Original Pechanga's Blog

Chukchansi Tribe's "Leaders" Have Earned Scorn & Mockery. Should the BIA withdraw Recognition?

2013-06-19T04:53:00.000-07:00

We’ve read so much about the issues at Chukchansi. Does anyone really believe that the three groups led by Morris Reid, Nancy Ayala and REGGIE LEWIS have the best interest of the tribe as their priority, or the best interest of themselves?

All three of these so-called leaders were proponents of the first disenrollments in the tribe in 1999 and 2006. They cut 800 tribal members from their heritage and rights as Native Americans. Is that what someone who purports to care about the tribe does? I think not.

These actions against their own people and those subsequent disenrollments documented by the Sierra Star News, have led to violence ( Chukchansi Tribe at War With Each Other ) and huge police presence to protect Chukchansi’s shrinking number of citizens from their own leaders. Is THIS what was meant by tribal self reliance?

Nancy Ayala wants to limit the Chukchansi membership to 46 people. Is she serious? Taking a once prominent tribe to such a small number is unconscionable. A real leader would be making it tribe STRONGER, by restoring their membership to 1998 levels and enrolling any who rightfully belong.

All three “leaders” are culpable in the destruction of the Chukchansi tribe. Yet blinded by their own ambitions, they can’t see the damage they are doing with their depopulation efforts..

Help these leaders see the light. How, you ask? Ask your congressperson to set up field hearings on the issue. Ask for enforcement in the Indian Civil Rights Act. And most importantly: DO NOT FEED THE GREED.

Simply quit going to Chukchansi Gold Resort and Casino. Dry up the income stream and let them KNOW WHY you are no longer coming. Let them know you refuse to support their corruption and greed.

But what about sovereignty, you may ask? Yes, they are a sovereign nation, but then, so was South Africa, and we used moral persuasion to get them to eliminate apartheid. You can do the same at Chukchansi. Let them know you expect them to act humanely towards their people or they won’t get your entertainment dollars. Help them to see that being corrupt is not a long term solution.

Bring ALL the Chukchansi people home.

Read more about the Picayune Band of Chukchansi Indians: Bedbugs at Chukchansi

Chukchansi Violence

Picayune Rancheria of Chukchansi Indians

Read about Chukchansi Language Speaker RUBY CORDERO

COURT DENIES MAYES MOTION FOR EMERGENCY RESTRAINING ORDER Against Cherokee Nation

2013-06-18T15:45:00.001-07:00

As expected, Cherokee council candidate Mayes' motion is denied.

Case 4:11-cv-00648-TCK-TLW Document 205 Filed in USDC ND/OK on 06/18/13 Page 4 of 4

Non-party Mr. Mayes’ “Motion for Emergency Restraining Order” (Doc. 203) is DENIED.
The Court finds it unnecessary to order responsive briefing or to conduct an evidentiary hearing, and
Mr. Mayes’ Motion for Hearing (Doc. 204) is DENIED. If the Motion to Intervene (Doc. 202) is
moot in light of this Order or the election held June 22, 2013, Mr. Mayes shall withdraw such
motion no later than Wednesday, June 26, 2013.

SO ORDERED this 18th day of June, 2013.

TERENCE C. KERN
United States District Judge

Read about that motion: http://www.originalpechanga.com/2013/06/cherokee-nation-tribal-council.html

Justice Delayed AGAIN in Robinson Rancheria Chair Tracey Avila's Theft Trial

2013-06-18T07:09:00.002-07:00

The theft case against the Robinson Rancheria Pomo Indians tribal chair faced another delay on the doorstep of trial.

Judge Andrew S. Blum granted an unopposed defense request to postpone the proceedings Friday -- five days before the jury selection process was set to start in the trial of Tracey I. Avila.

Avila, 51, of Nice has pleaded not guilty to a single felony count of grant theft. Authorities allege she stole tens of thousands of dollars from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Elem Indian Colony of Pomo Indians while working as that tribe's fiscal officer between February 2006 and September 2008.

Avila was arrested in September 2011 and held to answer for the lone charge after a preliminary hearing last October.

Her jury trial was scheduled to begin on Wednesday, but her defense counsel, R. Justin Petersen, filed a motion last week asking for a continuance, citing primarily that the defense recently received additional discovery documents and records in the case.

Petersen also stated the defense hasn't had ample time to prepare because he was previously involved in an unrelated trial and Avila's battle with kidney failure restricts her availability, according to court records. Those two issues led to a pair of trial postponements earlier this year.

Deputy district attorney Rachel Abelson, who is prosecuting the case, said she did not oppose the latest delay request, which the judge granted Friday at the Lake County Courthouse. The trial, estimated to last six to 10 days, is now scheduled to start Aug. 14

Three Chukchansi Leaders Act Like THREE STOOGES. WHICH ONE IS MOE?

2013-06-17T00:15:00.001-07:00

The FRESNO BEE continues to shine the spotlight on the corruption and infighting at Chukchansi. It's amazing that the three so-called "leaders" can't see how stupid they are. How does that dead golden goose taste? Like it has bedbugs in it? Nancy AYALA is accusing Lewis of TREASON against the tribe now. Really, you stupid idiot? And you were part of the faction that destroyed your own tribe? Nancy is not smart enough to be LARRY.... so can we call her Curly?

The three leaders vying for control of the Picayune Rancheria of Chukchansi Indians — and its $9 million-a-month haul from its Madera County casino — have undeniably different styles.

Reggie Lewis, 62, conducts business from a high-rent, north Fresno office that has a sweeping view of the San Joaquin River. He has control of the tribe's multimillion-dollar bank accounts.

Nancy Ayala, 46, holds meetings in a windowless portable building near the tribe's Chukchansi Gold Resort & Casino, which opened in 2003 along Highway 41 near Coarsegold. Ayala controls the daily casino profits, which she no longer deposits in the tribe's bank accounts for Lewis to use.

Morris Reid, 72, keeps tabs on the tribe from his Fresno home near Saint Agnes Medical Center. He has neither access to the bank accounts nor the casino profits.

While all three agree that in-fighting is bad for business, none of them are willing to step aside.

The power struggle has led to charges — and counter charges — of embezzlement that, in Ayala's estimation, will put the casino in bankruptcy within a year if the leadership issue isn't resolved.

Now, Lewis has upped the ante, said Ayala, who described the dispute as "a chess match."

For years, Lewis opposed the North Fork Rancheria Band of Mono Indians' plan to put a swanky casino resort along Highway 99 north of Madera because it would cut into the Chukchansi tribe's profits.

As recently as May, Lewis sent out a newsletter to tribal members voicing his opposition. But now, Ayala said, he is trying to cut a deal with the North Fork tribe "for his own personal gain."

"He's a traitor. He's not only selling out his mother, he is selling out the entire tribe," she said.

