From gars@speakeasy.org Tue Oct 1 21:51:32 2002 Date: 2 Oct 2002 02:48:37 -0000 From: Gary Night Owl To: Internet Recipients of Wotanging Ikche Subject: Wotanging Ikche--nanews10.040 WOTANGING IKCHE -- Lakota -- Common News Kanoheda Aniyvwiya -- Cherokee -- Journal of the People Otapi'sin Atsinikiisinaakssin -- Blackfeet -- News for All the People Es'te Opunvk'vmucvse -- Creek -- People's New News Aunchemokauhettittea -- Naragansett -- Let Us Share News Ni-mah-mi-kwa-zoo-min -- Ojibwe -- We Are Talking About Ourselves Ha-Sah-Sliltha -- Ditidaht Nation -- News of the People Un Chota -- Susquehannic Seneca -- The People Speak Ximopanolti tehuatzin, inin Mexika tlahtolli -- Nahuatl -- For you we offer these words It-hah-pe-hah Ah-num pah-le -- Chickasaw -- Together We Are Talking Sho-da-ku-ye -- Teehahnahmah -- Talking Birchbark Acimowin -- Plains Cree -- Story or Account Dineh jii' adah' ho'nil'e'gii ba' ha' neh -- Navajo Nation -- What's Happening among The People News Okla Humma Holisso Nowat Anya -- Choctaw -- People(s) Red Newspaper Native American News -- Language of the Occupation Forces Wotanging Ikche and Native American News Copyright c. 1996-2002 nanews.org ==>If you want your Nation represented in the banner of this newsletter<== email gars@nanews.org with the equivalent of "News of the People" in your tribal language along with the english translation O +-----------------------------+ O o O | Much more happens in Indian | O o O VOLUME 10, ISSUE 040 | Country than is reported in | O o o o o O | this weekly newsletter. For | O o O October 5, 2002 | For daily updates & events | O o O | go http://www.owlstar.com/ | O | dailyheadlines.htm | Mvskokee big chestnut moon +-----------------------------+ Pomo kalemkayo/trees felled by fire at butte moon <================<<<< >>>>================> This newsletter is produced in straight ASCII text for greatest portability across platforms. Read it with a fixed-pitch font, such as Courier, Monaco, FixedSys or CG Times. Proportional fonts will be difficult to read. <================<<<< >>>>================> This issue contains articles from www.pechanga.net; www.owlstar.com; www.indianz.com; ndn-aim, Chiapas95-English, Amazon Alliance, RezLife, and Iron Natives Mailing Lists; UUCP email IMPORTANT!! ----------- In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, all material appearing in this newsletter is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for educational purposes. <================<<<< >>>>================> This newsletter is a way of keeping the brothers and sisters who share our Spirit informed about current events within the lives of those who walk the Red Road. ++ It may be subscribed to via email by sending a request from your own internet addressable account to gars@speakeasy.org ++ It is archived at http://www.nanews.org <================<<<< >>>>================> As historian Patricia Nelson Limerick summarized in The Legacy of Conquest: The Unbroken Past of the American West, "Set the blood quantum at one-quarter, hold to it as a rigid definition of Indians, let intermarriage proceed as it had for centuries, and eventually Indians will be defined out of existence. When that happens, the federal government will be freed of its persistent 'Indian problem.'" "We were here before you. We're going to be here forever. This is where our ancestors shed their blood." __Vincent Lujan, Governor - Taos Pueblo +- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+ | Indian Pledge of Allegiance | The Indian Pledge of Alleg- | | iance was first presented | I pledge allegiance to my Tribe,| on 2 December '93 during the | to the democratic principles | opening address of the Nat- | of the Republic | ional Congress of American | and to the individual freedoms | Indian Tribal-States Relat- | borrowed from the Iroquois and | ions Panel in Reno, NV. NCAI | Choctaw Confederacies, | plans distribution of the | as incorporated in the United | Indian Pledge to all Indian | States Constitution, | Nations. | so that my forefathers | | shall not have died in vain | Walk in Beauty! Night Owl +- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+ +- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+ | Journey | In the summer and early fall | The Bloodline | of 1998 the Treaty Unity Riders | | rode a thousand miles on horse- | For all that live and live by law | back, carrying a staff and | We Stand, we Call, We Ride | praying each step of the way. | For All that fear and fear by sight | | We Hear, we Listen, we Ride | These prayers were offered for | For all that pray and pray by strength| each of us, and that the Unity | We Feel, we Move, we Ride | of all Peoples might happen. | For all that die and die by greed | | We Hurt, we Cry, we Ride | Tatanka Cante forwarded this | For all that birth and birth by right | poem on behalf of all the Unity | We Smile, we Hold, we Ride | Riders that we might stop and | For all that need and need by heart | ask if the next words we say, the | We Came, we Went, we Rode. | next act we make is for the good | | of the People or is it from ego | Treaty Unity Riders | for self. +- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+ O'siyo Brothers and Sisters! I really do try to avoid political issues, but the noise level is too great and the stench too strong to ignore. The Bush administration continues to rattle sabers and campaign for war. The resultant rising oil prices and falling consumer confidence cannot be a surprise to any but the most naive. Even world allies are turning their colective back to the Bush regime... all except Tony Blair who must serve up huge ladels of aplogia to his own Labour Party in the UK. If this rhetoric continues or if war is actually engaged it will almost insure a cut-off in mideast oil and/or retalitory terrorist attacks. That said what this boils down to in Indian Country is native warriors being shipped to foreign lands to wage battle. It will mean reservations will be the last to receive smallpox, anthrax or whatever bio agent is used against the U. S. vaccine/ You can bet grandmothers will be written off before dominant society bankers. Sacred sites and Sacred lands will be sacrificed for mineral greed. The Quechan are now fighting to protect the Sacred from mining greed. The Big Mountain is suffering from Peabody exploitation. The Zuni have already lost their legal battle to save their Sacred Salt Lake. Alaska National Wilderness Refuge is target numero uno for Gail Norton, despite having lost this battle in court and congress. If you think for one minute the Indian Trust debacle will not be swept under the rug in the dust and noise of war you are in serious error. I am not telling you how to vote. You must decide that. I am telling you Indian People must vote. Our voices must be heard. -=-=-=- Winter is coming early to the north plains. Frost warnings and winter storm warnings are already a fact of life in the Dakotas and Montana. Elders in those areas already need assistance... remember Secretary of Interior Norton withheld checks after the court appointed monitor broke into DoI computers. If you know of a reliable point where funds can be sent to assist these precious elders please drop me a note at gars@nanews.org and make the subject (all caps) WINTER HELP. Dohiyi Ani Oginalii , , Gary Night Owl gars@nanews.org (*,*) P. O. Box 672168 gars@speakeasy.org (`-') Marietta, GA 30007, U.S.A. gars@olagrande.net ===w=w=== gars@sdf.lonestar.org ----------- News of the people featured in this issue ---------- - Crossings - Congress debates ANWR Bargains - Seismic Drilling will be used - Escalating Violence in Chiapas at Sacred Monument - Brazil: - Norton reopens Slave Labour and Illegal Logging Sacred Site Controversy - AFN wants Independent Body - Snoqualmie Tribe tries to settle Claims to block Flood Work - Aboriginal War Veterans - Senate panel approves funds Ready to Accept for Western Shoshone - Officers charged - BLM plans Seized-Cattle Auction in Beating of Aboriginal - Another Reason to vote this Year - Documents refute Harris Denials - Terrible Price of a - Inquest begins into Death Bush Environmental Blunder of Man shot by Police - Tim Giago OP/ED: - Native Prisoner Many Indians ruled by Catch-22 -- Sitting Bear needs Urgent Help - Bush Administration -- Religious Practice Restricted Alarming Land Grab Proposal - Rustywire: Running Wild and Free - Land Management hindered - Verse: Hawaiian Book of Days by Bite-Sized Ownership - Editorial: The Great Law of Change - Judge refuses Arrest Warrant - Doreen Yellow Bird: for Patterson Colonial Bioterrorism - Taos Pueblo Parents - Osage Oil Land Allotments want action on Student Needs were worth killing for - Tribal Group seeks Payback for Land - This Week on First Peoples TV --------- "RE: Crossings" --------- Date: Mon, 30 Sep 2002 08:10:52 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="CROSSINGS" Sep. 26, 2002 Goldie M. Klug Goldie M. Klug, 91, Michigan, N.D., died Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2002, at Lakota Good Samaritan Center, Lakota, N.D. Goldie Marie Baker was born Aug. 14, 1911, in a sod house on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation near Medicine Lake, Mont., the daughter of Harry and Lillie (Hall) Baker. She was raised on the family homestead near Dagmar, Mont., and was educated in the area. She graduated high school in Plentywood, Mont. In 1934, she moved with her family to the Niagara, N.D., area. She met Ernest Klug, and they were married Oct. 1, 1935. They farmed near Niagara until retiring in 1958. They then moved to Michigan, N.D. Ernest died Sept. 26, 1977. Goldie continued living in Michigan until May 2002, when she became a resident of Lakota Good Samaritan Center. She was a member of United Church of Christ in Michigan. Goldie will be deeply missed by her four children, Helen Pulst of Devils Lake, Fred and wife Catherine Klug of Edina, Minn., Harold Klug of Blairstown, Iowa, and Beverly and husband Allen Parrott, Denver; eight grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren. She was preceded in death by her parents, husband Ernest, a grandson and three brothers, Cesco Baker, Elzie Baker and Eugene Baker. Goldie's funeral service will be held in Michigan Lutheran Church, Michigan, at 1 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 28, 2002. Officiating will be the Reverend Sue Mackey. Music will be provided by Jason Flom. Burial will be in the Niagara Cemetery following lunch in the church. Visitation will be held in the church Saturday from Noon until the time of service. Copyright c. 2002 Grand Forks Herald. -=-=-=- September 25, 2002 Richard E. 'Dick' Hagen PINE RIDGE - Richard E. "Dick" Hagen, 65, Pine Ridge, died Sunday, September 22, 2002, in Pine Ridge, SD. A one-night wake begins Friday, September 27, at 3 p.m. at Pine Ridge High School Gym, Pine Ridge, SD. Mass of Christian Burial will be Saturday, September 28, at 10 a.m. at Pine Ridge High School Gym. Mr. Floyd Hand will officiate over traditional Lakota services. Rev. Steve Sanford, SJ will be celebrant. Interment will be at Holy Rosary Mission Catholic Cemetery, Pine Ridge, SD. Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements. Richard "Dick" Hagen was born on August 16, 1937, to Frances Garnette Pushcar and Mike Hagen. Unfortunately, he never met his father. Dick has one surviving brother, Ted Garnette of Pine Ridge. Dick was born at Pine Ridge Hospital in Pine Ridge. Dick grew up at his Grandma Emma Reddy's in Kyle. He attended grade school in Vetal, boarding school in Pine Ridge, three schools in Illinois and graduated eighth grade from Kyle in 1953. When he was a freshman, he moved to Illinois with his mother and stepfather Joe Barbish. He graduated from Hall High School in 1957, where he was an All-star basketball player, making 87% of his free throws as a senior. He could tell about how he would run 5 miles to school. After school he would practice and run five miles home. This running helped as he ran track and placed every time in the half mile and at times in the 1 mile. In Dick's time when he came back from Illinois and had nowhere to go he lived with James Benedickt and family. In 1957, he joined the Coast Guard and was honorably discharged in 1961. He attended boot camp at Cape May, New Jersey. He was stationed in Morgan City, Louisiana on an 83-footer. After Morgan City, he went to Unimak Island, Alaska, where he was under isolated duty for one year. He then left for Sheboygan, Wisconsin. Sheboygan is where he was discharged honorably. After he was discharged he lived in Illinois, Michigan, California, back to Illinois and finally to Pine Ridge. He worked as a Police Officer for Pine Ridge, Allen and Kyle. He was married to Geraldine Trueblood and from their marriage, Michelle Hagen-Pourier, of Pine Ridge, was born. In 1971, he married Mona Hagen. From this marriage, they had two children, Shayne Hagen and Winona "W.T." Hagen, both of Pine Ridge. Mona and Dick also raised Irving Cottier, who they took in as a son. Mona and Dick also raised others, such as Barb Linehan-Yellow Boy, Marie Vocu-Grube, Angie Big Crow-Cournoyer, Robby Brewer, Tom Morton, Gary Garnette, Steve Reddy and Alan Reddy. Dick also has 5 grandchildren and 42 other grandchildren. He worked for the BIA for one year. He was on the Shannon County School Board for two terms. Dick also served on the Tribal Council for two terms. In 1982, he was elected to serve in the South Dakota State House of Representatives for Shannon, Todd and Bennett Counties. He continued as a representative for 18 consecutive years and had to move to the Senate due to term limits. In 2001, he was elected as Senator, where he served one term and was working on the second. Dick was a paint contractor for over 20 years. He announced Rodeos for 35 years and retired in 2001. Also served on the Board of Directors for Golden West for 5 years and was up for re-election this year. Dick was much honored when he received Legislator of the Year in 2001 and in 2002 was West River Legislator of the Year. He would almost try everything once. Dick loved to play pool, cribbage, attending auctions, horseshoes and darts at times. He also loved watching basketball, football, softball and fast pitch games. He would announce ball games, parades, and almost everything if you would ask him. He loved watching kids playing sports and knowing they were continuing their education. It did not matter which team, from this reservation, was playing, he was behind them all the way. Dick was diagnosed with cancer in August of 2002 that claimed his life September 22, 2002. A very great friend who helped the family take care of him was Margaret Hart, who is a Registered Nurse. Through Dick's years, he has made a lot of friends and almost everybody who knew him, liked him. When you would see him, he was always smiling, saying hello, shaking hands with everybody or telling a joke. It took a lot to get this good man down. He was always on his feet, constantly moving, trying in many ways to help this reservation. One of his dreams he wanted for this reservation was to get a nursing home here, and maybe one day his dream will be complete. There will never be another man like Richard "Dick" Hagen. He will be greatly missed by everyone. We love you Dad, AKA Papa Hage, from all your kids. Before Dick passed on this was told to W.T. by Dick. September 26, 2002 Rosemary R. Good Voice Elk OGLALA - Rosemary R. Good Voice Elk, 72, Oglala, died Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2002, in Oglala. Survivors include five sons, Stan Good Voice Elk Sr., Charles Good Voice Elk Sr., William Good Voice Elk Jr. and Brian Brings Him Back, all of Oglala, and Cetan Enchalada, Chadron, Neb.; six daughters, Wilma Good Voice Elk, Porcupine, Delma Good Voice Elk, Grace Good Voice Elk, Martha Two Bulls and Delora Walks Out, all of Oglala, and Antoinette Iron Rope- Hunter, Grand Island, Neb.; two brothers, Henry Brings Him Back and Fred Brings Him Back, both of Oglala; two sisters, Elizabeth Titus and Sylvia White Dress, both of Oglala; 27 grandchildren; and three great- grandchildren. A two-night wake will begin at 1 p.m. today at Oglala Recreation Center. Services will be at 2 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 28, at Oglala Recreation Center, with the Rev. Pedro Sharpfish and the Rev. Abe Tobacco officiating. Mike Little Boy and Sam Moves Camp will officiate at traditional Lakota services. Burial will be at He Haka Sundance Grounds in Oglala. Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements. Lavon M. Short Bear-Saxton PORCUPINE - Lavon M. Short Bear-Saxton, 42, Porcupine, died Friday, Sept. 20, 2002, in Franklinton, N.C. Survivors include one son, Derek Short Bear-Gaither, Oklahoma City; two daughters, Kimberly Short Bear-Pierce, Youngville, N.C., and Vesta Short Bear-Gaither, Franklinton; her adopted mother, Vicki Voemer, Franklinton; two brothers, Benjamin Black Bear Jr., Rosebud, and William Wounded, Pine Ridge; one sister, Alberta Seminole, Lame Deer, Mont.; and one grandchild. One-night wake began Wednesday, Sept. 25, at Christ the King Catholic Church Hall in Porcupine. Mass of Christian Burial will be at 9 a.m. today at the church hall, with the Rev. Bill Pauly officiating. Burial will be at Christ the King Catholic Cemetery in Porcupine. Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements. September 27, 2002 Hamilton Kills Plenty KYLE Hamilton Kills Plenty, 74, Kyle, died Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2002, in Pine Ridge. Survivors include one son, Irvin Kills Plenty, Fort Totten, N.D.; two brothers, Sterling Kills Plenty and Vincent Kills Plenty, both of Rosebud; and three sisters, Pearl Provencial, Sioux Falls, and Marcella Fisher and Vera Kills Plenty, both of Rosebud. A two-night wake will begin at 11 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 28, at Lakota Chapel in Kyle. The second night will begin at 4 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 29, at Grace Episcopal Church in Soldier Creek. Services will be at 10 a.m. Monday, Sept. 30, at the church. Burial will be at Creek Community Cemetery in Soldier Creek. Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements. Robert E. `Bob' Hillman WOUNDED KNEE - Robert E. "Bob" Hillman, 56, Wounded Knee, died Thursday, Sept. 26, 2002, in Wounded Knee. Survivors include three stepsons, James Ager, Jaycyn Ager and Joe Ager, all of Belle Fourche; two daughters, Bobbie Wiseman, Minatare, Neb., and Nicky Hillman, Gering, Neb.; four brothers, Don Hillman, Oglala, Bill Hillman, Wounded Knee, Rick Hillman, Upton, Wyo., and Gale Hankins, Hay Springs, Neb.; one sister, Gina Hillman, Valdez, Alaska; and 14 grandchildren. Memorial services and inurnment will be announced at a later date. Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements. September 28 Myrtle Fool Head-Grosz KYLE - Myrtle Fool Head-Grosz, "Wounsila Gluha Mani Win," 75, Kyle, died Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2002, in Rapid City. Survivors include her husband, Calvin Grosz, Kyle; one son, Mike Fool Head, Kyle; two daughters, Cheyenne Grosz and Myrtle Grosz-Garnette, both of Kyle; one adopted sister, Elfreda Slow Bear, Oglala; and 13 grandchildren. A two-night wake will begin at 2 p.m. Monday, Sept. 30, at Our Lady of Sorrows Catholic Hall in Kyle. Mass of Christian Burial will be at 9 a.m. Wednesday, Oct. 2, at Our Lady of Sorrows Catholic Hall, with the Rev. Bill Pauly officiating. Burial will be at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday at Black Hills National Cemetery near Sturgis. Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements. Everett F. Catches PINE RIDGE - Everett F. Catches, 78, Pine Ridge, died Friday, Sept. 27, 2002, in Pine Ridge. Survivors include two sons, Martin Catches Sr., Chadron, Neb., and Marvin Catches, Calico; five daughters, Doreen Richards, Allen, Bernice Catches, Wilmot, Arvella Catches, Pine Ridge, and Emily White Mountain and Edelyn Catches, both of Chadron; 28 grandchildren; and 25 great- grandchildren. Arrangements are pending with Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge. Augustus Gilbert Kingman July 6, 1898 - Sept. 25, 2002 RAPID CITY - Augustus (Gus) Gilbert Kingman, Wanbli Sung Cikala, 104 Elder, of Rapid City died Wednesday, September 25, 2002 at Sioux San Hospital. He was the oldest living member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe. He was born July 6, 1898, at Cheyenne Agency, SD, on the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation to Harry Kingman, Atagela Wicakte, and Mollie (Two Tails) Gilbert Kingman, Cigalawi Wi. Gus was a member of the Minicoujou and Siha Sapa Bands of the Lakota. His grandfathers were Chief No Heart and Sunka Cankohan (Dogs Backbone) who was killed fighting at Little Big Horn. Gus was raised on a ranch near (Old) Cheyenne Agency, SD and he attended Pierre Indian School. Gus worked various jobs over a long career with the US Govt. at Old Agency, including team and wagon driver, truck driver, police jailer and dorm counselor. He retired in 1962. He then served several years as Tribal Judge for the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe. In the early 1930s, he married Violet Wilhelmina Rivers. They initially made their home working for the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camps. Then later they made their home at Old Agency where Gus worked as the Jailor, and Violet worked as the cook for the jail. Both worked for the US Govt. at Old Agency, Violet as a Dorm Matron for the Little Boys, and Gus in Property and Supply, (BIA). From their love was born a daughter, A. Gay (Kingman) Wapato. In the early 1960's Gus and Violet retired to Rapid City. Gus was a life-long member of the Episcopal Church, Brotherhood of St. Andrew and Brotherhood of Christian Unity. Gus was a well-known tenor singer and sang in both Lakota and English. He traveled extensively throughout his life singing and working for the church. In his younger years, Gus was active with running, boxing, baseball and ranching. In his later years, he was active with the great-grandchildren, carpentry work, storytelling and with Violet, arts and crafts and gardening. He also studied history and was a member of the SD Historical society. Gus lived a great life. He was proud that he had taken care of himself and that he should see so many years. He lived in three different centuries and has experienced tremendous change and fulfillment. He was always positive, smiling and happy. He loved to laugh and tell stories. He greeted everyone. He never complained or spoke a harsh word. He never drank or smoked. The Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe honored Gus in 1999 and 2001 for his long life and for being such a positive role model. He was fortunate to be active and alert in his old age. Right up until the end, he would sing to himself in the early morning before anyone else was awake. Lakota Hymns and Indian Songs were his specialty. Gus is survived by daughter A. Gay (Kingman) Wapato and her husband Tim Wapato of Rapid City. Grandsons Charles D. Robertson, Jr. and Kathy Returns, Rapid City. And Vernon A. and Corina (Mendoza) Robertson, Brainerd MN. Great-grandchildren Augustus G., Sylvia R., Isaac K., Sophia M., and April V. Robertson and Justin, Kellen and Cole Returns. Nephews: Jim Claymore, Wayne Kingman of Eagle Butte, and Lehman Brightman of Pinole CA. Kenneth Provost, Keith Traversie, Ovie Olsen, Bill Rivers, Alvin Rivers, Pat Rivers, Arnold Rivers, Gary Traversie and Gerald Traversie. Nieces: Andrea Kingman, Brown, Lucille Runs After, Rapid City, Edwina Traversie, Colette Ganje, Marie Long, Tina Clement, Rosetta Traversie, Debbie Rivers, Karen Rivers, Julie Rivers, Karla Rivers and Connie Olsen. Sister-in-law: Ione Opp, Ridgeview. Numerous other friends and relatives who call him Grandpa Gus. He is preceded in death by his wife Violet, his parents, Harry and Mollie Kingman, sisters, Agnes Kingman Lafferty, Phoebe Kingman Brightman, and brothers, Andrew Kingman, Isaac Gilbert and Luke Gilbert. Visitation and Wake Service commenced at 7 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 27, 2002 at the Mother Butler Center. Funeral Service and Holy Eucharist will be 11 a.m. Saturday at Mother Butler Center with Rev. Paul Sneve officiating. Burial will be at Pine Lawn Cemetery. Arrangements are under the direction of Osheim-Catron Funeral Home. October 1, 2002 Everett F. Catches PINE RIDGE - Everett F. Catches, 78, Pine Ridge, died Friday, Sept. 27, 2002, in Pine Ridge. Survivors include two sons, Martin Catches Sr., Chadron, Neb., and Marvin Catches, Calico; five daughters, Doreen Richards, Allen, Bernice Catches, Wilmot, Arvella Catches, Pine Ridge, and Emily White Mountain and Edelyn Catches, both of Chadron; one brother, Edsel Catches, Kyle; one sister, Audrey Shields, Kansas City, Kan.; 28 grandchildren; and 25 great- grandchildren. A two-night wake will begin at 1 p.m. today at the Wakpamni CAP building in Pine Ridge. The second night will begin at 1 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 2, at the Everett Catches home in Calico. Mass of Christian Burial will be at 10 a.m. Thursday at the Everett Catches home, with the Rev. Bill Pauly and the Rev. Steve Sanford officiating. Burial will be at the Catches Family Cemetery in Calico. Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements. Malcolm J. Black Elk PINE RIDGE - Malcolm J. Black Elk, 55, Pine Ridge, died Friday, Sept. 27, 2002, in Rapid City. Survivors include four brothers, Luke Black Elk Jr., Denver, and Michael Black Elk, Dawson Black Elk and Nathan Black Elk, all of Pine Ridge, and six sisters, Betty Lou Black Elk, Scottsbluff, Neb., Iris Black Elk, Chicago, Ivis Black Elk, Pine Ridge, Lucille Stewart and Marjorie Black Elk, both of Number Four Community, and Julia Black Elk, Seattle. A one-night wake will begin at 3 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 2, at Billy Mills Hall in Pine Ridge. Services will be at 2 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 3, at Billy Mills Hall, with Abraham Tobacco officiating. John Red Feather will officiate at traditional Lakota services. Burial will be at Black Elk Family Cemetery in Oglala. Sioux Funeral Home of Pine Ridge is in charge of arrangements. Robert E. `Bob' Hillman WOUNDED KNEE - Robert E. "Bob" Hillman, 56, Wounded Knee, died Thursday, Sept. 26, 2002, at his home. Survivors include his wife, Cynthia Hillman, Wounded Knee; two daughters, Nikki Hillman, Gering, Neb., and Bobbie Jo Wiseman, Minatare, Neb.; six grandchildren; four brothers, Bill Hillman, Wounded Knee, Don Hillman, Oglala, Rick Hillman, Upton, Wyo., and Gale Hankins, Hay Springs, Neb.; one sister, Gina Gordon, Valdez, Alaska; three stepsons, Joe Ager, Salisbury, Md., and James Ager and Jaycyn Ager, both of Belle Fourche; and eight stepgrandchildren. Memorial services will be at 1 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 5, in Our Lady of Lourdes gym in Porcupine. Burial will follow at Wounded Knee Cemetery. In lieu of flowers, the family requests memorials to the Ellen Stephens Hospice Program in Kyle. Copyright c. 2002 the Rapid City Journal. -=-=-=- September 28, 2002 Elizabeth June Beeson Elizabeth June Beeson, 21-year-old daughter of Arlie and Myrna Beeson of Cutter/Upper Gilson Wash, died Sept. 21 at Desert Samaritan Hospital in Mesa following an unexpected two-week illness. She was born in Phoenix and was a member of the Colorado River Indian Tribes in Parker. She grew up in the Globe-Miami and Cutter area and attended local schools. Recently she resided in the Gila River Indian community where she took care of her niece and nephew. Survivors include her parents, Arlie and Myrna Beeson; her sisters, Leona, Kimberlie, Amanda, Alana, Michele and Kelly; and her maternal grandmother, Myrtle E. Pete. Funeral services are pending with Bunker Garden Chapel in Mesa and will be announced as soon as possible. Daniel Bond Daniel Bond, 64, of San Carlos died Sept. 16 in Globe. He was born in San Carlos and graduated from East Fork Mission High School. A champion bull rider, he was a member of the California Cowboy Association. He worked as a welder, a shipping clerk, and then as a custodial worker in the Oakland Public School system for 25 years. He was also a member of the Lutheran church. Survivors include his wife, Violet Bond of San Carlos; four sons, Daniel Bond Jr., Robbie Bond, and Brian Bond, all of San Carlos, and Louis Bond of Tuba City; and one granddaughter. Funeral service for Mr. Bond was conducted Sept. 22 at Our Savior's Lutheran Church in Bylas. Interment followed in Navajo Point Cemetery in Bylas. Arrangements were under the direction of Morris-David's Safford Funeral Home. Copyright c. 2002 Arizona Silver Belt/Apache Moccasin. -=-=-=- October 1, 2002 Gracie A. Naranjo GRACIE A. NARANJO, 64, of Santa Clara Pueblo, died Sunday. She was a member of the Navajo Tribe in Pinedale. She was preceded in death by her son, Edward 'Eddie' Naranjo on June 12, 2001. She is survived by her husband, Edward Naranjo of the home; two daughters, Teresa Naranjo and Tracy Naranjo; a granddaughter, Iris Naranjo all of Santa Clara Pueblo; sisters, Cecilia Arviso and husband Paul of Gallup, and Patsy Lopez of Prescott, Ariz.; a brother, Tom Joe of Gallup; and many other relatives and friends. Visitation will begin at 3:30 p.m. today and a rosary will be recited at 7 p.m. at the home of the late Teresita Naranjo in Santa Clara Pueblo. Mass will be celebrated at 9 a.m. Wednesday at the Santa Clara Catholic Church. Interment will follow at the Santa Clara Pueblo Cemetery. Salazar Family of Block-Salazar Mortuary. Copyright c. 1997 - 2002 Albuquerque Journal: Albuquerque, New Mexico. -=-=-=- September 26, 2002 Maurice N. "Morris" Benally Mr. Maurice N. "Morris" Benally, 89, of Red Valley, Ariz., died Sunday, Sept. 22, 2002, in Farmington. Funeral services will be Saturday, Sept. 28, 2002, starting at 10 a.m. at the Christian Reformed Church of Red Valley, with Pastor Howard Begay officiating. Burial will follow at the family cemetery in Red Valley. Funeral arrangements are with Chapel of Memories Funeral Home of Kirtland, (505) 598-9636. Richard Billy Sept. 22, 2002 Richard Billy, 39, of Sundance, died Sept. 22, 2002, in Pinedale. Richard attended Wingate High School and graduated from Gallup High School in 1983. While in high school, he ran cross-country. He attended TVI in Albuquerque for two years. He loved animals and nature. He worked for Albertsons, Big-O Tires, NAPI bean plant in Farmington and was presently employed by Bishop Optical. He is survived by his wife Sheryl Billy of Sundance, father Roger Billie of Whitecone, Ariz., mother Geneva Whitmore of Gamerco, daughters Delvora Billy, Krystal Billy and Raylyne Billy, all of Sundance; sisters Melinda James of Pinedale, Katherine Whitmore of Gamerco and Martina J. Whitmore of Gamerco; grandfather Jones R. Begay Sr. of Pinedale; grandmother Helen Billie of Whitecone, Ariz., and step-father Martin J. Whitmore of Gamerco. Pallbearers will be Clinton Begay, Jasper Begay, Patrick Begay, Vincent Begay, Malcom Leslie and Tommy Williams. Honorary pallbearers will be Fedale Begay, Peter M. Begay and Robert Cupp III. Services will be Friday, Sept. 27, 2002, in the Palm Chapel of Rollie Mortuary in Gallup at 10 a.m. Copyright c. 1999-2002 MediaNews Group, Inc./Farmington, NM. -=-=-=- September 26, 2002 Waite Sixkiller Waite G. Sixkiller of Miami died Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2002, at Freeman Hospital in Joplin, Mo., after an illness. He was 56. Arrangements are pending with the Paul Thomas Funeral Home of Miami. Copyright c. 2002 the Miami News Record/Miami, OK. -=-=-=- September 25, 2002 Esther Coyote Baker Visitation will be today at from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Hood Mortuary, 1261 East Third Ave., followed by a rosary at 6 p.m. at St. Ignatius Catholic Church, 14826 Colorado Highway 172, Ignacio, for Esther Coyote Baker. Mrs. Baker died Monday, Sept. 9, 2002, at her home in Ignacio after a long illness. She was 71. A Mass of Christian Burial will be at 10 a.m. Thursday at St. Ignatius Catholic Church. The Rev. Eddy Andary will officiate. Burial will occur at La Boca Cemetery. Esther (Coyote) Baker was born April 4, 1931, in Mancos Canyon, the daughter of Ruth Coyote. She married Chris A. Baker Sr. on Jan. 26, 1948, in Durango. She has worked at the Pino Nuche Restaurant in Ignacio, and was a dorm attendant for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. She was a member of the Ute Mountain Indian Tribe. She enjoyed cooking, family and gardening. She especially loved her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She was preceded in death by a daughter, Mary Baker. She is survived by her husband, Chris A. Baker Sr. of Ignacio; two sons, Clifton G. Baker of Ignacio and Chris A. Baker Jr. of Las Vegas, Nev.; four daughters, Carol A. Olguin, Bonnie K. Baker, Nancy R. Baker and Christine A. Sage, all of Ignacio; a sister, Elsie Martinez of Cortez; 17 grandchildren; 12 great-grandchildren; and numerous nieces, nephews and cousins. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to Hospice, Pagosa Chapter, 375 E. Park Ave., Durango, CO 81301. Copyright c. 2002, the Durango Herald. -=-=-=- Golden Triangle On-Line Obituaries The following obituaries appeared in the Cut Bank Pioneer Press, Shelby Promoter or Glacier Reporter this week. September 27, 2002 William Butterfly William Jess Butterfly, 19, who graduated from Sentinel High School in Missoula and worked at Teeples IGA in Browning, died Saturday in an auto accident near East Glacier. Rosary is 7 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 26, at Little Flower Parish. Funeral Mass is 2 p.m. Friday, Sept. 27, at Little Flower Parish, with burial in Butterfly Family Cemetery. Day Family Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements. Butterfly was born July 1, 1983 in Browning. He enjoyed working on automotives, bicycles, music and electronics such as stereos and speakers. Survivors, all of Browning, include his partner, Eileen Devereaux; his mother, JoAnne Racine; father William "Smoky" Butterfly; sisters Billie Jo Myo, Delores Lynn Spotted Wolfe, Patricia Spotted Wolfe, Cheryle Spotted Wolfe, Gail Ann Brown and Hope Racine; and brothers Randy Paul Brown, Brian Racine and Lance Racine. Your guide to the 'Net, gadgets, games and more. Dwight Yellow Owl Dwight Yellow Owl, 57, a Browning native and laborer, died Saturday in an auto accident on Highway 2 near East Glacier. Rosary was Sept. 25 at Little Flower Parish. Funeral Mass is 2 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 26, at Little Flower Parish, with burial in Willow Creek Cemetery. Day Family Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements. Yellow Owl was born in Browning on Nov. 11, 1945. He attended schools in Browning. He married Wynema Calf Tail in Browning in 1998. Survivors include daughters AnnaRea Ray, Denise Yellow Owl, Geri DePache and Kimberly Jiran; sons Wildean Yellow Owl and David Roundine; sisters Doris Yellow Owl, Rose Marie Bull Child and Sandra DeRoche; brother Kenny Yellow Owl and Donald Yellow Owl; 17 grandchildren and one great- grandchild. His wife, Wynema Calf Tail Yellow Owl, preceded him in death. Patricia Ann Irwin Patricia Ann (Racine) Irwin, 60, a former substitute teacher and kitchen aide, died Thursday of complications from arthritis. Funeral services were Monday, Sept. 23, at the Holy Family Mission, with burial to follow. Day Funeral Home is handling the arrangements. Irwin was born Jan. 8, 1942 in Browning, where she schools. She also attended Flathead Indian School and Haskell Institute. She married James Irwin in February of 1963 in Cardston, Alberta. Along with her work in Browing Public Schools, she also worked at Tribal elections. She also enjoyed being an active member of the Holy Family Church, working crusillos and attending prayer meetings, as well as rodeos, basketball and horse races. She is survived by her husband, James Irwin; daughters Tracy Edwards, Dory Goss, Evelyn and Jamie Irwin; son, John Irwin; sisters Deloris Douglas, Lenora Salois and Jewel Lahr; brothers Kevin Racine, Wayne Racine and Tom Whitford Sr.; and 16 grandchildren. LaDean Rutherford LaDean Merle (Wippert) Rutherford, 71, died Friday, Sept. 20, 2002 of renal failure at a Great Falls hospital. Mass was held today, Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2 p.m., at the Little Flower Parish, with burial to follow in Willow Creek Cemetery. Day Funeral Home is handling the arrangements. She was born on Feb. 17, 1931 in Browning. She attended schools in Browning and Flathead Indian School up until 11th grade. She received her G.E.D. form the Flathead Community College. Rutherford was a member of the first graduating class of the Blackfeet Community College in 1978 with an A.A. degree in Human Services. She was a waitress and cook, bartender, matron of the boarding dorm, foster parent, a child care provider, she also worked for Family Planning Services, was Program manager for the Blackfeet DD Program from which she retired. She enjoyed reading, crafts, crocheting, fixing puzzles, going for rides and spending time with her family. She is survived by her husband, Joseph Rutherford Sr.; daughters Geri Brown, Georgia After Buffalo, Rosanna, Mona, Roberta, Holly, and Tracy Rutherford, Pat Wikstrom, and Sherrie Rooney, all from Browning, and JoDean Rooney of Cut Bank; a son, Joseph Rutherford Jr. of Browning; sisters Ramona Wellman, Darlene Wippert, Shirley Guardipee, Ona Running Crane, and Cheryl Ball; brothers Alvin Wippert Sr., Harold Wippert Sr., Verlin Wippert Sr., George Wippert Jr., Matt Renville and Fred Old Rock; 27 grandchildren and 27 great-grandchildren. Also survived by her are grandchildren she helped in raising; Tressa, Trevor, Tricia and Tracie Rutherford; Leroy Bear Medicine Jr.; Dennis Fitzpatrick Jr. and Rochelle (Sissy) Johnson. She was preceded in death by a grandson Carl After Buffalo, sister Marlene Wippert and a brother Johnny Wippert. Francis Bullchild Jr. Francis Edward Bullchild Jr., 35, of Browning died Sept. 21, 2002 on Highway 2 near East Glacier. A rosary will take place at Little Flower Parish today Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2002 at 7 p.m. Funeral will be Thursday, Sept. 26, 2002 at 2 p.m. at the Little Flower Parish with burial at Willow Creek Cemetery. Day Funeral Home is handling the arrangements. Bullchild was born Sept. 15, 1967 in Browning. He attended Flandreau Indian School in S.D. In 1985 he married Wendy Little Dog at the Little Flower Parish. Bullchild worked as a custodian and for Blackfeet Tribe maintenance. He enjoyed boxing, stock car racing, cross-country, track, cruising and restoring old cars. He is survived by his wife Wendy Bullchild, parents Francis and Rose Bullchild, biological parents Merlin Bird Rattler and Mae Little Plume, daughters Kimberly, Krystal and Kourtney Bullchild and a new baby due in February. He is also survived by sisters Lynn Little Plume, Tinsey Bird Rattler, penny Bird Rattler and Carla Bird Rattler; brothers Steve Bullchild, Shawn Bird Rattler, Merlin Bird Rattler Jr., martin Little Plume and Loren Bird Rattler and numerous nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his grandparents Pete and Rose Yellow Owl, John and Mary DeRoche, Joe and Else Bird Rattler and Joseph and Theola Bullchild. Kenneth Bullchild Kenneth Roy Bullchild, 49, of Browning died Sept. 12, 2002, in Great Falls. He was born in Browning, Sept. 29, 2002, he served in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam era. He enjoyed hunting in his spare time. He is survived by his parents Joseph and Josephine Bullchild of Browning, a daughter Angela Bullchild of Polson, a son Kenny M. Bullchild of Browning, sisters Betty Loya of Rialto, Calif., Debra Kary of Palmdale, Calif. and Kathy Rosen of Buena Park, Calif., and one grandchild Alyssa "Princess" Bullchild. Doris Old Person Doris (Bullshoe) Old Person, 64, of Browning, died Sept. 17, 2002, in Browning of renal cell cancer. Funeral services were held on Saturday with burial following at North Star Cemetery. Funeral arrangements were handled by Day Family Funeral Home. Old Person was born May 31, 1938 in Browning; she graduated from Browning High School and earned her bachelors degree in education from Northern Montana College in Havre. She then earned her Master's degree in administration from Arizona State University in Tempe, Ariz. She married Earl Old Person Sr. in Phoenix, Ariz., in August of 1970. Old Person held many jobs over the years including; Director of Headstart in Heart Butte, she taught at Starr School, Heart Butte Public Schools, she taught at Browning Public Schools for 38 years, and also a professor at the University of Great Falls/Blackfeet Community College. Old Person was involved in many community organizations. She was a member of the Blackfeet Community College Board of Regions, USDA Conservation Board for Glacier County, wrote and published books for Northwest Regional Labs, she was also named Indian Educator of the year. She was also a rancher, farmer jockey, author, a Christian member of her church, also involved in 4-H and native cultural activities. She is survived by Earl Old Person Sr., her parents Lillian Gabriel Henault Bullshoe and Francis Bullshoe Sr., daughters Glenda Eagle Feathers and Erlina Old Person, sons Marty Eagle Feathers, Alfred Eagle Feathers and Earl Old Person, sisters June Tatsy, Carmen Marceau and Joan Kennerly, brother Francis Bullshoe Jr., 17 grandchildren and 4 great-grandchildren. A daughter, Roselyn Marie Eagle Feathers, preceded her in death. Copyright c. 2002 Golden Triangle Newspapers. -=-=-=- September 30, 2002 John Bernard Little Nest, Jr. LODGE GRASS - John B. Little Nest, Jr. 32, of Lodge Grass, went to be with his Lord and Savior on Sept. 27, 2002 in the Deaconess Billings Clinic following a short illness. He was born May 11, 1970 in Crow Agency, a son of John Little Nest, Sr. and Wilma Backbone. He was raised by William (Kay) Bends, Bonnie Little Nest, Marcelline and Dexter Falls Down, Sr. He grew up and received his education in Lodge Grass and while in school participated in basketball. He enjoyed fishing and hunting and was actively involved in the Crow cultural ways. John was a member of the Catholic Church, Greasy Mouth Clan and a child of the Greasy Mouth Clan. He was a kind and gentle loving person, who was always ready to lend a helping hand. He was greatly loved and will be missed by all. His father, John B. Little Lest, Sr. preceded him in death. Survivors include his parents, Wilma and Garryowen Stewart of Lodge Grass; four daughters, Mortisha Little Nest of Hardin, Dara, Dana and Keisha Little Nest of Poplar; three sons, Richard Little Nest of Crow Agency, Christopher and Tristen Little Nest of Spokane; his sisters, Gwen (Terrance) Covers Up, Tanya (Solon) Moccasin, Tiffany and Roberta Falls Down of Lodge Grass, Doren Bulltail of New Mexico, Margaret (Clinton) Stops of Crow Agency, Rebecca Anderson of Hardin and Hannah Little Nest of Wyoming; his brothers, Gary (Carrie) Gardner, Harold and Donald Old Bull, John Joseph Little Nest, Dexter (Jasmine) Falls Down, Jr. of Lodge Grass, Chesco (Sarah) Little Nest of Billings, Curtis Falls Down of Dunmore and Tyrone Bravo of Washington; his grandmothers, Frances Bends, Ruth Alden, Laura He Does It and Clara (Joseph) Bull Tail; his grandfather, Frank Back Bone; his adopted brothers, Benjamin (Teatta) Bear Below, Pete (Cedar) Left Hand, Les (Garilyn) Nomee, Dee (Loretta) Nomee, Thomas Walks and Anthony (Alma) Davis; his adopted sisters, Jeanette (Mandale) Spotted Horse, Lucrecia Little Nest, Marcelline Little Nest; his aunts, Gladys Bear Below, Agnes (Anthony) Left Hand, Helen Old Coyote, Brenda He Does It, Jolena (Darrell) Pretty Weasel, Cora (Alfred) Teeth, Ruth (Stanley) Bell Rock, Sharolyn (Chester) Nomee, Shirley (William) Stewart, Nadine (Dean) Dawes. Donna (Danny) Brien, Noreen (Jacob) Big Hair, Arlene (Robert) Fitch, Francine (Dave) Camden, Clara Nomee, Ellie Rides Horse, Jennifer (James) Medicine Horse; his uncles, Clayton (Rebecca) Falls Down, John M. Little Nest, Ronald (Georgine) Falls Down, Marvin (Gwen) Falls Down, Sr., William (Pamela) Backbone, Golet (Dessie) Little Nest, Frank Backbone, Jr. and Thomas Stewart. He is also survived by many friends, nieces and nephews; as well as the Well Known, Jack Rabbit, Bouyer, Stewart, Alden, Backbone, He Does It, Bull Tail, Left Hand, Blood Man, Tobacco, Picket and Bad Bear families. Rosary will be recited 4 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 1 in the Bullis Funeral Chapel. Funeral Mass will be celebrated 10 a.m. Wednesday, Oct. 2 in the Lodge Grass Our Lady of Loretto Catholic Church. Interment will follow in the Lodge Grass Cemetery. Bullis Mortuary of Hardin has been entrusted with the arrangements October 1, 2002 Colette Bear Robe BUSBY - Colette Jean Bear Robe, 22, of Busby, died Saturday, Sept. 28, 2002, in Busby. She was born Sept. 12, 1980, in Crow Agency, a daughter of Joseph Bear Robe, Sr. and Charlotte White Wolf. She grew up in Busby and attended local schools. Following her education, she provided childcare services to area residents and worked as a Daycare aide at the Busby School. Colette was a member of the Busby Pentecostal Church. She enjoyed and loved spending time with her nephew Cactus, whom she was helping raise, as well as her other nephews and nieces. She also enjoyed visiting with her Grandma Glenda Russell. She always made everybody laugh with her goofy imitations and stories. She just loved to have fun and going around visiting here and there with family and friends Her parents and a sister, Tamara Bear Robe, preceded Colette in death. Survivors include two sisters, Jocelyn and Lisa Bear Robe of Busby; three brothers, Thomas (Corine) Bear Robe of Billings, Joseph (Ilene) Bear robe of Muddy Creek and Dana Bear Robe of Colorado; two aunts, Effie Bearchum of Busby and Freda Smith of Pryor; her uncle Charles Bear Robe of Colorado and her special friends, Verna Wolf Black, Charles Russell, Lynette and Patricia White Dirt. Baby sister, though you have gone from this earth, you'll forever be in our hearts and memories. Wake services will be held 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 2, in the Busby Pentecostal Church. Funeral services will be held 2 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 3, in the Church. Interment will follow in the Busby Cemetery. Bullis Mortuary of Hardin has been entrusted with the arrangements. John Bernard Little Nest, Jr. LODGE GRASS - John B. Little Nest, Jr., 32, of Lodge Grass, is also survived by his adopted mother, Georgine Little Nest of Lodge Grass; his sister, Rhonda Anderson; and his brother, Robert Brien. Copyright c. The Billings Gazette, a division of Lee Enterprises. -=-=-=- September 25, 2002 Francis Edward Bull Child Jr. BROWNING -- Francis Edward Bull Child Jr., 35, a custodian and maintenance