Anti-Indian Groups Will Not Go Away If We Ignore Them

Opposition to Indian self-preservation or betterment for our Nations and our people is growing by leaps and bounds in this country. If an Indian Nation mentions the words “property into trust”, the alarms go off. Mention the possibility of opening an Indian owned casino, smoke shop, convenience store or other business and you know that some group of local citizens are going to form an “organization” to oppose it. If that isn’t the way it unfolds in your locality then you can count on an established local, regional, or national organization to start lobbying against your efforts. You are all familiar with the scenario and most of you here have had some first hand experience in dealing with these issues.

The published and spoken directive of these groups is usually "sugar coated" in an effort to make it appear that they exist only for the best interests of the people they represent. They espouse that they are not racist or anti-Indian while they continue their efforts to stifle our business growth, sovereignty and our people themselves. In reality, most of these groups are biased toward Indians in some way or another. Their press releases, actions and their web sites clearly prove this fact.

They state their concern about the loss of tax revenue if property is taken off of the tax roll in their locality. We all know the reality of those figures. There is minimal loss for the state, county or municipality and a great gain in revenue in most instances.

One such group is One Nation United, a Redmond, Washington and Thousand Oaks, California based organization formerly known as United Property Owners, who merged with the Oklahoma based One Nation, on January 1, 2005. This merger combined a grassroots organization with big business and big money backing interests from the One Nation group, which at one time claimed in excess of 150,000 members alone.

The One Nation line up includes the Petroleum Marketer's Association of America, the National Association of Convenience Stores, and the Farm Bureau Insurance Company, among other business interests. If you think for one minute that the people behind these organizations are pro-Indian, think again. They are fully supportive of their business plan, their stockholders and the dollar. Millions of those dollars are at their disposal and they are using them to lobby against us at local, state and Federal levels.

Barb Lindsay, National Spokesperson for ONU and David Jaques, President of ONU were on hand for a public meeting of the Douglas County, Oregon commissioners on August 2nd, 2006. What ensued, in my opinion, was a fiasco of "us against the Indians" brought on by Lindsay in an attempt to justify her organization's stand on the issues against the Cow Creek Band of Umpqua Indians, a Federally recognized tribe and good neighbor to the county. While Ms. Lindsay stated that the organization was not racist or anti-Indian, her rhetoric said volumes more.

These groups are everywhere in Indian Country. They continue to grow, they continue to multiply and they continue to gain support. I was told by the Public Relations head of a large Oklahoma Indian Nation a couple of years ago that their position was, “They will go away if we just ignore them.” It appears that that Nation was wrong in their assessment and we should all know it now.

They will not go away if we ignore them.

Many of these group’s supporters are non-Indian property owners and concerned citizens who buy into their inflamed and false rhetoric. But, many are businesses or business organizations that have deep lobbying pockets and the desire to stop us in our tracks. This fact alone should give us cause for deep thought about the solutions we must search for to sway public opinion. A mutually tribally funded positive advertising campaign across the country would be one way to sway opinion. The Chickasaw Nation in Oklahoma has done an excellent job recently with the campaign they are currently running on television.

I know there are many battles we must fight in the course of our history. We, as Nations and as individuals, each have our own battles, our own hardships to endure. But, only with determination and unity, as Indigenous People, shall we prevail. We must all come together in support of a common goal. The preservation and continuation of our inherent sovereignty and our rights as the first people of this great country is of the utmost importance to us all.

Push for a Native American Day in Oklahoma

Push for a Native American Day in Oklahoma
State would become third to do so

OKLAHOMA CITY OK
Sam Lewin
1/19/2005


An Oklahoma lawmaker has introduced a bill to declare Native American Day to be observed annually on the 2nd Monday in October.

Rep. Glen Bud Smithson, a Democrat from Sallisaw, has received praise for his authorship of the bill. Mike Graham, a member of the Cherokee Nation and the founder of United Native America, said the move is long overdue.

“From our standpoint-Oklahoma has the largest Native American population in the country. Even on the license plates it says Oklahoma is Native America,” Graham told the Native American Times.

