At the beginning of the year, Tribal Council decided to begin ongoing discussions in three areas of great concern. The meetings are to be had on Fridays and the areas of concern were identified as enrollment, health care and economic development.
On Friday, April 2, we had our enrollment discussion. The fact that enrollment is a burning issue within our tribe was clear by the number of concerned tribal members in attendance. These meetings are open to the public and it seems that there are consistently tribal members who show up for the enrollment discussions. I am happy that they come and I feel it sends a clear message to the members of Tribal Council.
During the most recent enrollment discussion (April 2, 2010), the phrase "born to a parent who was a member of the tribe at the time of the applicant's birth" continued to rise to the surface as an area of concern. Every Tribal Council member in attendance agreed that this particular language was concerning and wanted to see a constitutional amendment to omit that phrase. I recommended to have an "Authorization to Proceed" (ATP) drafted by our Legal Department so we could get a resolution approved and sent to the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) for a vote by the membership to omit this unfair criteria. To pass an election for a constitutional amendment, it would require 2/3 of the registered voting membership to vote in approval of the amendment. Basically, before the election was held, everyone that wished to participate in the vote would be required to register. Of those registered, 30% would have to actually vote and 2/3 of those individuals would have to vote in favor of the amendment.
There was argument by the part of some council members. Their argument was that if we move forward with a constitutional amendment, we should amend all of the unjust criteria and not focus on one particular area. I completely understand this way of thinking and in a perfect world, I would support this 100%. However, my biggest fear is that Tribal Council will not come to an agreement on how to achieve this. I feel like there are areas of the enrollment requirements that members of Tribal Council take different positions on and we all know how long these negotiations have taken in the past. I feel we have a rare opportunity to take immediate action and not only prove to the membership that we are committed to working on enrollment but help a large percentage of those who have been wrongfully denied or disenrolled. I, along with many, am tired of Tribal Council meeting on this issue and never taking any kind of action. I guess I felt that this was our chance to prove the urgency of this issue and to help as many people as we can while we continue our battle in the other areas of enrollment.
With that being said, if this ATP fails, I will support the decision of this Tribal Council. I will wholeheartedly participate in fixing the unjust enrollment criteria as a whole or support taking some sort of other immediate action. I will contribute by sharing my ideas and concerns and regardless of the direction we go, I refuse to let this become a dead issue or let my pride get in the way of what is right.
As of today (April 7, 2010), the ATP has received three "approve" votes, three "deny" votes and one individual abstained. Two council members have yet to vote.
Keep your fingers crossed and your hopes high.
Thank you for reading,
Toby
