frivolous lawsuit was brought by a single landowner and that a majority of landowners around the lake understand and support our objectives. They have shown respect for our efforts to reach out to work cooperatively while recognizing the exclusive governing authority of the Tribe. Good public policy among separate and distinct sovereigns requires cooperation, good faith, respect, and, when dealing with tribal nations, an understanding, in principle and practice, that our governing powers long pre-date the United States and its political subdivisions. I want to publicly thank our neighbors and say that we look forward to strengthening our valuable relationship with them. Working together, as we have been able to do, is the best way we can all assure that Lake Quinault will remain clean, beautiful and available for all citizens for many years to come,” she said.
Judge Leighton issued separate dismissal rulings for the Tribe and the DNR. The Court granted the Tribe’s motion to dismiss based on sovereign immunity. The state dismissal was based on the Eleventh Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.