Read the REST OF THE STORY HERE

Pala Tribal Chairman Smith Online Gaming: NOT SO FAST Why Should We Respect The Opinion of a Man Who's Led a Jihad on His Own People?

2013-06-16T23:52:00.001-07:00

Well known as the man who led the expulsion of 164 members of his tribe, Pala Chairman Robert Smith tries to tell Californians what to do. See if he'd accept Californian's telling HIS TRIBE what to do.

Preserving sovereignty and maintaining our commitment to California’s voters should be the first priority when discussing online gaming — an issue that continues to raise its head in both the state Legislature and in Congress.

Remember, CA is a sovereign state too. Tribes can preserve sovereignty too, but if they want a part of Internet Gaming, they should prepare to lose either sovereignty, or onling gaming rights.

Creating an opportunity for businesses to operate poker, slot machines and other Class 3 gaming online has been an issue for several years because corporations large and small smell the potential payday that could follow. But we cannot be shortsighted with regard to opening up this industry. We must methodically develop and implement public policy that is smart, thoughtful and well-researched.

In addition to the legal and logistical issues regarding player protections and integrity involved in online gaming, questions swirl around the mechanics and impacts of the online industry. Questions like who will be licensed to provide the games? Which games should be included? What will be the impacts on brick and mortar casinos? What impacts will California’s social service programs feel, given that state set-asides from casinos currently fund a number of state programs that serve poor children and the elderly?

Player protections? Do we even KNOW what the payouts are at tribal casinos? There are no player or employee protection from smoke filled casinos either. Smith didn't consider the impact on social services when he eliminated tribal members did he?

For years, Indian Country has raised grave concerns about online gaming. On its face, it violates compacts tribes have with the state, it is contrary to voter-approved constitutional measures that limit gaming, and it creates a direct threat to tribal sovereignty by undermining the revenue source that funds tribal operations and social services. OP: The direct threat to tribal sovereignty does NOT depend on gaming. If Smith was so concerned about sovereignty threat, he'd be pushing for EVERY tribe in CA to have gaming, but he isn't, he's worried about his own tribal business.

But in today’s environment, several states — most of which do not have a tribal presence — are desperately cobbling together laws that will open the doors to online gaming, thereby creating pressure on California to create reciprocal agreements with those licensees to provide an online presence.

And in response, a number of legislative proposals have been floated. But none of those proposals have sufficiently answered the basic questions regarding player protections and integrity, much less gaming mechanics and impacts on Native Americans.

As such, it has become abundantly clear that the only way California is going to see meaningful consensus on rational Internet gaming legislation that is respectful of tribal issues is to develop a proposal ourselves, as a collaborative of individual tribes with common interests.

To that end, eight California tribes, including the California Tribal Business Alliance’s member tribes — Pala Band of Luiseño Indians, Paskenta Band of Nomlaki Indians, Lytton Rancheria — recently circulated a draft copy of the Internet Poker Consumer Protection Act 2013 to tribal leaders throughout the state, requesting feedback on the language.

The language begins to spell out what provisions and protections California tribes are looking for, including strong controls, tight regulations, and provisions that protect our people.

For tribes, online gaming is a high-stakes discussion because of the huge impacts it could have on Indian Country. Native American casinos are uniquely responsible for providing the revenues that sustain many tribes — providing jobs, health care and housing in a manner that protects our sovereignty and promotes self-reliance.

By recklessly establishing an online gaming capacity in California that has not been measured against brick and mortar enterprises, tribal leaders are concerned livelihoods will be threatened. We believe a collaborative approach is the right way to go. But until a consensus is reached, it is imperative that legislators push for methodical, smart, well-researched gaming bills that will promote a prosperous California in the long-term.

Robert Smith is chairman of the California Tribal Business Alliance (THREE TRIBES!) and chair of the Pala Band of Luiseño Indians. He deserves to be treated with scorn and derision, not respect.

Learn MORE about they type of tribe Robert Smith runs:

Pala Disenrollments
Pala dispute
Pala Disenrolls families

HAPPY FATHER's DAY

2013-06-16T13:22:00.001-07:00

hope that you have a wonderful Fathers Day and that you have great memories of your father.

Cherokee Nation Tribal Council candidate seeks Emergency Restraining Order On CN's Handling of Freedmen applicants.

2013-06-14T15:34:00.001-07:00

Is Mr. Mayes looking out for the Cherokee Freedmen, or is he looking for votes? It's good for the Freedmen if the court will do something, but does it make Mayes look good

A candidate competing for an at-large seat on the Cherokee Nation Tribal Council filed a motion Friday, seeking an emergency restraining order against the tribe.

Robin Mayes, one of six candidates for an at-large post up for grabs June 22, alleges that tribal officials have restricted the enrollment of freedmen descendants. He contends those efforts violate an existing federal court order and hinder his candidacy.

Mayes motion, filed this afternoon in the U.S. District Court of Northern Oklahoma, asks the judge to order the processing of pending citizenship applications filed by freedmen descendants. Mayes also is asking the court to “hold open” the June 22 election until those applications are processed and the applicants have time to register and vote

Chukchansi Shenanigans: Ayala v. Lewis, the Thrilla in Coarsegold: LEWIS COMMITTED TREASON against us!!

2013-06-14T08:06:00.002-07:00

Any act outside the groupthink of Chukchansi is TREASON to Nancy "We got rid of a thousand tribespeople" Ayala. Feel Free to point your fingers at her and LAUGH.

The following is a statement from Chukchansi Tribal Council Chairwoman Nancy Ayala and the Chukchansi Tribal Council Quorum on the Mono North Fork Casino.

In the past 24 hours, the Tribal Council has been contacted multiple times by Sacramento insiders, tribal officials and reporters who have related an infuriating, astonishing story. According to multiple sources, it appears that Reggie Lewis, a lawfully removed Tribal Council member who continues to illegally hold himself out as the Chairman of the Chukchansi Tribe, is allegedly in the process of negotiating a multi-million-dollar financial deal to throw his support and the Chukchansi Tribe's support behind the Mono North Fork Casino.

Such an agreement is illegal. Because Lewis is not a member of the Chukchansi Tribal Council Quorum, he cannot do business for our Tribe or sign a contract on our Tribe's behalf. Lewis' support for the North Fork Casino -- a gaming facility that would destroy the Chukchansi Tribe's casino business and flies in the face of Lewis' own May newsletter condemning the Mono Casino -- represents an act of treason against the Chukchansi Tribe.

Let us be abundantly clear. The Chukchansi Tribe is steadfast against the illegal, off-reservation casino proposed by the Mono Tribe. Each member of our Tribal Council Quorum -- recognized as the ruling body of the Chukchansi Tribe by the U.S. Department of Interior Bureau of Indian Affairs and multiple federal agencies -- is in agreement: The North Fork casino should not be built in Madera, off the Mono Rancheria. Our Tribe does not support this casino now, nor will we support it in the future. We will remain actively engaged, together with our sister tribes, in strong opposition to this casino.