man for the Blackfeet tribe, died Saturday in an auto accident on Highway 2 near East Glacier. Rosary is 7 this evening at Little Flower Parish. Funeral Mass is 2 p.m. Thursday at Little Flower Parish, with burial in Willow Creek Cemetery. Day Funeral Home of Browning is in charge of arrangements. Survivors, all of Browning, include his wife, Wendy Bull Child; daughters Kimberly, Krystal and Kourtney Bull Child; sisters Lynn Little Plume, Tinsey Bird Rattler, Penny Bird Rattler and Carla Bird Rattler; brothers Steve Bull Child, Shawn Bird Rattler, Merlin Bird Rattler Jr., Martin Little Plume, Loren Bird Rattler and Barney Augare; and his grandfather, Joe Bird Rattler. September 27, 2002 George T. Not Afraid, Sr. LODGE GRASS - George Thomas Not Afraid, Sr., 38, of Lodge Grass, went to be with the Lord, Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2002, in the Billings St. Vincent hospital. He was born Aug. 1, 1964, in Sheridan, Wyo., a son of Etheline and Donald Dreamer and Edward and Shirley Not Afraid, Jr. He grew up and received his education in Lodge Grass. George married Rosella Bulltail in September of 1996, in Wyola and the couple made their home in Lodge Grass. He loved his wife, family and friends dearly. God saw him as a caring and loving person and we as a family see him in the same light. He enjoyed fishing, hunting and his Father's majestic creation. A sister, Adelle Sue Not Afraid; his grandparents, Ed and Ethel Not Afraid, Sr., Pete Grey Bull, Sr.; his aunts and uncles, Prisilla (Simon) Flat Mouth, Rosalie (Jess) Hill and Shirley Iron Horse, preceded George in death. Survivors include his wife, Rosella; his children, Heidi, Debra, Rosebud, Natoya, Jorden, Thomas and George Not Afraid Jr., Kassie and Cori Bulltail; his mother Etheline (Donald) Dreamer; his father, Edward (Shirley) Not Afraid, Jr.; his brothers and sisters, Mary (Steve) Mullenberg, Barbara (Darrell) Brightwings, Marilynn (Victor) Morning, Debbie (Harold) Backbone, Janice (Henry) Speelman Sr., Joy Buckley, Mike Dreamer, James (Gladiolus), Herschel (Susan) Hill, Alvin Sr., Marcia, CJ (Jana) Sr., Edward (Tammy) III, Eliza, Wayne (Cathy), Christina and AJ (Carey) Not Afraid Jr., Ethel (Alex) Madill, Danielle Patterson, Kellie, Donna and Daniel Dreamer; his grandparents, Cyril (Flora) Not Afraid, Julia Not Afraid, Caroline Miller, Arthur (Lenora) Plenty Hawk Sr., Mary Carpenter, Gloria (Joe) Medicine Crow, Mary Grey Bull, Edith Birdinground and Agnes Faraway; his aunts and uncles, Bethann (Willis) Medicine Horse Sr., Alma (Jay) Anderson, Beverly (Dennis) Huber, Peter (Marella) Grey Bull, Adella Spotted Horse, Melvina Jefferson, Bertha (Paul) Nomee Jr., Lorraine (Joseph) Bear Cloud Sr., Gail Red Wolf, Georgine Little Nest, Oliver (Lucille) Yarlott Sr., Greeley (Stella) Not Afraid Sr., Faith, Woodson, Darlene and Warlene Bird Faraway, Karen (Bill) Austin, Rosie Mae (Earl) Bear Crane Sr., Beldean (Larry) Beninger, Carmlita and Agnes Birdinground, Gilbert (Kathy), Wilford (Lorna), Thrulow (Zena) and Quinton Birdinground; as well as numerous nieces, nephews, brothers, sisters, aunts and uncles. Funeral services will be held 11 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 28, in the Lodge Grass Our Lady of Loretto Catholic Church Gymnasium. Interment will follow in the Lodge Grass Cemetery. Bullis Mortuary of Hardin has been entrusted with the arrangements. September 30, 2002 Beulah Iron Bear HAVRE -- Beulah (Horse Capture) Iron Bear, 72, of Havre, a homemaker, died Saturday at the Northern Montana Hospital in Havre of natural causes. Her wake and rosary are 7:30 p.m. today at the Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Fort Belknap. Funeral Mass is 10 a.m. Tuesday at the Sacred Heart Catholic Church, with burial in Fort Belknap Cemetery. Adams Funeral Home of Malta is in charge of arrangements. Survivors include her children, Eunice The Boy of Havre, Virginia Batt of Missoula, Barbara Sun Child of Havre, Donna Houle of Great Falls, Kim Iron Bear of Havre, Margo Morgan of Missouri, Amber Seamons of California, and her grandson, who she raised, Shorty Larsen; 25 grandchildren and 18 great-grandchildren. October 1, 2002 Vincent Douglas Short FORT BELKNAP -- Vincent Douglas Short, 31 years, a worker at Western Sugar, died Friday at a Billings hospital following an automobile accident. His wake and rosary begin at 7 p.m. Wednesday, at the Red Whip Community Center at Fort Belknap. Funeral Mass is 11 a.m. Thursday at the center with burial in the Hi-Way Church Cemetery. Adams Funeral Home of Malta is in charge of arrangements. Survivors include his wife, Carisa Short of Billings; children Vincent Douglas Jr. and Jamie Lynn Short both of Arkansas, Robert Diego and Cecelia Rose Short both of Billings; step-children, Justina Banda, Melissa `Banda, Arthur Banda, Patricia Banda and Antonia Banda, all of Billings, his mother, Linda "Sugar" Short of Fort Belknap; his father and stepmother Robert and Debra Short of Billings; a sister, Amber Short of Billings; and a brother, Robert Blackbird of Nevada. Copyright c. 2002 Great Falls Tribune. --------- "RE: Seismic Drilling will be used at Sacred Monument" --------- Date: Wed, 25 Sep 2002 08:41:22 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="DRILLING SACRED LANDS" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://www.durangoherald.com/asp-bin/article Seismic drilling will be used at monument September 24, 2002 By P. Solomon Banda Associated Press Writer DENVER - Trucks that send shock waves into the Earth to help pinpoint oil reserves will be used for exploration in the Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, under an agreement announced Monday. A lawsuit that halted the plan last month was settled Friday after environmentalists and oil companies agreed to restrictions that would protect the archaeologically sensitive area in Southwest Colorado from destruction. The monument holds cliff dwellings, large circular rooms known as kivas, farm sites and rock carvings dating back thousands of years. Four environmental groups filed the lawsuit after the Bureau of Land Management approved the plan Aug. 9. "Both groups worked out a practical solution. Environmentalists knew exactly what they wanted to protect, and the oil industry folks knew exactly what they wanted to do," said Jay Tutchton, director of the Earthjustice Environmental Law Clinic, which represented the groups. The agreement calls for moving so-called "thumper trucks" away from archaeological sites and keeping their vibration in some areas on dirt roads. Reptile and archaeological experts will accompany the exploration team to identify sensitive sites when the trucks are in undeveloped areas. "I think the bottom line is they want to develop their oil, and they want to make money, but they don't want to trash the place," Tutchton said. Under the project, expected to last three weeks, four large trucks will drive single file through the area. They will stop periodically and lower a vibrating plate to the ground. Wire strung on the ground will detect the vibrations and record the data to determine where oil might be found. Mark Pearson, executive director of the San Juan Citizens Alliance, said it was important to keep the large trucks "out of sensitive wildlife habitat, archeological sites and undisturbed soil crusts to help address our concerns." The agreement will include the closing of some roads that were created by previous seismic exploration on Hamilton Mesa. Pearson said this was important because access from the old roads would increase chances for vandalism. Once the project is over, the agreement calls for posting signs near the exploration vehicles' tire tracks so visitors don't confuse them with roads. "People usually see what they think is a road and say, `Hey, let's see where it goes,'" Tutchton said. "Almost all your destruction in these areas is vehicle-based. I mean, a person doesn't walk five miles to spray paint a kiva." A key part of the Bush administration's national energy plan is opening more public land to oil and gas development to increase domestic production. The proclamation that created the 164,000-acre preserve of ancient American Indian ruins near Cortez barred oil and gas exploration where there are no existing leases, except in certain cases. Opponents say federal mineral lease maps show that about 20 percent of the land to be surveyed has never been leased. The Interior Department has said the monument has the highest known density of archaeological sites in the country - more than 20,000 in the area, and in some places more than 100 sites per square mile. The lawsuit was filed by the San Juan Citizens Alliance, the Wilderness Society, the Colorado Environmental Coalition and the Oil and Gas Accountability Project. "We're very pleased that they were able to reach an agreement," said Bill Rice, a spokesman with the BLM, which manages the monument. "It allows those oil companies that have those oil leases already to know exactly what is below there, and it allows them to propose to drill fewer wells." Herald Editorial Assistant Matthew Colella contributed to this report. Copyright c. 2002, the Durango Herald. All rights reserved. --------- "RE: Norton reopens Sacred Site Controversy" --------- Date: Mon, 30 Sep 2002 08:10:58 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="QUECHAN SACRED SITE" http://www.indianz.com/ Norton reopens sacred site controversy MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2002 Amid Congressional attempts to protect Indian Country's significant places, the Bush administration on Friday gave new life to plans for a controversial gold mine located near a California tribe's most sacred site. Based on a determination by agency experts, the Department of Interior upheld the mining claims of Glamis Gold, an international company that prides itself on low-cost developments. Although final approval is not guaranteed, the move clears the way for a massive open pit operation in an area known as Indian Pass. To the Quechan Nation, the proposal is disastrous. The tribe considers Indian Pass the life-blood of its culture, a place where ancestors are cremated and religious pilgrimages occur. "Our sacred sites are more precious than gold," said council member Phil Emerson. "Tribal sacred settings in many cases are centuries old and at the heart of tribal cultures and traditions." Emerson organized a 700-mile run to attract attention to the cause. A group of 40 tribal members, some as young as eight years old, ran from the state capitol to their reservation, where they arrived on Saturday, to support of legislation pending in the U.S. Congress and in California. But those efforts can be overwritten by Secretary Gale Norton, who last year rescinded a legal opinion that stopped the mine in its tracks. Based on that opinion, her Clinton administration predecessor, Bruce Babbitt, had denied Glamis a permit. The department will now review the environmental analysis for the 1,571- acre open pit project. A decision to approve of seek additional studies is expected in three months. Senator Barbara Boxer (D-California) hopes to head off action. An amendment prohibiting federal funds for the project cleared the Senate last week. "The destruction of this sacred area would violate the Interior Department's obligations to protect the interests of federally recognized Native American tribes, with tragic consequences," Boxer said on Friday. According to Quechan Nation President Mike Jackson, the decision to reverse course on the mine came from Deputy Secretary J. Steven Griles, a former lobbyist for the mining industry. The tribe tried repeatedly to meet with Bush officials to express its views but have been unsuccessful. Interior officials, in recent testimony to Congress, were unable to provide specifics about the lack of consultation. Boxer's provision on the mine was not included in the House version, which was passed in July. A joint House-Senate conference committee would have to resolve the difference. Also pending in California is a proposal to give tribes a greater voice in developments. Governor Gray Davis (D) has yet to write the bill into law. Representative Nick Rahall (D-West Virginia) has introduced legislation to protect sites like Indian Pass. Jackson testified in support of the bill last week. "The bulldozer or backhoe ripping into the earth, rips into our hearts," he told the House Resources Committee. "Our inability to stop this destruction makes us feel as though we are failing our ancestors and our children. If you destroy the land, you destroy what we believe in, who we are. This too must stop." Copyright c. 2000-2002 Noble Savage Media, LLC/Indianz.Com. --------- "RE: Snoqualmie Tribe tries to block Flood Work" --------- Date: sat, 27 Sep 2002 21:24:19 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="SNOWQUALMIE" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/134544403_tribeappeal28e.html Concerned tribe tries to block flood work at the falls By Sara Jean Green Seattle Times Eastside bureau The Snoqualmie Tribe is challenging a flood-reduction plan to blast bedrock and widen the river channel above Snoqualmie Falls, saying the project would hurt the environment and further damage a site of spiritual and cultural significance to its members. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers wants to eliminate a bottleneck in the river to help reduce the severity of floods in Snoqualmie, the state's most flood-prone city, which averages $1.6 million in flood-related damage each year. The tribe last week appealed a water-quality certification that the state Department of Ecology issued to the corps for the $3.5 million flood-reduction project. In its appeal - which corps and city officials say came as a surprise - the tribe lists 14 points for its opposition to the project, including potential adverse impacts on the cultural integrity of the falls, water and soil quality, hunting and fishing areas and fish habitat, as well as inadequate consultation and mitigation measures. The parties are expected to meet with a member of the state's Pollution Control Hearings Board to see whether they can reach an agreement. No date has been set. If they can't reach an agreement, the entire board would hear the appeal to revoke the certification, which is the only permit the corps needs to proceed. Any appeal of the board's ruling would then go before a Superior Court judge. In the meantime, corps and city officials hope to meet with tribal representatives next week to better understand the tribe's concerns. King County likely will be involved, too, because the county and city are splitting about 25 percent of the project's cost. The Federal Emergency Management Agency is providing the rest. For the tribe, Snoqualmie Falls is a sacred site that has served as a spiritual gathering place for generations. Tribal officials worry that further alterations could adversely affect the falls' eligibility for listing on the National Register of Historic Places. They also believe if they don't say something now, their future standing on any projects involving the falls could be jeopardized. Ray Mullen, the tribe's economic-development director, said the tribe didn't get a say when a 270-foot shaft was drilled into the falls for an underground power plant in 1898, or when the rock outcropping where Chief Seattle is said to have lured Yakama warriors to their deaths was blasted in 1900. "We weren't allowed to comment in the past, but we are now," he said. Still, the decision to appeal was tough for the Snoqualmie tribal council because a significant number of the tribe's members live in Snoqualmie's flood plain, said tribal administrator Matt