Letters to the Editor

To The Editor,

Recently I attended the financial public meeting held at the tribal community building. Many surprising things were said by the auditors who spoke. Two auditors were present and the other spoke on the telephone from a loudspeaker. Our chief financial officer was also present.

Finally it has to be asked. How can this tribe have a casino resort which does not give out per-capita payments to all of our tribal members? Someone said that the tribal council uses the gaming earnings to fund the “heating fuel” allotments to community members. But is this really the total truth in this matter? If so, why are some Onkwehon:we households getting fuel money while others are not? Who determines who is a community member? Every tribal household located on the territory is getting the full amount of $800, while some of those in the land claim area are getting $400 (half). Then there are those that have or are renting households in close proximity of the Territory, most likely from no choice of their own, which are getting NONE.

If this is not a form of discrimination of our own people, then I don’t know what is. All tribal members get a vote at the ballot box, if they have a house address south of the imaginary line. Those living in Massena (the largest number) couldn’t live any closer to Hogansburg, without actually living here.

What is going to happen if there is a land claims settlement? Are all of those tribal members in Massena going to move to Brasher? That seems unlikely, just to get half allotments of heating assistance?

Everyone should know that the Tribe has a $50,000,000.00 (million) unsecured cash account. Yes, this was in the report from the recent audits and the meeting I attended. I know some say if we get per-capita payments then we would have to pay income tax…we always had to pay income taxes when we worked during and throughout our lives so why should this be a deterrent for getting per-capita payments? It would be interesting to know if some of these monies should rightfully be distributed to individual members of this community which would eliminate holding an unsecured cash account. Maybe now is the time to relieve this burden that some are so worried about.

By the way. The unsecured cash accounts means the bank would only cover losses to this account up to $250,000 per account…the banks would consider the rest of it as a tribal LOSS. This is in the case of an economic depression and or bank failures.

The tribal membership was greatly increased during the 1990’s. It seems that this was done to also increase the overall allotment the tribe receives from the outside governments, to cover all of these people’s needs. Maybe that is a question that also has to be asked. How many or how much benefits does the tribal council manage for EACH enrolled tribal member, multiplied by the entire enrollment? That map of the United States in the tribal building lobby has red numbers for each state it shows. Those are all the numbers of tribal members living in each state. Are they all being counted for these government benefits? That seems to be the case. Those people get almost nothing from here except the tribal newsletters and the ID cards. Too many people, including the tribal lawyers, who work for the tribal council are too quick to say no to legitimate requests by tribal members but they make sure that they get theirs first. That is unfair. The per capita payments can be made to happen if everyone wants them. If the tribal election candidates running for office do not want to support that idea, it would seem that they would not get elected. The tribal lawyers do not run for their positions and have too much influence on tribal member’s household budgets. Something is wrong here. We need fighters to go to bat for our needs, not just get in front of the tribal meetings and say we can’t do anything about it. That is so lame.

In Peace and Friendship,

Agnes Terrance