20 Member Ramona Band Agrees to Casino Compact. The first ENVIRO-FRIENDLY Resort?

2013-06-14T07:54:00.000-07:00

An agreement between the Brown administration and the Ramona Band of Cahuilla allows the tribe to build a casino with as many as 750 slot machines on its remote Riverside County reservation.

The compact, if ratified by the Legislature, would mark the first growth of Inland Southern California’s large tribal gaming industry since California voters supported casino-expansion deals between the state and four Inland tribes several years ago.

With fewer than 20 members, the Anza-area tribe’s 560-acre reservation is next to spectacular wilderness area in the San Bernardino National Forest. It has no electric utility service and relies on wind and solar systems.

The tribe operates a small eco-tourism resort. And in a first for any casino deal negotiated by the Brown administration, the compact announced Thursday, June 13, would reduce the tribe’s mitigation payments to the state if it makes good-faith efforts to build and operate its casino in an environmentally friendly way. The agreement would expire in 2033.

Riverside and San Bernardino counties already are home to several tribal casinos, including some of the most successful in the state.

Those include the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians near Temecula, the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians in the Coachella Valley, the Morongo Band of Mission Indians near Banning and the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians near San Bernardino.

CA's Attorney General Kamala Harris: NO LAND for "THOSE" Indians. Mechoopda Tribe has Exhausted Funds in Fight.

2013-06-13T08:49:00.001-07:00

Let's see, CA says it's OKAY for NORTH FORK RANCHERIA to have a casino outside it's area, but NOT for Mechoopda's to get land? Wow, we don't need equal rights in CA. Key words here: NO LONGER HAS FUNDS. Can't pay to play.

After 13 years of battling for a federal land trust, the Mechoopda tribe no longer has funds to fight the state Attorney General's request that the tribe's application be denied.

Even if the decision is made in favor of the tribe, the tribe does not have funding to develop the land or a partner to start a casino, said Sandra Knight, vice chairwoman of the Chico tribe.

The Mechoopda had a long-time plan of building a casino off Highway 149 near the intersection with Highway 99. On April 1, the Bureau of Indian Affairs sent the state a notice of the application for 645 acres to be put into a federal trust for the tribe.

The state responded May 17 by requesting the trust be denied at this time, based on elements lacking in the application.

This is the first time that the Attorney General's Office has responded to notices sent to the state in regard to the Mechoopda trust application, Knight said.

A decision will now be made on whether or not the state's denial will be approved, but while in the past the tribe has intervened to protect their interests, it no longer has the funds to do so, Knight said.

Despite lack of funding and not being able to develop the land if it was granted, the tribe still seeks the land for cohesion as a tribe.

"Our tribe is a landless tribe," Knight said. "With land, the tribe would be made whole."

The attorney general's reasons for seeking denial of the trust application were stated in a letter.

Read the rest of the story HERE

San Diego Reader Has Expansive Story on Pala Corruption and Disenrollment

2013-06-12T15:01:00.002-07:00

(h/t PALA WATCH) The Reader gets in depth on the Pala corruption issue.

In the late ’90s, when the idea of a casino was first considered, members viewed it as a source of security for their financially struggling tribe. Back then, the reservation had few opportunities for employment, and many members moved off the reservation to make better lives for themselves. But a small minority wanted nothing to do with the casino, viewing it as an invitation to trouble. They wanted to keep things as they were and not let outsiders in.

“The casino was supposed to be a good thing for our people,” Paul Johnson, a former member of the Pala Band of Mission Indians, explains. “Unfortunately, a small group of people have turned it from something that was supposed to uplift our tribe and used it for their own personal gain.”

On June 1, 2011, eight tribal members were disenrolled by the band’s executive committee, a six-person elected governing body that rules the tribe. A year later, 154 more members were taken off the roll, losing their per capita, health benefits, and housing. In early 2013, two more were cut; these last members are children.

The 164 disenrolled members of the Pala tribe are all descendants of the late Margarita Brittain, whose blood purity was called into question.
The cited cause of tribal disenrollment is a blood-purity dispute. All 164 disenrolled members are relatives of the late Margarita Brittain, a woman whose lineage has long been questioned by tribal members. The Pala Band of Mission Indians’ tribal constitution states that in order to be a member, 1/16 Pala blood is necessary.

The disenrolled give various reasons for their removal; none have anything to do with blood quantum. Among the alleged motivations are greed, power struggles, and old family feuds. But there is one notion all 164 agree on: if the casino had never opened, they would still belong to their tribe. Find the link at Pala Watch

Happy Birthday Mr. Chairman. A Rememberance of Bob Foreman, Redding Rancheria Chairman, Shame on REDDING RANCHERIA

2013-06-12T13:34:00.004-07:00

Happy BIRTHDAY to BOB FOREMAN, here's a post we did a couple of years ago in his honor. Sad what the Redding Rancheria did to him and his family under the watchful eye of the BIA.

Robert Edward Foreman, the first Chairman of the Redding Rancheria, passed away Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2008. I wanted to make sure we got this up for him for the weekend

Here's how the first Chairman was treated by the Redding Tribal Council:

On January 27, 2004, all 76 members of my family the “Foremans” were removed from the Redding Rancheria tribal rolls based on nothing more than a conjured up rumor alleging my mother Lorena Foreman-Butler was not the daughter of her mother Virginia Timmons, one of Redding Rancheria’s 17 Original Distributees.

Tribal Officials never produced a single piece of evidence to dispute my mother's maternal lineage and my family provided reams of legal and contemporary documents proving her mother was Virginia Timmons. Tribal Council still required my family to provide genomic DNA from my deceased mother and grandmother to retain our tribal citizenship

Despite my family providing Tribal Council with DNA test results from two separate labs of 99.987% and 99.890%, proving by the legal standards established by the American Bar Association and the American Medical Associations that Lorena Butler and Virginia Timmons were mother and daughter, Tribal Council still stripped my family of our tribal citizenship.

Bob Foreman has been fighting to regain his family's civil rights and the rights of disenfranchised Native Americans since.

Here is Bob's Obituary:

Bob Foreman, Redding Rancheria's first tribal chairman and a pioneer in north state American Indian health clinics, died Wednesday after a long illness. He was 72.
An Achumawi Pit River Indian, Foreman was remembered Thursday by friends and family as a tireless advocate for Indian rights, skilled communicator and loyal patriarch.

