In our mission to expose the truth, a platform has developed!

It’s been quite an experience running for our tribal council. I’ve encountered a lot of things over the past couple of months that I could never have expected. I’ve been meeting some awesome tribal members that I hadn’t previously known. I’ve learned a lot about how much work it is to run for this position and I’ve also learned that I didn’t know as much about the activities of our tribal leaders as I thought I did.

Over the past couple of months Shondel Barber and I have formed an unexpected partnership in our mission to expose the truths about our corrupt tribal council members. Each of us has been leaked some pretty reliable information from many different sources since we began our quests to represent the membership of this tribe. But, prior to this when I started writing articles about the mismanagement of tribal funds and the terrible path our casino manager had us on, and especially, seeing so many of our people lose their jobs, was when I decided to rise up to the challenge of running for tribal council.

Why am I running for council? Because I got tired of sitting back watching the current leadership destroy the fabric of this community through misconduct in many forms, which include illegal activities, fraud and intimidation. They hold job security over people’s heads even going so far as creating a tribal ordinance that said no tribal employee could speak out against the tribal council or face termination. They’ve fired many hard-working tribal members only to replace them with non-tribal workers. They denied a TERO office here that would have protected workers from unfair wages and secured jobs for our workers on government contracts. They’ve eliminated positions of workers who had been in their positions for decades because they didn’t fall into line with their illegal policies. They’ve eliminated positions and fired long-time employees to free up payroll money to hire unnecessary executive positions with six-figure incomes and of course, these positions were created for their friends! Enough is enough.

I asked one of our young warriors the other day what he thought I could do for him and his generation if I were elected. What could we do better for the youth? This is what he said, “We need direction. Too many of our youth fall into gangs and drugs. There is no sense of community. Out here it’s an every man for himself attitude. If our government could do something to improve our community’s pride, that would be the first step to advance us as a people.”

Well said, and this sentiment is exactly what many of our young people feel. If we continue on this path, what type of Rez will we leave them? They are the next generation of leaders and right now, if we don’t change the course, they will inherit a mess beyond repair. We cannot allow these current leaders to continue to steal from us, destroy our communities, lead through fear and intimidation and neglect the ones who need leadership the most, our youth.

The only way things will change is if we remove the officers from their positions which include Chairman Mic Isham, Vice Chairman Rusty Barber and Secretary Treasurer Norma Ross. Unfortunately, those three aren’t up for re-election this year. But, the only way they continue to run this tribe into the ground is because they have a block of four votes, themselves, along with Gary “Little Guy” Clause, who does happen to be up for re-election. This group of four is running everything right now. The key to removing Mic from the chair is to vote for all four candidates that agree with me… we need a change of leadership! This means that you won’t cast a vote for Little Guy, or any other that supports the status quo. There are a half dozen other candidates that support keeping things as is and I hope that you, the voters who truly want change, will investigate each candidate and see where they stand.

Shondel and I are two of those candidates that will change the direction, but we can’t do it alone. We need the perfect team to be elected, so that we can remove the officers who are currently leading this tribe down a path of despair. Please vote in the primary election on May 16 from 9 am to 6 pm, and remember, you can vote for four candidates. I know many of you have a family member you support or have already in mind who you support, but I’m asking that you consider us for those other spots you can cast a ballot for. Also, on May 16, if you can’t get to the polls for any reason, don’t hesitate to message me or call me.

Here are some of the issues of our platform that we will push for when we are elected. These are a few of the changes that can take this tribe in the right direction and improve the health of our Rez!

JOBS, JOBS, JOBS

We need to create jobs through business development and improving the businesses we have so they make a profit, or face closure so other businesses can be operated that may make money. We need to return jobs to those who lost theirs over the past two years, especially at the casino. We strongly believe in the “Tribal Member Preference” policy. Our casino manager is firing long-time employees who make too much money for non-tribals who he can pay much, much less to cover the outrageous executive staff positions he created. We also firmly stand behind creating a Tribal Employee Rights Ordinance here at LCO to protect our tribal workforce so that all businesses and contractors operating on our Rez have to hire at least 75% workers and to pay them the same wages non-tribals are paid. Our current leadership recently said no to a TERO!

IMPROVE HOUSING

Way too many of our tribal homes have mold problems and for the health and well-being of our families, this problem can’t be ignored any longer. Our people are getting sick. We need to seek funding to repair these homes immediately. We also need to seek funds for more housing on our Rez and work to eliminate the homeless problem. We need to put the Supportive Housing project back on the table that would have helped shelter those who need it the most.

CASINO BOND RESTRUCTURING

By next year our casino bond payment will exceed what we can pay and we’ll default all because of a terrible deal that our 2006 leaders put us into with excessive interest rates, increasing monthly payments and outrageous commissions, so much so that it resulted in a $2.3m lawsuit against the bond holders. We need a new bond deal or we’ll default losing management of our casino. A good deal with zero commissions and very low interest was almost made with the Shakopee Sioux tribe but our chairman, Mic Isham, with Norma Ross, Rusty Barber and Little Guy Clause turned it down and now we have nothing but uncertainty. We need to make sure to get four council members elected who agree that we need an immediate leadership change. It's the only way we can save our casino. We need to ask the Shakopee to sit back down at the table and give us the deal that had previously been agreed upon.

CHILDREN’S DAYCARE FACILITY

A major struggle for our people is to find work and have adequate daycare for their children. There is no daycare for our hard-working families, especially single mothers. We will work tirelessly until we get a daycare facility.

TRANSPARENCY

Our tribal finances should be open to our tribal membership. We'll make sure our people are made aware of exactly where we stand financially. We were nearly broke in November, unable to make the Christmas bonuses for employees and elders, until our council made the $2.3 million dollar settlement and received a lifeline. Very soon we'll be broke again. Repeatedly we are saved by a settlement or a bad bond deal, but what happens when we go broke and their isn't a lifeline? It's going to happen soon. Look at the millions of dollars we've run through since the last bond deal was made in 2006 or the $8m Nez Perce settlement. The $2.3 million dollar settlement last year saved the council a lot of humiliation from explaining how broke we truly were. But, it won't be long, and they will face the same circumstances and will have a lot of explaining to do. We guarantee to end these secret deals and inform the membership!

CASINO MANAGEMENT

Shortly after Lee Harden was hired as our casino manager, he hired several highly paid executives to do the jobs he was hired to do and gave himself a new title...Chief Executive Officer. Lee “the General Manager” decided to hire Dulcie Rae Wolfe in that role. He must think he’s running the MGM Grand. We don't need a CEO. We don't need to be paying well over half a million dollars on executive jobs he created so he can sit in his office and be unapproachable to our people. We’ll eliminate these executive jobs freeing up the money to get our people back to work. We’ll replace Lee Harden with a manager who knows and understands the ways of our people and be more sensitive to the struggles that us regular folks encounter. Lee has lost touch with the reality of LCO!

And there you have it! Remember to vote at the primary on May 16 and a vote for Shondel Barber or myself, Joe Morey, is much appreciated. Let’s restore Native Pride and start looking out for each other once again… like our Elders used to do!