Back to Accountability

I continue to hear the words “ethics” and “accountability” come up in conversation whether it be a private discussion or in a public forum. It is obvious that Tribal Members find these issues to be a very serious matter. It was recently pointed out to me that there is a Tribal Ethical Standards Ordinance of which I obtained a copy and read thoroughly. It states the following on page two of the ordinance:

The Tribal membership judges its government by the way Tribal Officials conduct themselves in the positions to which they are elected or appointed.

Tribal members have a right to expect that every Tribal Official will conduct himself or herself in a manner that will tend to preserve public confidence in and respect for the Tribal government.

Such confidence and respect can best be promoted if every Tribal Official, whether paid or unpaid, and whether elected or appointed, will uniformly: (i) treat both Tribal members and members of the non-Tribal public with courtesy; (ii) carry out the duties of their position with impartiality, fairness and equality under the law; (iii) avoid both actual and potential conflicts between their private self-interest and the public interest.

There are then two full pages of “Standards of Conduct” followed by two full pages of procedures that a complainant would have to follow in order to file a complaint. What I find interesting is that the complaint would be given to the Tribal Council Secretary, the Tribal Council Chairperson and the Legal Team. After that point, it would be determined whether or not there is any validity to the complaint and if there is, a hearing would then be pursued. It seems to me that it would be a conflict of interest to have a team of people that report directly to the Tribal Council investigate the complaint and be in charge of whether or not the complaint should be taken to the next step. If the Legal Team decided to take it to the next step, their findings would then be turned over to Tribal Council where they would then vote on an “appropriate” sanction for the guilty person(s). It appears that there are too many holes in the system we now have in place.

I do believe there are some possible solutions to this broken ordinance however I don’t feel like there are any “short-term” solutions. I feel like the processes need to be simplified and the conflicts of interest need to be removed. And there is only one group of people that can make that happen. Until this ordinance is fixed, we all need to vote in who we believe to be the most ethical choices for Tribal Council.