He was born June 12, 1936, in Lake County. A veteran of the U.S. Navy, he worked in construction as did his father, said daughter Carla Maslin of Redding. In the late 1960s, he began his campaign to get Indians health care in the north state.
His efforts paid off in 1971, with the opening of the federally financed Shasta-Trinity-Siskiyou Rural Indian Health Center in Anderson.

"Bobby was a real devoted guy to his tribe," said Everett Freeman, tribal chairman of the Paskenta Band of Nomlaki Indians near Corning. "He almost single-handedly got Indian health to where it is today."
Larry McClanahan, a Navajo Indian who moved to Cottonwood from Arizona in 1972, said Foreman was one of the first people he met in the north state. He and his family were glad to receive clinic services.

"He took me as I was," McClanahan recalled. "He was a man that was concerned for people."
Rod Lindsay, a Shasta Lake city councilman who works with the Office of Indian Education for the Anderson Union High School District, also met Foreman through the clinic. Lindsay said Foreman was a mentor for many, sharing his knowledge of culture and history with the young.
Foreman also was instrumental in organizing the Redding Rancheria Indian Health Clinic on Churn Creek Road and served as director, later retiring as self-governance coordinator for the rancheria, Maslin said.

In 1985, when the rancheria regained its tribal status, Foreman was elected as its first chairman and subsequently served on the tribal council.

But in 2004, he and all his family members were disenrolled after a bitter dispute over his mother's maternal lineage. The struggle took a toll on his health, Maslin said. Foreman suffered from heart and kidney problems, she said.

Leah Harper, a family friend of more than 20 years who does native medicine work in Redding, said she wanted to stand out in front of the Churn Creek clinic with a "thank you" banner in Foreman's honor.
"I believe that Bob had the heart of the native people and he wanted to make a difference for them," she said. "Bob was loving and the children are loving and they work very hard."
In addition to Maslin, Foreman is survived by three daughters and three sons, as well as 15 grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren. Funeral services are pending.
For her part, Maslin is grateful her father last year was able to do something he'd always wanted - to see the Grand Canyon.

"He actually got emotional just looking at it," she said. "He was in awe of its beauty and couldn't believe the world had such a beautiful place."

Congratulations to the Redding Rancheria for their dispicable acts of DISHONOR in what they did to this man and his family. Look who they have NOW

BIA Ruling Be Damned: US District Court Rules in Favor of One Corrupt Chukchansi Group (Lewis) Over the Other Corrupt Group (Ayala).

2013-06-11T21:00:00.005-07:00

A Fresno judge ruled Tuesday that a Chukchansi leadership group led by Reggie Lewis has legal standing to intervene in a federal lawsuit involving the tribe's multi-million dollar bank accounts.

The U.S. District Court ruling sets the stage for the ultimate prize: a federal court ruling on who controls the Picayune Rancheria of Chukchansi’ Indians in Madera County and its casino's haul of $9 million a month from slot machines and table games.

Nancy Ayala, who contends she is the tribe's chair, filed the suit in April, seeking a court order to compel Rabobank to give her unrestricted access to the tribe's casino and other bank accounts.
Rabobank, however, has refused to do so. The bank recognizes Lewis' council as the tribe's legitimate governing body and has allowed it to withdraw funds, Magistrate Judge Michael J. Seng said in his ruling.

Court documents submitted by Lewis and Rabobank "raise substantial questions about the validity of the tactics used by the Ayala faction to assert control of the Tribe, justify its actions, and even initiate this litigation," Seng wrote Read more here:

Therefore, "the court finds that the Lewis faction does have a significant protectable interest in the subject matter of this suit," he ruled. The decision comes a day after Ayala's group circulated a month-old Bureau of Indian Affairs letter that apparently confirms her as the tribe's chair.

Tuesday, Lewis and his supporters disputed Ayala's contention, saying the BIA letter was miscast as proof of her leadership. Lewis said more than 50% of the tribe's estimated 760 voting members have signed a referendum in support of his council as the tribe's governing body.

The case now heads to Judge Lawrence O'Neill's Fresno federal courtroom, but it's unclear when the legal arguments will take place; Seng has given Ayala 15 days to file an opposition to his ruling.

In addition, Reid, who has been involved in tribal leadership — and upheavals — since the 1990s when the Chukchansi casino was first planned, has filed court papers seeking legal standing in the federal case.

Read more here: http://www.fresnobee.com/2013/06/11/3338830/judge-rules-in-favor-of-lewis.html#storylink=cpy

Read the REST OF THE STORY in THE FRESNO BEE

Learn More on Disenrollment, Ethnic Cleansing in Indian Gaming Country at these Links:
Gaming Revenue Blamed for Disenrollment
disenrollment is paper Genocide
CA Tribal Cleansing

BIA Steps Into Chukchansi Disputed Election. Inconsistent Federal Interference Hurts Tribe, Disenrollees and Indian Country

2013-06-11T07:37:00.002-07:00

The FRESNO BEE continues its fine reporting on the Chukchansi issue. The Chukchansi Council is well know for stripping their tribe of over 75% of their membership, leaving elders in the cold because of greed. Those greedy factions, like jackals and vultures are still fighting over the scraps.
The Federal Bureau of Indian Affairs has finally stepped into the feud over control of the Picayune
Rancheria of Chukchansi Indians — and its lucrative Highway 41 casino — by identifying Nancy Ayala as the tribe's leader.

No so fast, said an attorney for one of Ayala's two adversaries, Reggie Lewis, who also wants control of the Madera County tribe and its estimated haul of $9 million a month from slot machines and table games.Robert Rosette, who represents Lewis, said Monday that the BIA only ruled that the Dec. 1 tribal electionwas valid; it did not establish Ayala as the current tribal leader.

"The BIA puts us one step closer to resolution," Rosette said.

A Fresno federal judge will rule this week who is the rightful leader.
For years, factions led by Ayala, Lewis and Morris Reid have vied for power. Though the dispute has
exploded in several violent skirmishes, including a riot in February 2012, the BIA took a hands-off
approach.

In March, dispute over who are the rightfully elected tribal council members led Rabobank to freeze the
tribe's bank account. This put the tribe at risk of defaulting on roughly $310 million in bonds for Chukchansi Gold Resort & Casino near Coarsegold.

Ayala's group blamed Lewis and his faction for the delay in bond payments. Under Ayala's leadership, the tribe figured out a plan to make bond payments, but members still fight over who's in charge.
In April, the Ayala faction filed a complaint in U.S. District Court in Fresno, asking the court to recognize it as the rightful leaders. Federal Judge Michael J. Seng is mulling over the issue.

That same month, the BIA got involved when Reid submitted grant proposals on behalf of the tribe. In a May 17 letter to Reid, the BIA informed him that his faction does not represent the tribe's governing council.