Mattson. "Flood reduction is as important to the tribe as it is to the city of Snoqualmie," he said. "But in the end, the tribe felt we needed to appeal to preserve the tribe's position that Snoqualmie Falls is a sacred place." For at least the past 40 years, engineers have been trying to solve Snoqualmie's flood problems, said Paul Cooke, the corps' project manager for the current flood-reduction plan. Previous ideas - such as building a dam and reservoir on the north fork of the Snoqualmie River - proved too costly and offered little flood relief, Cooke said. "This is the closest we've gotten," he said of the current plan. He characterized it as a "surgical strike" to remove "pinch points" upstream from the falls, reducing the amount of water that backs up there during flood season. While Centralia and Chehalis in Lewis County and areas along the Skokomish River in Mason County probably see more severe flooding than Snoqualmie, Cooke said those places are predominantly rural. "But Snoqualmie gets hit harder (with damages), and I'd say it's the most flood-prone city in the state," he said. The Snoqualmie project would see 20,000 cubic yards of rock and earth removed from the east side of the river and 30,000 cubic yards removed from the west bank a few hundred feet upstream from the falls, Cooke said. He estimated the project would reduce flood depths by 18 inches during serious floods and anywhere from 6 to 12 inches during more frequent flooding. "In many cases, it's enough to keep flood waters out of the first levels of people's homes," Cooke said. The project would reduce Snoqualmie's estimated annual flood damage from $1.6 million to $600,000, he said. When the corps began studying the project four years ago, officials met with the tribe's former chairman. Another meeting with tribal officials was held in June, followed by a field trip to the project site in July, Cooke said. "I naively went away from those meetings thinking we'd satisfied their concerns," Cooke said. "We're very concerned that the tribe feels threatened by our project, and regardless of the appeal, we want to work with them." In the end, the tribe still had significant concerns and felt the corps hadn't looked hard enough at alternatives, Mullen and Mattson said. Snoqualmie Mayor Fuzzy Fletcher said he's well aware of the falls' spiritual significance to the tribe. Though he wishes tribal officials had raised concerns earlier, he said he hopes the parties can reach a compromise. "I don't see this as something that will kill the project," Fletcher said of the appeal. "I refuse to give it up - it's the best flood- reduction project we can get for the money." For Mattson and Mullen, the choice between flood protection and cultural preservation is a no-brainer. For a dozen years, the tribe has worked with the Snoqualmie Falls Preservation Project, a coalition of tribal members and church and environmental groups, to have the power plant at the falls decommissioned and water flows returned to their natural course. The coalition is working with the tribe on its appeal of the flood-reduction project. "We're not going to take a back seat when it comes to our falls," Mullen said. Sara Jean Green: 206-515-5654 or sgreen@seattletimes.com Copyright c. 2002 The Seattle Times Company. --------- "RE: Senate panel approves funds for Western Shoshone" --------- Date: Thu, 26 Sep 2002 08:22:02 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="WESTERN SHOSHONE" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://www.rgj.com/news/stories/html/2002/09/25/24601 Senate panel approves funds for Western Shoshone Indians Associated Press 9/25/2002 12:55 pm A Senate panel voted Wednesday for a plan to distribute about $20,000 apiece to qualifying members of the Western Shoshone Tribe for federal seizures of their land dating to the 1860s. The bulk of a $138 million fund would be released to those who are at least one-quarter Western Shoshone, under a bill introduced by Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev. The tribal members _ numbering about 6,600 _ live mainly in Nevada, California, Idaho and Utah. The bill by Reid, who sits on the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, now moves to the full Senate. Reid is hoping for Senate passage this year. The legislation has been controversial because a minority of the tribe opposes it. The dissenters believe it thwarts their challenges to land rights. Among them are Western Shoshone ranchers Carrie and Mary Dann, who contend the tribe still owns the land under terms of the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley. The treaty between the Western Shoshone and the United States took 23.6 million acres of land from the tribes. Tribal leaders have argued that the treaty simply granted the United States limited access to the land and didn't cede it to the federal government. But the majority of the Shoshone are said to favor receiving the payments. In June, tribal members voted in support of the plan by an 8-1 margin. "Talk about a majority _ that's a super majority,"Reid said after Wednesday's committee vote. Reid believes a U.S. Supreme Court ruling and an Indian Claims Commission settlement in 1979 make it clear the Western Shoshone no longer have land claims, and the time has come to make the payments. Copyright c. 2002 Reno Gazette-Journal, a Gannett Co. Inc. Newspaper. --------- "RE: BLM plans Seized-Cattle Auction" --------- Date: Tue, 1 Oct 2002 22:54:10 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="BLM RUSTLE SALE" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://www.rgj.com/news/stories/html/2002/09/30/25020.php?sp1=&sp2=&sp3= BLM plans seized-cattle auction Associated Press ASSOCIATED PRESS 9/30/2002 11:17 pm The Bureau of Land Management on Friday plans to auction cattle seized from two Western Shoshone sisters in Nevada. Confiscated Sept. 22 in a decades-old grazing dispute with Mary and Carrie Dann, the livestock will be auctioned in four lots: 40 cow-calf pairs; 88 dry cows; 58 calves-yearlings; and three bulls, the BLM said. Written bids will be accepted either in person or by fax from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m. at the agency's state office in Reno. The cattle, being held at the BLM's Wild Horse and Burro Center north of the city, can be viewed by potential bidders through Wednesday, the BLM said. The BLM claims the sisters have illegally grazed cattle and horses on public lands around their Crescent Valley ranch for decades. The Danns maintain the Western Shoshone still own much of Nevada under an 1863 treaty and that the BLM has no jurisdiction over their ranching operation. Western Shoshone activists plan to protest the cattle impoundment outside the BLM office the day of the auction. Copyright c. Reno Gazette-Journal, a Gannett Co. Inc. --------- "RE: Another Reason to vote this Year" --------- Date: Thu, 26 Sep 2002 11:07:11 -0500 From: "Carter Camp" Subj: Another reason to vote this year Mailing List: ndn-aim Earthjustice Press Release Bush Administration Anti-Environmental Policies Linked to Corporate Campaign Contributions New Report Details "Paybacks" September 25th, 2002 Contact Info: Maria Weidner, Earthjustice, 202.667.4500, x. 237 Rick Bielke, Public Campaign, 202.293.0222 Washington, DC/Oakland, CA-- In a report released today, Earthjustice and Public Campaign established in detail for the first time the strong correlation between big corporate contributions to the Bush-Cheney campaign and Republican National Committee (RNC) and Bush administration policy paybacks that benefit these interests. "These contributions and policy paybacks tell the story of how corporate interests brought the Bush administration to power so that it could weaken the law to benefit the companies' bottom line," the groups said. The report, entitled PAYBACKS, makes an accounting of industrial contributors to the Bush-Cheney campaign and the industry-friendly policies that have become the regular order of business since President Bush took office. The report also names some of the top environmental officials within the administration who built their careers as lawyers and lobbyists for the industries they are now in charge of regulating. "The Bush administration's anti-environmental agenda doesn't just appear to be made-to-order for polluting industry interests. It is," conclude Earthjustice and Public Campaign in PAYBACKS. "Industries now reaping the benefits of an administration intent on eliminating important environmental and public health safeguards are the same ones that helped underwrite the Bush-Cheney campaign and the RNC with more than $44 million in contributions." "Over thirty years of progress in addressing environmental problems - spurred by public servants and private individuals of all political persuasions - is being squandered by this administration," said Buck Parker, executive director of Earthjustice. "The Bush administration is giving away our nation's clean water and air, national forests, and public lands to its corporate contributors." "Because you have to pay to play in the current campaign finance system, anti-environmental special interests with plenty of cash see all their policy wishes granted. Meanwhile, the public's interest in a healthy environment is ignored," said Nick Nyhart of Public Campaign. The report, which is available on the web (www.earthjustice.org and www. publicampaign.org), focuses on the investments made by timber, mining, oil and gas, coal-burning utilities, chemical, and other manufacturing interests. PAYBACKS shows how these investments resulted in handsome returns for polluting and resource extractive industries in the form of anti-environmental policy decisions, often facilitated by Bush administration political appointees who are former industry lawyers and lobbyists. The groups also will launch a website today (www.GeorgeWBuy.com) that presents some of the information from the report. "The GeorgeWBuy website is an accurate depiction of the sad reality: the Bush administration has put the public's health and precious natural resources on the auction block," said Parker. ### Earthjustice is a nonprofit public interest law firm dedicated to protecting the magnificent places, natural resources, and wildlife of this earth and to defending the right of all people to a healthy environment. We bring about far-reaching change by enforcing and strengthening environmental laws on behalf of hundreds of organizations and communities. Public Campaign is a non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to sweeping reform that aims to dramatically reduce the role of special interest money in America's elections and the influence of big contributors in American politics. ----------------------------------- Earthjustice 426 17th Street, 6th Floor Oakland, CA 94612-2820 Phone: (510) 550-6700 Fax: (510) 550-6740 Email: eajus@earthjustice.org Earthjustice is a non-profit public interest law firm dedicated to protecting the magnificent places, natural resources, and wildlife of this earth and to defending the right of all people to a healthy environment. We bring about far-reaching change by enforcing and strengthening environmental laws on behalf of hundreds of organizations and communities. --------- "RE: Terrible Price of a Bush Environmental Blunder" --------- Date: Mon, 30 Sep 2002 11:44:12 -0500 From: "Carter Camp" Subj: More anti-ndn Bush actions Mailing List: ndn-aim t r u t h o u t - The Terrible Price of a Bush Environmental Blunder The Terrible Price of a Bush Environmental Blunder By Timothy Egan New York Times, Science Saturday, 28 September, 2002 SEATTLE, Sept. 27 -- More than 10,000 chinook salmon have died in the Klamath River in northern California in recent days, leaving biologists stunned and Indian tribes and fishermen angered at the Bush administration, which they say caused the deaths by favoring farmers in one of the most contentious water disputes in the West. Federal officials, while not conceding that administration policy had anything to do with the die-off, said they would reverse an earlier policy and begin releasing water from Upper Klamath Lake in southern Oregon in an effort to revitalize the Klamath River downstream. The slow-moving river is littered with thousands of dead, bloated salmon, rotting in the sun. Biologists say they have never seen a salmon kill of this size. It comes six months after the Bush administration decided to divert more Klamath Lake water to irrigation in the Klamath basin, saying the decision would satisfy farmers and comply with environmental laws. Indian tribes and fishermen say the administration broke the law -- and starved the river -- by favoring farmers over fish. "We're seeing dead fish everywhere; it's just tragic," said David Hillemeier, a biologist with the Yurok Indian Tribe in northern California. "No matter what happens now, the damage is done. We could lose 30,000 fish." Although biologists disagree on what caused the fish to die, they say a very warm and dry September in the Pacific Northwest and low water flows in the Klamath River are the two major reasons the river is too low for fish to move upstream and spawn, as they would normally do this time of year. Instead, the fish are crowded into small pools and dying of disease. On Thursday, fishermen and environmental groups went to federal court in Oakland, Calif., charging the Bush administration with giving too much water to irrigation interests at the risk of thousands of salmon, including coho, which are listed as threatened with extinction, and king salmon, or chinook, which are considered the most desirable and grow to 70 pounds or more. "Basically, the administration created a drought in the lower river," said Zeke Grader, with the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen, the largest trade group of salmon fishers on the West Coast. "We were expecting a really good run of fish this year. And now we've got the federal government essentially killing fish to satisfy their irrigation interests." Bush officials said they had acted on the best information from scientists and were baffled by the death of the salmon. Allocating more water to irrigators, who staged protests last summer when they were denied their usual amount of water for farming, may not have been a factor in the die-off, the officials said. "It's an anomaly," said Mark Limbaugh, director of external affairs at the Bureau of Reclamation, which controls water in the upper Klamath Basin. "No one has ever seen a problem like this, and it may very well turn out to be a natural phenomenon." The Indians say that the warm and dry weather has not affected any river except the Klamath and that the fish die-off can be directly tied to the withholding of river water. "We begged them for more water, starting in the spring," said Sue Mastern, chairwoman of the Yurok Indian Tribe, which has 4,500 members and lives in northern California. "They would not consult with us. They ignored us. And now people are feeling helpless and outraged. It's just a sickening feeling." Just six months ago, the Bush administration held an elaborate ceremony in Klamath Falls, where officials released water for irrigation that had been held up because of concerns for endangered fish. As farmers chanted, "Let the water flow," Bush officials unveiled a 10-year plan that they said would settle the water war, one of the biggest in the West. Property rights groups and farm interests portrayed the fight as a battle between sucker fish, which live in Upper Klamath Lake and were dying because of little water, and farmers, who depend on backed up river water to irrigate 200,000 acres. The downstream salmon, and the Indians