Smithson has already filed the legislation, House Bill 1216. If the law were enacted, Oklahoma would become just the second state to have a Native American Day as a state holiday. South Dakota established the holiday in 1989 to replace Columbus Day. Wyoming celebrates a similar holiday on the second Friday in May.

While Graham thinks there are multiple benefits to the holiday, he says two really stand out: tourism and education. Both are areas where the Sooner State lags behind the rest of the country.

“It would be a good deal for the school system. Kids could learn more about the tribal nations in their area of the state. It would be a major boost to the tourist industry,” he said.

Thousands attended South Dakota’s Native American Day celebrations last year.

Graham doesn’t want to stop at a state holiday. United Native America was originally founded in 1993 to push for a federal holiday, something Graham thinks will eventually happen.

“Some day people will wake up and see that Native Americans deserve their own holiday,” he said.

from: Native Times

Study: Self-governance IS the answer

Study: Self-governance IS the answer
Harvard report confirms what tribal officials have been saying for years

WASHINGTON DC
National Congress of American Indians 1/7/2005


Self-governance is the key to crucial economic strides made by tribal governments in the last ten years, according to a report issued by the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development at the Kennedy School of Government. The report, American Indians on Reservations: A Databook of Socioeconomic Change Between the 1990 and 2000 Censuses, compiled data and marked the positive changes in Indian Country over the last ten years. The report reflects the tremendous changes experienced by individual Indians living on reservations during a time of increasing political self-determination by tribes and the unprecedented expansion in gaming activities under the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act.

"The data reflects that when tribes are truly empowered to govern, our communities grow," said Jacqueline Johnson, Executive Director of the National Congress of American Indians. "There has been a ripple of positive change in tribal communities, as tribes make their own sound decisions on what is best for their citizens. Strong, healthy tribal self-governance is not just good for the health of tribal nations, but for the health of the United States as a whole."

Highlights of the report include:

Having started the 1990s with incomes lagging far behind those for the general U.S. population, American Indians in Indian Country experienced substantial growth in income per capita. Even with this Indian population rising by more than 20% between 1990 and 2000, real (inflation-adjusted) per capita Indian income rose by about one-third. For both gaming and non-gaming tribes, the overall rate of income growth substantially outstripped the 11% increase in real per capita income for the U.S. as a whole. However, the average income in Indian Country is still less than half the national U.S. average.

From 1990 to 2000, Indian family poverty rates dropped by seven percentage points or more in non-gaming areas, and by about ten percentage points in gaming areas. For the U.S. as a whole, family poverty dropped eight-tenths of a percentage point. Indian unemployment rates dropped by about two-and-a-half percentage points in non-gaming areas and by more than five percentage points in gaming areas. U.S. unemployment dropped by half a percentage point.

Housing overcrowding in Indian Country decreased during the decade, particularly in Indian areas without gaming. The percentage of American Indians living in homes with plumbing increased markedly in both gaming and non-gaming areas. The proportion of adult Indians on reservations with less than a 9th grade education declined substantially. In Indian areas with gaming this put adult Indians at about par with U.S. levels. The proportion of Indian adults with college degrees rose substantially, though not enough to keep pace with the very substantial gains in overall U.S. college attainment.

Johnson said the data reflects positive change, but there is still a long way to go to bridge the socioeconomic gap with mainstream America.

"Our economies will continue this upswing in socioeconomic standing as long as tribal governments are recognized as viable governments making good decisions for the health of their communities," Johnson said. "Indian leaders know what is best for protecting Indian communities. This report is a strong statement of the powers of tribal self-determination."

The report's co-author Jonathan Taylor, a research fellow at The Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development, said "the data shows solid improvement in the lives of Indians living on reservations with and without gaming. What's more, these gains came despite the fact that federal Indian funding levels have been losing ground against non-Indian domestic spending. Considering that reservation incomes fell by eight percent in the 1980s, the strides tribes have made in the 1990s are quite remarkable."

To view the report and supporting documentation please visit
http://www.indiangaming.org
or http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/hpaied/

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