In the letter, the BIA ruled that the Dec. 1 election was valid and said the governing body "authorized to
conduct government to government with the BIA" comprises: Ayala, chair; Lewis, vice chair; Tracy
Brechbuehl, secretary; Karen Wynn, treasurer; and members-at-large Chance Alberta, Charles Sargosa
and Carl "Buzz" Bushman.

Because Ayala's supporters include Brechbuehl, Wynn and Sargosa, she has a four-vote majority to run
the tribe, she contends. Alberta and Bushman support Lewis.

Monday, Reid said he has filed an appeal to the BIA ruling. He also said he is seeking legal standing in the tribe's federal case.

"We are still key players," said Reid, who has been involved in tribal leadership — and upheavals — since the 1990s when the Chukchansi casino was first planned. It opened in June 2003.

OP/ED: Saginaw Chippewa Council Cuts of Killers and Other Felons from Per Capita; Pechanga Tribe Gives them Credibility

2013-06-09T16:04:00.001-07:00

The MORNING SUN has an editorial on Saginaw's decision to cut of per capita from their tribal felons.

We wrote about how Pechanga celebrates their child molesting felon:

http://www.originalpechanga.com/2010/03/pechanga-tribal-council-honors-man-who.html and they have more than their share of felons on their per capita list.

Kudos to the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribal Council for its move to cut off killers, kidnappers, rapists and other felons from per-capita payments.

Most people off the reservation don’t understand the concept of per-cap, but it’s not hard. The Tribe is analogous to a huge, extended family. That family is in business.

The business enterprises – the casinos, the hotels, the restaurants, golf course, water park, real estate – could be considered family businesses. It’s obviously more complex than that, but that’s the basic principle. Per cap is a way for the Tribe to distribute the profits of Tribal business enterprises to the people who own them – the Tribal members.

Just like any other family, there are bad actors. A few Tribal members have committed horrible crimes. The federal court in Bay City and the Tribal court in Mt. Pleasant are far too busy.

No family has an obligation to support brothers, sisters or cousins who turn their backs on what’s right, who do evil things.

Likewise, the Tribe has no obligation to support evildoers.

Is a Casino at JAMUL INDIAN VILLAGE good for a neighborhood? Not Where the BEAT homeowners to EVICT THEM...

2013-06-08T16:12:00.003-07:00

Well, maybe not at a reservation where they had to BEAT homeowners to EVICT THEM.

The Jamul Indians and a developer plan to build a casino on a four and a half acre plot of land in Jamul.

The Jamul Indians are one step closer to fulfilling their rags to slot-machine riches dreams.

When the tribe signed an agreement in April with an East Coast developer, Penn National Gaming, to build and run a $360 million vintage Hollywood-themed casino, it settled on a more modest plan than before — no skyrise hotel, for one — but still grand enough to assure their economic prosperity, the tribe’s members say.

Residents of Jamul, a village about 20 miles east of San Diego, said putting a casino in their quiet community makes about as much sense as plopping a farm into the middle of the Las Vegas Strip.

“Keep it rural,” implored Marcia Spurgeon, an anti-casino activist, real estate agent and longtime Jamul resident, during an interview at her office on Jamul’s main road.

“We met halfway. We downsized,” countered Robert Mesa, a tribal spokesman and council member.

At a community meeting Wednesday night at a Jamul school auditorium, residents asked Penn to reconsider and warned they would not give up without a battle.

“We’ve been fighting this thing for over 20 years and I guarantee you you’re not gonna have a chance. We’re gonna fight this thing like the Jamul Alamo,” said Gary Clasen, to applause.

Read the rest of the article HERE

Representatives from Penn said the project will bring local jobs and amended casino plans address safety and quality of life concerns.

This type of back and forth has a familiar ring in East County, where the battle over the development of other casinos has often played out like this: A tribe announces a plan to build or expand a casino, neighbors object, the tribe makes concessions and some version of that casino gets built. That’s what happened with Barona, Sycuan and Viejas.

People with a stake on either side have a long list of benefits or drawbacks to cite, from employment to environmental damage. County Supervisor Dianne Jacob, who is against the Jamul development, addressed the positive and negative impacts of the county’s casinos in an email:

“While tribal casinos loom as giant figures on the local economic scene, they also take a daily toll on many of our smallest communities. They provide needed jobs and entertainment and the tribes play a major philanthropic role across the region,” Jacob wrote. “But the casinos have also brought big-city problems to rural areas, tying up roads with heavy traffic and straining public resources.”

If a casino does come to Jamul under the current proposal, what might its neighbors expect? A look around East County reveals that once the other casinos’ lights pierced the night sky and the dust settled, some original concerns of the neighbors were validated and some unexpected benefits emerged.

Concerns about crime

Does building a casino lead to a thriving criminal underworld in the neighborhood around it? And are neighborhood crimes a result of casino activity or other factors?

A 2006 publication by the California Research Bureau cites a study that found casinos increased crime after a few years: “Prior to the opening of a casino, casino and noncasino counties had similar crime rates, but after six years, casino counties had eight percent more property crimes and ten percent more violent crimes than noncasino counties.”

Jeffrey Vandersip, a senior crime analyst with the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department, said that for all types of crimes, the county’s casinos fared no worse than other populated areas in the county, according to 2012 crime statistics. “We saw a slight (crime) increase, not as large an increase as what the entire county experienced as a whole. It really kind of fell in line with what the rest of the county experienced,” Vandersip said.

Common offenses at casinos are drug and alcohol violations, he said. “When you have a densely populated area (and) lots of people congregating at the same place at the same time, certain types of crimes are more popular.”

Repost: Pechanga's Masiel Crime Family is Four Generations Long; Are they really Pechanga? Now, ONE LESS Plotter....

2013-06-07T16:08:00.000-07:00

I've had numerous requests to run this post again, since the issue of the crime family has come up again, now that one of the elders of this family has succumbed to lung cancer.

There was also the question: Are Masiel-Basquez TRUE PECHANGA PEOPLE? Read the link to learn more

Update from Pechanga protest: Leiva family members, better known as the Masiel Basquez crime family were harassing protesters at Pechanga resort and Casinp. Felon Raymond Basquez Jr. One of the more stupid members of the family was one and Yolie "they are just herbs" McCarter was another. They had no effect

I've had requests to move this up again, so here it is.

The Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians has a crime family that spans GENERATIONS.

It's well known that the young, thuggish generation of the Masiel-Basquez crime family are violent offenders, which we reported on HERE and HERE the next older generation of criminals HERE and HERE and HERE and NOW WE KNOW where they get it from:

Francisca Leivas Basquez

As shown below there are two pieces of evidence that show the Matriach of the Basquez family, Francisca Leyva (Leivas) tried to defraud the government and gain of three per capita checks when only one was legal. Fraud, such as her family then perpetrated on the Pechanga Band.

Sins of the mother, passed on to her progeny.