and fishermen who depend on them, were largely forgotten in the debate, though some biologists warned that there was not enough water to satisfy all the interests. Under Indian treaty law, the federal government has a "trust" responsibility to tribes and their water, fishing and property rights. "This water will be released beginning today to meet tribal trust responsibilities and to support the migrating salmon during this emergency, " Interior Secretary Gale A. Norton said. "We are doing our best to respond to this situation." Federal officials say the water release, which they call a "pulse" and will go on for 14 days, may not be enough to help the thousands of fast- dying fish. "No one is certain exactly what effect the water will have on fish," said Steve Williams, director of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. "But we are all determined to do something to quickly address the situation." Fish runs vary greatly. The 10,000 fish killed this week are more than the river's entire salmon population in some years. Other years, like this one, are more bountiful, and biologists had been expecting a big run on the Klamath. It will take about three days for today's first release of water to make it downstream to where the fish are trapped in warm pools. The release comes at a time when irrigators say they have adequate water to give some back to fish. "We believe increasing the flows is justified at this time," said Dan Keppen, executive director of the Klamath Water Users Association, which represents 1,500 farm families. "We had an extra slug of water available, and we've got a cushion right now." Indians and fishermen say it is precisely that extra water that should have gone to other needs of the river starting last spring. "It's been clear all summer long that this river is ailing," said Kristen Boyles, a lawyer with Earthjustice, an environmental legal group, which is suing the administration on behalf of fishing groups and others. "Now we have this massive die-off, and it's the result of six months of water mismanagement." Copyright c. 2002 t r u t h o u t. --------- "RE: Tim Giago OP/ED: Many Indians ruled by Catch-22" --------- Date: Mon, 30 Sep 2002 08:10:58 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="CATCH-22" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://www.theday.com/news/ Many indians ruled by catch-22 09/29/2002 I believe the phrase "catch 22" originated in Sioux country as "Wikcemna nunpa yuza" long before the book by Joseph Heller. It is the circumstance of rule that denies a solution. For example; there is a saying commonplace in jurisprudence in America. It is that a person charged with a crime has the right to be tried before a jury of his or her peers. Who or what is a peer? An Indian charged with committing a serious crime on an Indian reservation is almost always tried in a city far from the reservation and usually before an all-white jury. The jury never knows anything about this person's life, the conditions in which he or she was raised, and nothing about the culture, traditions or language, the knowledge of which could have a serious effect upon why the crime was committed and upon the ultimate decision of the juror. Catch 22? A Lakota father has a duty to his wife and children as their provider and cultural and spiritual leader. When his freedom was taken from him and he was placed on an Indian reservation without a means to provide for his family, it is only natural that his ability to provide cultural and spiritual guidance also suffered. When the welfare system first originated, even if the man could not find a job, he could still stay with his family and he could hunt, fish and maintain the ties to the culture and spirituality necessary for his well being and that of his family. As the system became more controlled the woman was forced to sign papers under the AFDC programs that prevented the man from living under the same roof as she and her children. This totally went against the provisions of the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868. It placed the man in the position of becoming an outcast from his own family. Unemployment on many Western reservations hovers at 50 percent to 80 percent. There are few jobs and yet a man is forced to separate himself from his family because he is not working. Catch 22? When the Indian nations signed treaties with the United States of America, they did so under duress. Most treaties were created to take land. A tribe would give up a million acres of land for certain treaty rights. Most treaties provided for health care, education and welfare. These were provisions written into the treaties. In exchange for giving up large chunks of land, the Indian people were to receive certain benefits in perpetuity. As America became more secure in itself, the treaties soon became worthless pieces of paper. The millions of acres given up by the Indians for "health care, education and welfare" took on a different meaning. The monetary compensation for natural and mineral resources on Indian lands went into a trust fund where the accumulated profits often amounted to the millions of dollars. Treaties aside, if there had been proper accounting for the timber, water, oil and precious metals taken from Indian lands, there would have never been a need for any sort of welfare. Instead, the Interior Department, through its Bureau of Indian Affairs, so mismanaged the assets of the Indian nations that no one to this day, can account for the millions, nay billions, of dollars lost or stolen from these trust funds. Trust is such an odd name for these lost revenues. Who does one trust? Catch 22? As the number of welfare recipients grew on Indian reservations those receiving benefits were soon treated as the welfare recipients in the inner cities. The treaty obligations by the United States to the Indian people for giving up millions of lucrative acres of land no longer mattered. Every welfare recipient became a negative number. The United States supposedly recognizes the Indian nations as sovereign. And yet, when they initiated the National Indian Gaming Regulatory Act in 1987, they gave state governments the authority to regulate gaming compacts. In other words, if a state decided they did not want an Indian owned casino in their state, it could simply deny the Indian tribe applying a compact. Worse yet, every aspect of gaming was regulated by the state. How many slot machines, whether there could be Black Jack tables, roulette or other gaming devices, all came under state jurisdiction. One sovereign took precedence over another sovereign. Catch 22? In Indian country the circumstance of rule that denies a solution is doing well. Tim Giago, an Oglala Lakota, is editor and publisher of weekly Lakota Journal. He can be reached at editor@lakotajournal.com or at P.O. Box 3080, Rapid City, S.D. 57709 Copyright c. 1998-2002 The Day Publishing Co. --------- "RE: Bush Administration Alarming Land Grab Proposal" --------- Date: Fri, 27 Sep 2002 08:49:37 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="LAND GRAB" http://www.indianz.com/News/ NCAI: 'Alarming' land grab proposal FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 2002 The nation's largest inter-tribal organization criticized the Bush administration's draft legislation to take "unclaimed" Indian land. In a analysis distributed to tribal leaders, the National Congress of American Indians said the proposal was "alarming" because it shifts the burden from the trustee to the beneficiary. Indian landowners would forfeit their rights even if the Department of Interior can't identify them. The outlines of the legislation were outlined in a September 26 report on Indianz.Com. The bill is still in the very early stages of development. But tribal leaders already rejected the proposal last month. Department officials intended to discuss the proposal at the trust reform task force yesterday. Instead, the meeting turned into a debate over the future of the tribes' relationship with the Interior. The department plans to go to Congress with its own trust reform projects -- with or without tribal involvement. Tribes plan on drafting their own legislative packages as well. Copyright c. 2000-2002 Noble Savage Media, LLC/Indianz.Com. --------- "RE: Land Management hindered by Bite-Sized Ownership" --------- Date: Mon, 30 Sep 2002 08:10:58 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="LAND MANAGEMENT" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://www.billingsgazette.com/~/68-trust.inc Land management hindered by bite-sized ownership pattern BY JODI RAVE LEE Special to The Gazette September 29, 2002 "The earth was created by the assistance of the sun, and it should be left as it was. ... The country was made without lines of demarcation, and it is no man's business to divide it..." Chief Joseph, Nez Perce Picture this piece of land four, three, even two centuries ago. Eighty acres of hardwood forest in Wisconsin's upper reaches. Ojibwe country. Maybe they hunted there. Maybe they fished. But they didn't own the land; most tribes didn't think anyone could own the land. Today, that land - on the Lac Courtre Oreilles Reservation - likely hasn't changed. It's still 80 acres of hardwood forest, still Ojibwe country. But you could fill a small city with the number of tribal citizens sharing ownership in the 80 acres: At one point, the local Bureau of Indian Affairs office struggled to simply keep track of the parcel's 2,400 owners. And they can all be traced to Git-chi-i-kwe Sr., and the U.S. government's controversial introduction of land ownership to tribal citizens. He was 82 in 1881, when Washington assigned him the 80 acres. The land that stood without owners for so long now had a title. And boundaries. And heirs. When the old man died 17 years later, the government transferred his land to the next generation. As the years passed, the number of owners grew. Across Indian Country, where hundreds - even thousands - of owners share single tracts of land, this has become the joke: Sure, you might own land, but just enough to stand on. Git-chi-i-kwe's 80 acres and thousands of other parcels are known as fractionated land - pieces of property shared by multiple owners and held in trust by the U.S. government. And Washington's failure to manage the land and the income it generates is at the core of a class-action lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Interior on behalf of an estimated 800,000 past and present Native landowners. The landowners contend up to $100 billion has been lost, misappropriated or never deposited into their accounts. The case, which has triggered a sweeping reform movement involving all three branches of the federal government, could change the way Washington does business with Native America. --------------------------------------------------------------- Picture a family farm that's been divided and subdivided again and again and again, as each generation passes its holdings to the next. The land doesn't grow, but the number of owners does. Dozens at first, then hundreds, then thousands. All heirs, all owning interest in the same piece of land. But none of them allowed to manage their own assets on their own terms because of the government's role as trustee. Now picture you're that trustee - responsible for managing 11 million acres nationwide for these owners, and the money generated by leases for farming, minerals and timber. How do you keep track of 230,000 current owners? How do you manage the records? How do you handle probate cases? How do you divide the income? "It's meticulous, tedious, pain-in-the-ass work," said Michael Hackett, superintendent of the Winnebago BIA Agency in Nebraska. Finally, imagine you're sued by an angry and determined landowner. ------------------------------------------------------------- Six years ago, Elouise Cobell of Montana's Blackfeet Nation asked a judge to force the Interior Department to provide an accurate accounting of its Individual Indian Money trust fund account, which collects and distributes lease payments and royalties for tribal members who own trust land. The class-action suit has generated thousands of pages of testimony and documents that depict a broken system: inadequate account statements, destroyed and missing records, lack of security for landowner information stored on computers. Since the lawsuit was filed, two Interior Department secretaries - members of the Clinton and Bush cabinets - have been held in contempt of court for failing to comply with the judge's requests for trust fund records. Cobell's suit, however, has done more than expose problems with how the government manages tribal citizen trust funds. It's sparked a reform movement now spreading across Indian Country with the speed of a prairie fire. And it could restructure how the Interior Department and the BIA manage trust assets and resources for tribes and tribal citizens - undoing federal policy that started 212 years ago. ------------------------------------------------------------- The roots of government-managed trust lands can be traced to the Trade and Intercourse Act of 1790, which required federal approval of any sale of Native American lands. "The trust responsibility was initially created as a way to justify how the United States had power over people who had never consented to the Constitution," said Kenneth Bobroff, a University of New Mexico assistant law professor. A century later, the Dawes Act, or General Allotment Act of 1887, decimated reservation land bases by assigning parcels to individual tribal citizens. The law didn't allow landowners to make wills until 23 years later, setting the groundwork for fractionated land inheritance. The problem was instantly clear to some. "After a few subsequent deaths of the heirs the title becomes so interminably mixed that it is next to impossible to clear it up," an Indian agent on Washington's Puyallup Reservation said in an 1892 complaint to superiors. Fast forward 110 years. Ernie Pourier, BIA realty director at Nebraska's Winnebago Agency, helps manage thousands of acres shared by thousands of owners on the Omaha, Santee and Winnebago reservations. One 80-acre tract on the Winnebago Reservation has 600 owners. Among his duties: Negotiating leases on behalf of owners and notifying them about lease changes. On those days, he said, the office printer runs all day. Nationwide, it's an extensive - and expensive - duty. In 1999, the BIA spent 50 percent to 75 percent of its $33 million realty budget managing fractionated land interests alone, according to congressional testimony by Kevin Grover, former head of the BIA. But critics say the Interior Department and its bureaus are failing in their trust fund management duties: * Some probate cases - which determine heirs for ownership - haven't been resolved for decades, creating a backlog that prevents efficient records management. * Most BIA workers manage assets with two obsolete computer systems that can't interact with each other. A new, $40 million computer system that began to be developed in 1998 was deemed a failure by Interior Department and BIA officials. Work was halted on the system in January. * Landowners say they are denied basic information about their land and assets. Diane Rasmussen, who inherited land from her grandmother on South Dakota's Rosebud Reservation, remembers a relative giving her a check for about $800. "I thought at the time, 'Gee, I didn't know when you own the land you get that much.'" Now her lease earnings have dwindled to as low as 36 cents, she said. But the 58-year-old Sicangu Lakota said she can't find out why. "I don't know who to call, who to discuss it with or where to start," she said. In Idaho, Shoshone-Bannock landowners are suing the BIA. They claim the BIA provided land ownership information to non-Native lessees and a power company but that they were denied the same information. ------------------------------------------------------------- While fractionated land problems have long been acknowledged as an obstacle to trust land management, interest in the issue has been renewed because of the Cobell litigation. A trust reform task force of Interior Department officials and tribal leaders recently created a committee to find ways to solve the problems of fractionated land. The group had its first meeting in August. And now an effort is under way to amend legislation that would alleviate related problems. Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell, R-Colo., plans to introduce amendments to speed up land consolidation efforts. Congress tried nearly 20 years ago to fix those problems when it passed the Indian Land Consolidation Act of 1983. The law allowed tribes - with approval from the interior secretary - to buy, sell or exchange lands to consolidate tribal holdings. The idea was good, said Teresa Carmody of the Indian Land Working Group in Wagon Mound, N.M. But the language was flawed and the results ineffective, she said. The act stripped landowners of their property and gave it to the tribes if people owned less than 2 percent of the total land interest. The Supreme Court ruled the provision unconstitutional in 1997. Congress decided to amend the act in 2000. Carmody's group - with input from tribes, landowners, probate and realty officers - had developed a comprehensive legislative proposal for solving fractionated land problems, she said. Congress ignored the proposal. And the group does not support the amendments lawmakers ultimately passed. "Once again, the administration's attempt to come up with a cheap, quick fix for managing trust allotments and fractionated ownership has produced a complex and ill-fated law," Carmody said. The act gave tribes - but not individuals - more control over land acquisition and consolidation efforts. The act did, however, create a pilot program allowing individuals to sell fractionated interests to tribes. The BIA has administered the pilot program on five Wisconsin reservations. Meanwhile, tribes and Native organizations are undertaking their own reform efforts. Oregon's Confederated Umatilla Tribes is consolidating land for the tribe and individuals. "This tribe has been sort of fortunate that they have bought back tens of thousands of acres of land over the last, probably, six years," said Scott O'Daniel, Umatilla's general information systems manager. In 1946, legislation allowed the Rosebud Sioux Tribe to create the Tribal Land Enterprise program. In 59 years, the tribe has bought 500,000 acres and is slated to begin a BIA program similar to the one in Wisconsin. But many say sweeping changes must come from Congress - which introduced allotment and fractionated land. "The allotment property system is broken," said New Mexico's Bobroff. "It doesn't allow for rational inheritance. It doesn't allow for rational transfers among tribal members." Copyright c. The Billings Gazette, a division of Lee Enterprises. --------- "RE: Judge refuses Arrest Warrant for Patterson" --------- Date: Fri, 27 Sep 2002 08:49:37 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="PATTERSON/ONEIDA" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://www.zwire.com/site/news Judge refuses arrest warrant for Patterson By MIKE BILODEAU, Dispatch Staff Writer September 26, 2002 ONEIDA - Danielle Patterson's day in Oneida Indian Nation Tribal Court was adjourned Tuesday until Oct. 14 because she failed to appear. Patterson, who has defied the Nation's eviction notice and awaits the demolition of her trailer on the Nation's 32-acre territory, was due in court Tuesday morning in her assault case stemming from her home's inspection in December. The Nation's prosecutor asked for a warrant for Patterson's arrest, but Judge Stewart Hancock refused the warrant, according to Joe Heath, a general counselor for the Onondaga Indian Nation, who appeared for Patterson. "I don't think there will be any more action on the case," Heath said. "I don't think they can come in and face an order that's no longer valid." Patterson said the adjournment will help the Nation find a prison to hold Patterson after her assault trial. The Oneida Indian Nation contracts with the Lewis County jail for cells, but the jail is an all-male facility and cannot house Patterson. "I've had two victories today," Patterson said. "My house is still here, and they didn't come to arrest me." Patterson said she knows her home will still be demolished and the Oneida Indian Nation Police will soon come to take her to jail for the assault charges. "They'll try," Patterson said. "They can try all they want." Oneida Indian Nation Tribal Court Judge Stewart Hancock ruled in August that Patterson must vacate her home by Sept. 15, and the home would be demolished after that. So far, Patterson is still in her home, and the home is still standing. Mark Emery, spokesperson for the Oneida Indian Nation, referred questions to Oneida Indian Nation Tribal Court Clerk Wendy Fisher. Fisher said that Patterson will appear on Oct. 14 at 9:30 a.m. The legal issues began in November when Patterson attempted to replace a furnace in her home, but was told by the Nation Public Safety Commissioner Arthur Pierce that the furnace could not be installed until her home was inspected by the Nation. Patterson refused the inspection, and the Oneida Indian Nation Police forcibly removed her from her home to inspect it. Her home failed the inspection and the next day was scheduled for demolition. Legal appeals only delayed the original Dec. 15 day of demolition. Staff Writer Danielle Elliott contributed to this report. Copyright c. 2002 The Oneida Daily Dispatch. --------- "RE: Taos Pueblo Parents want action on Student Needs" --------- Date: Tue, 1 Oct 2002 22:54:10 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="TAOS CHILDREN" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://taosnews.com/db/Daily.php3#1125 Taos Pueblo parents want action on student needs By William Maxwell, The Taos News Monday, September 30, 2002 Taos Pueblo parents told a federal auditor Sept. 24 that they have been ignored for years, even while many Native American children fail in the schools. "Nothing has changed," said Shawn Duran, the pueblo's Education and Training Division director. "We still have the data that shows our children are failing." "People don't want to be accountable or responsible for our Native American children's performance, or lack thereof," state Education Department auditor Roz Carol said. Linda Gomez, reading a printout generated Sept. 23, said 60 of 91, two thirds of Native American students at Taos High School, are failing. Gomez is Native American education coordinator at Taos High School. "Can we ask the school district to hire more people to work with our children?" Gomez asked Kerry Wingell, a Washington, D.C.-based officer of the U.S. Department of Education's Impact Aid Program. The comments were made at a meeting of school officials, school employees and Indian Education Committee (IEC) members at the school administration building. Many of the IEC members and school employees are also parents or guardians of Native American children in the schools. The Impact Aid Program provides federal money to local school districts. It replaces the local tax money the districts are not receiving for students who live on Indian Reservation lands on which no property taxes are collected. Wingell said that the federal government does not tell school districts how it must spend the Impact Aid money. The money goes into the general funds and the districts do not have to earmark that money for the Native American students. Wingell said the problems the Native American students face must be solved on a local level. "We have a hands-off approach," he said. There is a large stick Wingell can hold over the district. If the local problems are not solved, the pueblo parents have the option to request a hearing with an administrative law judge, who has the power to rescind the Impact Aid funds for the district. Carol, the state Department of Education auditor, said she found in a May audit that there was no effective record keeping of Native American students, which affects for how many Native American students the district gets credit and how much Impact Aid money flows to the district. Taos Schools Student Services Director Diane Dorsey said progress has been made with the addition of filing cabinets and computers. New case management has been added to the program, she said. Native American liaisons now receive training for student assistance teams, child abuse reporting laws and 504 Forms. Dr. Rosa Herrera, the schools' new director of instruction, acknowledged there are problems with student record keeping. "It is what (new Schools Superintendent Dr. Marc Space and I) found out. Information is not centralized. The same problem exists with the bilingual students." Herrera said she is committed to solving the problems. "We want to work with the pueblo. We want to improve education for all students. We are putting systems in place. We need to place kids correctly in the programs," she said. Taos Pueblo Gov. Vincent Lujan said he will work toward a solution. "We need to deal with the school system. We have our work cut out. I'm going to hold this administration responsible. At least they are listening now," said the governor. Copyright c. 2002 The Taos News. --------- "RE: Tribal Group seeks Payback for Land" --------- Date: Tue, 1 Oct 2002 22:54:10 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="ALASKA PAYBACK" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://juneauempire.com/stories/093002/loc_payback.shtml Tribal group seeks payback for land BIA to review burning of Douglas Indian homes in '62 By ERIC FRY THE JUNEAU EMPIRE c. 2002 John Morris remembers watching the city of Douglas burn down his home in the Douglas Indian Village in 1962. The fire trucks were there to keep the fire in, not put it out. Douglas, at the time an independent city with its own government, razed the village to build the Douglas Boat Harbor. The beach homes of Morris and other Natives were cleared to make room for material dredged from Gastineau Channel. Juneau residents now play ball, barbecue and soon will ice skate on what some Douglas Natives consider to be stolen property. "This was a piece of property they had to have and took it by hook or crook rather than the letter of the law," said Morris, 61. The Douglas Indian Association, buttressed by a recent review of public records and federal law, has renewed its long-standing call for compensation from the federal government and the city. The tribal government says the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs had jurisdiction over the village and shouldn't have let the city burn it. "There's never been a satisfactory answer to the questions we raise," said Harold Frank, acting tribal administrator of the 414-member Douglas Indian Association, a federally recognized tribal government. "There's been a lot of folks willing to say it's been 40 years ago." The report by the Indian Law Resource Center, based in Helena, Mont., and publicly released by the tribe last week, said one member of the Douglas Planning and Zoning Commission was an employee of the BIA's realty office when the city was trying to acquire the tidelands and village site from the state and seeking to get a harbor built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Another zoning commission member worked for the Department of Interior, the BIA's parent agency, the report says. Those employees eventually cited a conflict of interest and resigned from the zoning commission while the city was^Gtrying to acquire the village land, city records show. But the new report, by attorney Andrew Huff, said the BIA's "willingness to abandon the Natives may be linked" to the two men's dual positions. Niles Cesar, Alaska director for the BIA, today said the report raises questions and the agency will investigate them fully. "Did we do due diligence for Douglas back in the '60s?" Cesar said. "Is there a conflict of interest and did that have an effect on the process?" The village, which tribal members said was lived in continuously since the 1880s, consisted of about 20 buildings, including 10 to 12 houses, on the beach that is now the site of Savikko Park. But like Natives throughout Alaska, the villagers spent part of the year at fishing and hunting camps. "Our lifestyle was from the last day of school in the spring we would go to the Taku River and stay there continuously through the summer and the fall until two weeks into the school season," said Morris, who said he grew up on the Taku and in the Douglas Indian Village in the 1940s and '50s. "We gillnetted and fished. Went hunting. Go get the moose and the berries and put up all the food for the wintertime," he said "We smoked and canned salmon. Everything that you could live off the land was there on the Taku." Douglas Natives in the mid-1940s asked the federal government to build a harbor in front of their homes. The Natives couldn't get loans for new boats because they couldn't insure them without having a harbor to dock them in. The Alaska Native Service, a federal agency, said the city of Douglas would provide new homes for Indian village residents on the area to be filled by dredged material, Huff's report says. But that project came to nothing. When the city in the early 1960s renewed efforts to build a harbor, it said the village was on city land. The state transferred the site to the city and the BIA didn't object. In compensation, the Douglas Indian Association now wants the federal government to give it Mayflower Island, the islet at the harbor connected by a road-topped causeway to Savikko Park, tribal administrator Frank said. The islet contains offices for the federal Bureau of Land Management. The tribe also wants to receive the former Douglas Indian School on St. Ann's Avenue. It is now owned by the city and used by a private Montessori school. The association wants the BIA to investigate, with the city's cooperation, the destruction of the village and explain its reasons for not protecting it. Cesar of the BIA said the agency is reviewing the land-status question. Juneau Interim City Manager John MacKinnon today said it was too early for city officials to comment on the report, which they received late last week. Juneau, Douglas, Auke Bay and the rest of town voted to unify filly as a combined city and borough in 1970. Huff's report says the Native village should have been considered a federally protected enclave, based on the 1884 Alaska Organic Act, which established civil government in the territory of Alaska. Later federal laws reaffirmed the state didn't have rights to property held by Natives or by the federal government in trust for Natives, Huff said. Cesar said he wasn't aware of any documents that show the village officially was a Native townsite or allotment protected by specific federal laws, but the agency will review whether the site nonetheless should have been under federal oversight. A U.S. Survey map from 1915 shows the Indian village wasn't part of the Douglas Townsite. In 1961, though, the city said the village was no longer on tidelands, but on uplands created over time as waves left sand behind. Following a land-ownership principle called accretion, the city said the village was part of adjacent uplands, which