How can the Pechanga Members continue to support them? How much theft has to happen?

OriginsofMasielcrimefamily

Irehne Basquez Scearce, One of the Architects of Pechanga's Disenrollments is DEAD. May GOD FORGIVE HER For the Harm She has Caused.

2013-06-07T13:57:00.000-07:00

Irehne Scearse, sister of Raymond Basquez Sr, and one of the elders of the Masiel-Basquez Crime Family of the Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians has died. She will have a wake on the reservation June 7th, and funeral on June 8th. May GOD forgive her

In the flyer for her passing, there was a note, possibly directed at her youthful family members: NO DRUGS OR ALCHOHOL. It's a shame that they would still have to point this out in writing, in order to maintain decorum.

To the detriment of HUNDREDS, Irehne, her sister Ruth Masiel conspired with the CPP and were two of the votes to terminate the Manuela Miranda descendents, claiming that as a FIVE YEAR OLD, Manuela Miranda cut her tribal ties by moving with a sister of the rez. Scearce avoided using her own hired expert's findings that Paulina Hunter was indeed Pechanga, instead using a letter from an imprisoned child molester and forced out the second family in 2006.

Light a candle at your Church that this woman who has abused elders and backstabbed friends may find peace.

Irehne Basquez Scearce

Disenrollment is TRIBAL TERRORISM. Does That make Tribal Councils TERRORISTS? HEY NSA, there are TERRORISTS on our REZ.

2013-06-07T05:28:00.004-07:00

I admit to overusing terrorism in the title because I figure the NSA will check in on it, since they are getting all our posts and emails.

Here's a repost of the subject.

Tribal membership is about heritage. It's the corrupt tribal council of Chukchansi, along with those from the Pechanga tribe of Temecula, and Redding that are tossing aside the history of their tribes with a dismissive attitude that should be alarming to the people of California. Pechanga ran ads for expanding gaming, claiming 10,000 years of history; yet quickly shed two families with more historical ties to the land, proven by the tribe's own expert, than one of their sitting council members who has no Pechanga blood.

Tribal governments are using sovereignty as a weapon to beat the weak and helpless, and terrorize them into submission. Our federal and state governments are happy to stay out of the issue by saying that membership is a tribal matter. Fair enough, but what about the government's trust responsibility to Indians to see that tribal constitutions are followed?

Good governance requires fair legal frameworks that are enforced impartially. It also requires full protection of human rights. Impartial enforcement of laws requires an independent judiciary and an impartial and incorruptible police force. That simply is not what is happening on tribal reservations. On reservations across our state tribes are using fear tactics and yes, terrorism, to keep members in line for fear of losing their land, homes, per capita shares and health benefits. More critical is that they also lose their rights to choose a representative government and to vote on issues that pertain to them. Imagine if the Republicans were able to eliminate 25% of the Democratic vote?

Currently at Pechanga, the tribal council is threatening allottees with fines, banishment and restricted access to their property. One family is taking it upon themselves to try to force another family who was given an allotment with the creation of the reservation, off their land. They're using their family members on the council to issue the threatening letter that is published on Original Pechanga's Blog. This is not what we voted for when we approved gaming to tribes in our state. This was not what was meant by self-reliance. I urge the readers to stand up for civil and human rights.

Bill Cosby stood up and refused to perform at Chukchansi because of these issues. By telling tribes you won't go to their casinos, you can nudge them into acting justly. Don't let tribes get away with terrorizing their own people into silence.

I would advise people to consider not supporting casinos owned by tribes that abuse their people.

Pechanga Tribal Theft Reaches $450 MILLION. Led By Mark Macarro, Pechanga Tribal Council Failed to Uphold Tribal Constitution.

2013-06-06T05:00:00.000-07:00

From the Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians in Temecula CA here is the breakdown of the theft of per capita by the Mark Macarro led tribal council:

The Hunter family has lost $1,920,666 per person, in per capita payments alone. We arrived at that figure by taking the last full year of per capita $268,000/12 months and multiplying that loss times 86 months of disenrollment. 95 adults at the time of disenrollment equals: $182,463,000

The Apis/Manuela Miranda family was disenrolled two years prior in 2004, our previous posts mistakenly put their disenrollment in 2005. The per capita was slightly less, about $17,000 per month times 94 months of termination: $1,870,000 times 135 adults equals: $252,450,000

Moratorium People NEVER shared in what was rightfully theirs. The per capita went up to $360,000 per year for those remaining after elimination of tribal citizens. Yet still, thug members were involved in drugs, shootings and carjacks.

Pechanga Theft of $454 MILION Includes additional $19.4 Million in Health Insurance, which would qualify under Obamacare as a "caddillac plan". Per capita losses are $200,000 PER DAY.

These totals do not include lost education assistance nor does it account for family members that attained the age of majority.

Learn More on Disenrollment, Ethnic Cleansing in Indian Gaming Country at these Links:
Gaming Revenue Blamed for Disenrollment
disenrollment is paper Genocide
CA Tribal Cleansing
Tribal terrorism
TRIBAL TERRORISM includes Banishment

North Fork Rancheria Plans Spurs Fight. Corrupt Tribes Like Picayune Rancheria and Pechanga OPPOSE Another Tribe Getting Casino

2013-06-05T10:56:00.000-07:00

When California voters approved Las Vegas-style gambling in 1998, proponents said it would be limited to places already recognized as Indian lands.

But a rare ruling from the Obama administration and a deal approved by Gov. Jerry Brown would allow one tribe to build a casino on a 300-acre property once slated to be a NASCAR racetrack in the Central Valley town of Madera. The prospect has divided Indian tribes and touched off an intense fight in the Capitol.

Members of the tribe, the North Fork Rancheria of Mono Indians, have not lived on the Madera land for generations. But if the group is successful, it could help reshape the future of tribal gambling in California, opening the way for new casinos up and down the state — and closer to urban centers — according to critics of the gambling industry and other opponents of the deal.

LA TIMES on North Fork Casino Plans

Susan Bradford: Saginaw Chippewa Still Want Their Congressional Investigation

2013-06-05T08:30:00.002-07:00

Where’s Our Congressional Investigation, Saginaw Chippewa Indians Ask

Within the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe of Michigan, a former client of former Republican superlobbyist Jack Abramoff, tribal members are asking why Congress has not acted on their request for an investigation into the fraudulent takeover of their tribe by fictitious Indians from Flint, the birthplace of General Motors, which has extensive reach and financial stake among the tribes.

“The (fictitious Indians) put all their families on the rolls, when, of course, they we illegitimate members to begin with,” tribal sources said. “There are a lot of un-Chippewa people over here, walking in shame. Everyone knows this!!!”

After Chief Dennis Kequom assumed power of the tribe in 2010, he promised tribal members that he would appeal to Congress for an investigation into the usurpation in 1986 when their constitutional was fraudulently revised to shore up power for the illegitimate interlopers, allowing them to control the tribe’s wealth and growing businesses while adding ever new waves of fictitious Indians onto the tribal membership rolls.

According to inside sources, Kequom requested that the tribe’s attorney, Scott Reed, write the letter to Congressman Doc Hastings requesting an investigation. The tribe’s lobbyist, Larry Rosenthal of Ietan Consulting was overheard telling a Tribal Council Member that he would block the investigation. Rosenthal’s mentor, retired Congressman Dale Kildee from Flint, was a key player in the takeover of the tribe and constitutional revision,

“We don’t have sovereignty over here,” inside sources said. “Larry Rosenthal keeps threatening Tribal Council with that they will destroy our sovereignty if they do the Congressional investigation.”
While Tribal Council Minutes report that the tribe’s duly elected leaders voted for the investigation, Hastings seemingly never responded. Tribal insiders report that Rosenthal succeeded at blocking the investigation by not delivering the letter to Congress. According to the House Ethics Office, if the allegations are true, Rosenthal did not breach formal congressional ethics statutes but may have flown afoul of his contractual and professional obligation to the tribe.

So far Hastings’ office has not commented on whether the Congressman received the letter or not, citing that the matter is under investigation.

Tribal members, who are keen to remove the fictitious Indians and restore legitimacy to their tribe, also took it upon themselves to compile a book of evidence along with a letter requesting a congressional investigation, but have yet to receive a response to their personal efforts.

Among the leaders contacted, they said, were: Hastings; Rep. Nick Rahall; Sen. Byron Dorgan, who has since entered private practice to work in government affairs ; Sen. John Barrasso; Jerry Gridner, the Director of Indian Affairs at the Department of Interior; Sen. Carl Levin; Sen. Debbie Stabenow; and Rep. David Camp.

“David Camp knows everything that took place over here on the Mt. Pleasant, Indian reservation back in the 70′s and early 80′s,” tribal sources said. “David Camp, Carl Levin, Don Albosta, Bill Schuttee, Don Riegle all from Michigan, knew what the Tribal Council was up to. They also knew that Tribal Council was counterfeit and illegitimate and crooked. These congressmen too were soooooo crooked they could not see straight. (Tribal attorneys) Thomas Wilson and Karl Funke, were quite crooked too… The Congressmen should help us out, they made this mess.”

David Wilkins on Path Forward for Disenrollees and the Federal Government. South Africa was a Sovereign Nation Too, Congresspeople

2013-06-04T14:48:00.004-07:00

Professor Wilkins writes on Disenrollment and Sovereign tribes. A reminder that SOUTH AFRICA was a sovereign nation too.

Disenrollment, a seemingly innocuous term when used outside Indian country, has become a loaded word that rivals, if it does not surpass, “termination” as a concept that invokes fear and trembling in those natives who suffer its consequences. While the federal policy of termination in the 1950s was the formal repudiation of numerous Native nations’ recognition and benefits and constituted an abrupt cessation of the trust relationship; tribes that have instituted disenrollments effectively repudiate an individual tribal citizen’s recognition and benefits and crush the nation’s trust relationship with that person.

Federal termination of Native nations was the intentional destruction of the political and economic identity of an indigenous people; tribal termination via disenrollment of bonafide native individuals is the purposeful destruction of the political and economic identity of a tribal citizen.

Tribal governments justify disenrollments on several grounds: fraud, documentary errors, insufficient blood quantum, and criminal activity are frequently cited reasons. Disenrollees, on the other hand, often assert that their tribes’ official rationales are mere pretenses that conceal the real motivation for disenrollment—the casting out of members who challenge tribal political figures who appear intent on expanding their own economic and political empires.

Learn More on Disenrollment, Ethnic Cleansing in Indian Gaming Country at these Links:

Gaming Revenue Blamed for Disenrollment
disenrollment is paper Genocide
CA Tribal Cleansing
Tribal terrorism
TRIBAL TERRORISM includes Banishment
Nooksack Disenrollment

Disenrollees are deprived of explicit political and economic benefits and lose their legal status as tribally and federally recognized citizens. Culturally, of course, they remain imbued with the core values, beliefs, and knowledge associated with being an indigenous citizen, even if their ability to exercise cultural sovereignty is denied them on tribal lands.

Disenrollment is expanding throughout Native America, with Native nations in at least seventeen states engaging in the practice. Precise numbers are nearly impossible to track down since the nations carrying out the practice are loathe to reveal their numbers,(OP: 75% of the Chukchansi Tribe, 25% at Pechanga and Redding Rancheria) and the Bureau of Indian Affairs will not divulge the data, asserting that it is an internal matter left to each native community.

Evidence of the spread of the disenrollment virus can be found in a spate of recent federal and court rulings. In the first, involving the Cahto Tribe of Laytonville Rancheria Rancheria, the federal court found that the Bureau of Indian Affairs had no authority to review appeals from the tribe’s disenrollment decision. Another federal court ruled that the Pala Band of Mission Indians’ sovereign immunity shielded the tribe’s officials from suit by twenty-seven disenrollees. And last week, the Nooksack Tribal Court in Washington State held that the Tribal Council could move forward on its decision to disenroll 306 tribal members--roughly 15 percent of the nation’s 2000 member population.

Imagine, if you can, the U.S. Congress, the Supreme Court, or President Barack Obama acting to strip the citizenship (which fortunately is not an available penalty under any federal statute—states can’t do it either) of 15% of the nearly 300 million citizens in the United States—a reduction of approximately 45 million persons!

Every sovereign, of course, enjoys as one of its bevy of inherent powers the right to decide who is entitled to citizenship/membership in their nations or states. But true sovereignty fundamentally rests in the hearts and minds of “the people,” and not in the structures of governance or the individuals who have been temporarily elected or appointed to public office. Thus, an act that leads to the formal termination of one’s citizenship, should, if it must be carried out, fall upon the shoulders of all the citizens/members of a community and not a handful of tribal officials since such an act reflects the severance of an individual’s political and economic relationship to the entire nation and not just officialdom.

That said it seems clear that native disenrollments will continue unabated until and unless a more powerful countervailing force emerges at the national level--in the form of a congressional act or Supreme Court ruling--that might stymie the ever expanding number of tribal disenrollments.

In previous writings I have urged tribal officials to pause and reflect on the history, practice, and especially on the rationales they have been invoking to justify these dismemberments, since such draconian measures were rarely carried out historically among native peoples because our ancestors emphasized healing and restorative justice as a way to restore balance and community harmony.