the city had seized from the Treadwell mining corporation for nonpayment of taxes in the 1920s. Most of Douglas' mines closed in 1917 following a collapse and flood. Soon after hearing the city's reasoning, the BIA told the city the BIA and the Interior Department didn't have jurisdiction over the "Indian- owned improvements" in "the Douglas Indian Village." The last sentence of the two-sentence letter to the city, the only known explanation of the BIA's position at the time, reads: "It is hoped that any action taken by the City of Douglas to force the removal of these Indian people from their homes in the village will be done without causing them undue hardship." It's not clear from existing public records how many village residents were compensated for their homes, attorney Huff said. A letter from the city of Douglas' attorney to some villagers said they were entitled to very little. "They were always bitter over it, saying they were never compensated for the land or the housing," said Morris, the former village resident. Huff said the question of whether the village was on tidelands or uplands is irrelevant: Any continuously used Native sites should have been considered federally protected land. The state also is at fault, he said. The tribe's report comes as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers considers building wave barriers at the harbor, which the city is expanding. The Douglas Indian Association has asked the Corps of Engineers to include the recent legal report in the agency's analysis of the new project. "There is a need for justice, and the Tribe seeks answers to our question," tribal President Dorothy Owen wrote to the Corps of Engineers. Corps of Engineers spokesman John Killoran said it was too soon to say whether the association's request would affect the proposed harbor project. The site of the Indian village is not within the project's boundaries. Eric Fry can be reached at efry@juneauempire.com. Copyright c. 2002 Morris Digital Works and JuneauEmpire.com. --------- "RE: Congress debates ANWR Bargains" --------- Date: sat, 27 Sep 2002 21:24:19 -0700 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="ANWR" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://www.adn.com/alaska/story/1849512p-1964119c.html Congress debates ANWR bargains DRILLING: Proponents are conflicted over possible compromises. By Liz Ruskin Anchorage Daily News September 27, 2002 Washington -- It's horse-trading time on the energy bill, and the proponents of drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge seem to hold conflicting views about what would make a good bargain. "I will tell you, I'm not going to give all my clothes away to get a date," Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, said Thursday to the House-Senate committee working on the bill. "I want to make sure what offer we give makes sense." His remark was aimed at the idea of a "mini ANWR," a compromise enthusiastically promoted by Rep. Billy Tauzin, the chairman of the negotiating committee. Tauzin's idea is to open only part of the coastal plain while protecting other parts as wilderness. The Louisiana Republican said he intends to offer Senate opponents of drilling "an offer they can't refuse." Sen. Frank Murkowski, the leader of the charge for ANWR development, didn't sound committed. He said Wednesday that there was no actual proposal. "There's just general discussion about the possibilities of having a flexible proposal that would reduce, if you will, some of the sensitive areas that are currently open in the House bill." A spokesman said Murkowski hasn't publicly expressed any opinion about the concept. The director of Arctic Power, the lobbying group funded by the state of Alaska and the oil industry, said her group doesn't want to close parts of the plain before companies do the seismic work that will reveal where the oil is. "We would be in a position of giving away something we don't know the value of," said Arctic Power's Kim Duke. "We'd be blindly choosing some area to exclude." Despite Tauzin's talk of compromise, the only ANWR offer House negotiators officially made Thursday was the same as what is in a bill the House passed a year ago. It would open the 1.5 million-acre coastal plain to oil exploration, though the surface disturbance would be limited to 2,000 acres. The bill the Senate passed would keep ANWR closed to drilling. If the conference committee adopts a compromise, it would still have to be approved by both houses. And time is running out. Lawmakers hope to adjourn in two weeks. Sen. Joe Lieberman called ANWR a "nonstarter" for the Senate. "Maybe I'll put it another way," Lieberman, D-Conn., said Thursday. "It starts, but it doesn't get enough votes to pass." Lieberman and other opponents of drilling say there isn't enough oil in ANWR to make a dent in our dependence on foreign oil. Their answer is to reduce consumption while developing alternative fuels. Murkowski restated the arguments he has been making all along: The refuge can be developed safely. America needs the oil. We shouldn't be buying oil from Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. But he seemed to be exploring new ideas. "I'm wondering if there's any likely compromise within the environmental community relative to increasing wilderness, or some other alternatives that might make it more palatable," Murkowski said, directing the question to Lieberman. Lieberman said he's always happy to hear proposals, though he said he hasn't heard one yet that would change his mind. Other opponents are insisting there can be no compromise. "The entire coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is a wilderness in fact and deserves to be deemed a wilderness in the law," said Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass. "Carving out a 'sacrifice zone' from this incomparable refuge is unacceptable." That seems to be the consensus of the environmental groups working to keep the refuge closed. "This is our big fight," said Athan Manuel, Arctic campaign director for U.S. Public Interest Research Group. "We've drawn a line in the sand on this one." Reporter Liz Ruskin can be reached at 1-202-383-0007 or lruskin@adn.com. Copyright c. 2002 The Anchorage Daily News --------- "RE: Escalating Violence in Chiapas" --------- Date: Wed, 25 Sep 2002 07:14:05 -0500 (CDT) From: owner-chiapas95-english@eco.utexas.edu (Chiapas95-english) Subj: Escalating violence in Chiapas Mailing List: Chiapas95-English This message is forwarded to you by the editors of the Chiapas95 newslists. To contact the editors or to submit material for posting send to: . Since the end of July, a new wave of violence has broken out in Chiapas, close or in the Lacandon Jungle and around the Montes Azules Biosphere. Five members of the civilian support base of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) have been killed and over 20 wounded in renewed conflicts involving local paramilitary groups. Several Zapatista communities have fled because of paramilitary violence, adding to the 12,000 people already displaced by ongoing violence in the state of Chiapas. The perpetrators of these latest crimes have not been brought to justice. The government continues to spread the myth that "Indians are killing Indians over family squabbles", and while it is difficult to work out the exact details from varying reports on the incidents, there is no doubt that these assaults have been accompanied by the deployment of hundreds of additional Mexican soldiers throughout the "canyon" region and Lacandon Jungle of Chiapas. On the surface these attacks are reported as random, "internal" or communal conflicts, but there is reason to fear that this latest wave of violence marks a new era of military and paramilitary activity, and is being used as a justification to re-militarise the autonomous zones. In particular, tension has been growing in the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve over the past months, with the Mexican government looking to relocate (forcibly or otherwise) approximately 28 communities located within the Reserve. Under the pretext of environmental conservation, military presence has increased heavily, and the Mexican Army has been assigned the new role of environmental supervision. Not coincidently, roughly half of the communities located within the Reserve are Zapatista- affiliated communities. According to a recent report by Global Exchange "Human Rights, Biodiversity and Local Autonomy: The Case of Montes Azules", the relocation effort would serve two purposes: 1) it would attack the heart of Zapatista communities, and 2) grease the wheels for the absolute exploitation of Montes Azules' prolific natural resources. See www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/mexico To subscribe to this list send a message containing the words subscribe chiapas95 (or chiapas95-lite, or chiapas95-english, or chiapas95-espanol) to majordomo@eco.utexas.edu. Previous messages are available from http://www.eco.utexas.edu/faculty/Cleaver/chiapas95.html or gopher to Texas, University of Texas at Austin, Department of Economics, Mailing Lists. --------- "RE: Brazil: Slave Labour and Illegal Logging" --------- Date: Fri, 27 Sep 2002 10:11:34 -0400 From: Amazon Alliance Subj: Brazil: Slave labour and illegal logging in Para; Tumucumaque plans; Raposa/Serra Mailing List: Amazon Alliance 1- Slave labour in Para doubled this year 2- Federal Police seize 1,990 illegal mahogany logs in Para 3- Government defines plans for Tumucumaque 4- Raposa/Serra do Sol - Indigenous leaders ask for the demarcation process to be expedited ____________________ From Amigos da Terra- Amazonia Brasileira- www.amazonia.org.br (Translated by Amigos da Terra- Amazonia Brasileira) Slave labour in Para doubled this year - 06/09/2002 Locality: Rio de Janeiro - RJ Source: Jornal do Brasil Link: http://jbonline.terra.com.br/ The Pastoral Land Commission has criticised the increase in slave labour in Brazil. In Para, since January, 67 farms have been accused of enslaving some 2,771 workers. That figure is double the number of cases last year. In Maranhao and Mato Grosso around 700 workers have been freed from slavery this year. Cases of slave labour have also been recorded in Sao Paulo, Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina. The Pastoral Land Commission has also stated that a lack of financial resources is impeding an inspection team from the Ministry of Labour from visiting 32 farms alleged to be using slave labour. There are more than 1,150 workers at these farms and according to eyewitness accounts from escapees, some workers have been killed in escape attempts. The allegations were made in a letter sent by Brother Xavier Plassat, who co-ordinates the PLC's campaign against slave labour, to the National Human Rights Secretary, Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, who is also president of the Special Commission to Combat Slave and Child Labour. Brother Xavier added that a meeting of the Group for the Eradication of Forced Labour had to be cancelled because of budget cuts. He demanded government action to stop this "human tragedy which is unfolding before our very eyes". The Superior Labour Court has called for the creation of a taskforce to combat forced labour, as well as the creation of a special itinerant court to hear cases of forced labour. The president of the SLC said "slave labour exists in Brazil and it is a scandal". The House of Deputies is to investigate allegations that the leader of the PFL, Inocencio Oliveira, held 58 workers in a regime of slave labour at the beginning of the year at his farm in Maranhao. A commission will visit the area after the first round of the elections in October. Inocencio has denied that accusations, alleging that he is a victim of political persecution. He said he considered the matter to be "closed". ____________________ From Amigos da Terra- Amazonia Brasileira- www.amazonia.org.br (Translated by Amigos da Terra- Amazonia Brasileira) Federal Police seize 1,990 illegal mahogany logs in Para - 06/09/2002 Locality: Belem - PA Source: O Liberal Link: http://www.oliberal.com.br/index.htm A Federal Police operation has resulted in the seizure of 1,990 mahogany logs with an estimated value of R$22 million. The timber - the extraction, sale and transport of which is prohibited by law - was found on the Xingu river at Sao Felix, in the south Para. One person was arrested at a sawmill in the forest. Operation Gnome 3 was carried out in secret by the Federal Police's recently-created Environment Department. "In the combat of crimes against the environment, we are giving priority to the question of mahogany", said the operation's commanding officer, Jorge Pontes. He added that a special group will guard the mahogany. The operation was supported by IBAMA officials. The operation began last month and lasted 15 days. One arrest was made. Divino dos Reis de Souza, manager of the Serra Dourada Sawmill, is being investigated for his involvement in the illegal extraction of mahogany. The timber would have been sold for US$7.5 million. According to a study carried out by the Public Ministry of Para, for every mahogany tree which is felled, a further three trees of other species are also felled. ____________________ From Amigos da Terra- Amazonia Brasileira- www.amazonia.org.br (Translated by Amigos da Terra- Amazonia Brasileira) Government defines plans for Tumucumaque - 04/09/2002 Locality: Sao Paulo - SP Source: ISA- Instituto Socioambiental Link: http://www.socioambiental.org/website/index.cfm Around R$2 million are to be invested in the Tumucumaque National Park by the end of the year. The process of creating the park has received criticism from NGOs. The government initiative to finance the implantation of transport infrastructure, energy, education, sanitation and agriculture to support research and ecotourism is considered to be innovative. The WWF is to contribute US$1 million for the demarcation of the area, the elaboration of a management plan, the implementation of basic infrastructure and the acquisition of equipment. The project is being financed by a partnership between the NGO, the Brazilian government, the World Bank and the Global Environmental Facility and forms part of the ARPA Programme. Part of the budget will be used this week for the elaboration of an emergency management plan. The Amazonian Working Group and the Pastoral Land Commission have published the Tumucumaque Manifesto containing various criticisms of the process. Among the criticisms are a failure to ensure the participation of the local population. A number of local NGOs, led by the Amapaense Society for Nature and Solidarity, have criticised the fact that action is restricted to the infrastructure area and failed to take into account local suggestions. For ASNS president, Herbert de Oliveira, this is a consequence of the hurry to approve the creation of the park ahead of the Rio+10 Summit. ____________________ From Amigos da Terra- Amazonia Brasileira- www.amazonia.org.br (Translated by Amigos da Terra- Amazonia Brasileira) Raposa/Serra do Sol - Indigenous leaders ask for the demarcation process to be expedited - 06/09/2002 Locality: Boa Vista - RR Source: Folha de Boa Vista Link: http://www.folhabv.com.br/ The Ministry of Justice, Paulo de Tarso Ribeiro, has made a commitment to indigenous leaders in Roraima to authorise a survey of the legal situation of the Raposa/Serra do Sol Indigenous Area to see if the ratification process, which has been foundering since 1998, might be expedited. The Minister met with indigenous leaders in Brasilia last week. They asked for immediate government action on the ratificati