Enter Vine Deloria, Jr. Deloria was one of our gifted philosophers and he produced many works like The World We Used to Live In that improved the lot of Native nations. He was a powerful advocate of native self-determination (individual and collective), but he also believed that governments and governing officials--indigenous and non-indigenous--needed to act with integrity, be accountable, and focus on maturity in all their actions and policies.

In an article in 2001 he urged readers to think imaginatively if we expected to make any real improvements in the conditions bedeviling our nations. He noted that “all things are possible but people have to think beyond the confines of where their minds are at the present time …” in order to change conditions for the better.

His comment along with conversations with several good friends, and given the current political landscape in which several thousand bonafide native individuals who have been disenrolled face a dire situation in which there are currently no effective avenues available to them to secure any semblance of justice, prompted me to consider some alternative organizational arrangements.

But two options may be available to native disenrollees who seek to restore, at the very least, their federally-recognized status as natives, if not their tribally-derived citizenship. A provision in the Indian Reorganization Act (IRA) of 1934 provides the first potential route. Section 19 of the act provided three definitions of the term “Indian.” First, it included “all persons of Indian descent who are members of any recognized Indian tribe now under Federal jurisdiction.”

Second, it applied to all individuals who were “descendents” of those members who, as of June 1, 1934, resided within a given reservation’s borders. And third, and of a special importance for our purposes, the term included “all other persons of one-half or more Indian blood.”

While the IRA has been amended several times since 1934, the definition of “Indian” has not changed appreciably. In Title 25 of the Code of Federal Regulations (2011 ed.), the term “Indian” is defined in two ways: “all persons who are members of those tribes listed or eligible to be listed … as recognized by and receiving services from the BIA … and “any person not a member of one of the listed tribes … who possess at least one-half degree of Indian blood” (25 CFR 81.1 (i)).

I am familiar with the one-half blood category because some of my own people, the Lumbee, who were not formally recognized by the U.S. as a nation in 1934, did apply for individual federal recognition under this provision and, after many years, eventually compelled the BIA to recognize them in the 1970s. They received some financial benefits as a result.

Current disenrollees who believe they meet the scientifically and politically problematic one-half blood quantum threshold, might consider invoking this provision as a way of forcing the Department of the Interior and the BIA to meet their political and economic, if not their cultural needs. Such a challenge might also allow an assault on the very notion of “blood quantum” itself—a phrase of dubious scientific and social credibility.

The second process that might prove useful also stems from the IRA period. The IRA did not initially apply to most Native nations in Oklahoma. But tribal complaints led Congress to enact a law two years later, the Oklahoma Indian Welfare Act (OIWA), which extended the principles of the act to the native peoples in Oklahoma, if they voted for it. The act allowed recognized tribal nations or bands to organize and to adopt constitutions and bylaws if they so desired.

Article 4 of the OIWA laid out an organizational path that a group of Native disenrollees might be able to follow to meet their needs and provide for a restoration of federal services and benefits. It declares that ten or more Indians “who reside within the state of Oklahoma in convenient proximity to each other may receive from the Secretary of the Interior a charter as a local cooperative association for any one or more of the following purposes: Credit administration, production, marketing, consumers’ protection, or land management.”

By organizing thus, a culturally and politically-related group of disenrollees, living in “convenient proximity,” of course, would be able to avoid the rigorous and highly politicized federal acknowledgment process since they would not be pursuing recognition as a “tribe,” but would instead be asserting their right to organize as an economic or political entity in order to receive needed benefits and rights.

Neither path is ideal, but until and unless native governing officials return to the values that once precluded such egregious violations of their citizens’ own identities, and until and unless Congress or the courts step in and provide a fair process that disenrollees can participate in to have their grievances heard, it behooves the disenrollees, the Department of the Interior, and the federal government to consider alternative arrangements to support the inherent civil rights of these put upon individuals.

GABRIELENOS Seem What Many Say is IMPOSSIBLE: Recogntions from the U.S. Government

2013-06-04T09:25:00.004-07:00

The Native American culture of Andy Salas' ancestors dominated the San Gabriel Valley long before Junipero Serra set foot in California, but to the U.S. government, Salas' tribe, the Gabrieleno, doesn't exist.

Andy's father, Ernie, 82, has been trying for much of his life to make the government acknowledge his tribal identity, culture and history. He's had little success and recently told his son he is too tired to fight anymore.

But Andy Salas said he's not going to let his father's dreams of recognition be crushed by a federal government that came on the scene long after the Gabrielenos.

"My dad is depressed, he told me I don't want anything to do with that," Andy Salas said through tears. "He said, 'No, you don't understand, I tried half of my life to get this right and these guys did me dirty.' That's why I do what I do today, because of him."

Five years ago, Salas decided to take action to ensure that his father could see the day his tribe, the Kizh Nation of the Gabrieleno Band of Mission Indians, is officially recognized. He has spent years gathering the necessary documents and criteria to apply for acknowledgement from the federal government, and in 2010 he submitted a fresh petition on behalf of the tribe of about 500 people he heads in San Gabriel.

And Salas is far from alone in his quest; the Kizh-Gabrieleno are among 79 tribal groups that have submitted petitions to the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Office of Federal Acknowledgement - and most of them are still waiting.

"We are known as refugees in our own land," Ernie Salas said.

Read the FULL ARTICLE HERE

Remember When Mark Macarro, Thief of Pechanga Heritage, Threatened Allottees with Expulsion via their Apartheid System?

2013-06-03T17:20:00.000-07:00

We have written before on the APARTHEID system in force at Pechanga at Pechanga.

APARTHEID as described by the dictionary is:
a•part•heid
2. any system or practice that separates people according to race, caste, etc.

Pechanga is doing just that, determining that families with historical ties to the origins of the reservation are ‘no longer pure’ in their eyes. They may be Temecula Indian, but “they aren’t Pechanga.” Even though the expert hired BY Pechanga proved that we were

Here is what Pechanga members who have been stripped of their citizenship in the tribe have lost:

Pechanga now has a group living on the reservation that have:

• Lost the right to vote
• Lost their rights to healthcare provided by the government.
• Their children can no longer attend tribal schools
• They can no longer be buried in the reservation cemetery with their relatives.
• Have no access to tribal health center
• Are not protected by the Tribal Rangers. Or in some cases FROM the tribal Rangers

Here is a copy of the letter that was presented to those people living on the reservation who are called "non-members" even though most are living on land that was given to their ancestor when the reservation began, roughly 90 years before council member Russell "Butch" Murphy was adopted into the tribe.

Threatening letter by Pechanga Chairman Mark Macarro and the Tribal Council including Adopted Member Russell "Butch" Murphy Click on photo to enlarge

The threat is very clear: Fine of $5,000 and exclusion from their own property. THAT is APARTHEID, pure and simple. The tribe is trying to force residents who own property OFF the reservation. Remember when they tried to Steal allottee’s water rights?

Mark Macarro, have you NO shame