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Quota stymies Indian agency The Tennessean - Sunday, 10/15/00
Quota stymies Indian agency The state commission deliberating over who should be considered "Indian" in Tennessee has been immobilized for months because too few of its own members are Indian. This week, state legislators will decide whether the Commission of Indian Affairs should even survive in its present form. It is a tiny operation working on a $50,000 annual budget out of one room in the state's Department of Environment and Conservation office. Executive Director Toye Heape is the sole staffer. A former commissioner said she often paid out of her own pocket to help Native Americans who came to her for assistance. At a hearing before the state legislative Agriculture and Natural Resources subcommittee in August, residents disagreed over the commission's effectiveness. Some said it had been instrumental in dealing with burial ground preservation issues and in representing Native residents. Several others assailed the group for not fulfilling its purpose and getting little accomplished. Past the applause and accusations, however, is a commission trussed by fractions. State codes require that three of the five commissioners be at least one-fourth Indian. But there are two vacancies on the board, both of those requiring the Indian blood quota. Without a majority of the commission's "Indian" members present, no votes can be taken, no official decisions made. "We don't have that, so we're locked down," said the commission's acting chairman, Clayton Prest. His group became stymied in May when Commissioner Eddie Nickens' term ended and he moved out of the state. The other position had been open since early in 1999. In the governor's office, where one person works to fill board and commission slots, spokeswoman Alexia Levison said the Indian Affairs Commission seats had been particularly difficult to fill. The governor strives to find quality appointees, Levison said. In this case, she added, "we have the extra task of assuring their lineage." State Rep. Bill McAfee, R-Chattanooga, said Friday that he thought the governor was reluctant to fill the positions because there appeared to be considerable infighting within the Native American community and discontent about the commission's leadership. McAfee, the subcommittee chairman, is one of two officials pushing publicly to have the commission "sunset," which would force it into a yearlong phaseout beginning June 2001. "I'm going to propose that we let them go into wind-down," McAfee said Friday. "Hopefully, in that period of time they can reach agreement on a number of things, namely on how to get along with each other. I have no desire to put the board or commission out of business. I'm a strong supporter of Native Americans' rights in this country and the things they do ... I'm concerned about them not doing what they should be doing for the Native American people." Milton Hamilton, state commissioner of Environment and Conservation, whose department has included the commission's budget, also has recommended to legislators that the commission be sunset so it can take time to set its goals, push for its own budget and find its place in the state. A sunset hearing is held automatically every few years so lawmakers can review a commission's role and decide whether it should continue, said Kim Olson, the department's spokeswoman. At the last hearing, commission proponents said they saw even a temporary dissolution as a dangerous step. "If the commission were eliminated, Native Americans of this state would no longer have any formal representation working toward the advancement and preservation of our traditional cultural, spiritual and economic status," said Pat Cummins, president of the Alliance for Native American Indian Rights in Tennessee, in a letter to state legislators. "... If you do away with or abolish the commission, you are saying to us that we are not important enough to be heard." Even if it is spared, though, some things about the commission need to change, said former commissioner Judy Creek Reynolds of Memphis. Reynolds served several years on the commission, ending in early 1999, and said she was frustrated by the group's lack of funding and lack of focus. "It's hard to work on things without a budget of some kind," she said. "Also there needs to be goals." A social worker by profession, Reynolds said her region of the state needed a Native American community center where newly arrived Indians could meet people and get advice on getting around. More and more Native Americans are venturing off poorer reservations in the north and west and coming to Tennessee for jobs, she said. Some, she helps fill out job applications and tries to help them find work. A few she takes into her home until they find places of their own. The current commissioners get these types of requests and more. For the past two years they have held public hearings and worked to refashion the rules for who can be recognized as "Indian" in Tennessee. Heape directs newly arrived Indians to government and social services, and he single-handedly stakes out Native American burial sites when he gets calls saying there are people digging for artifacts or scavenging for arrowheads. Last year, the executive director did his own legal research and represented the commission in court against Tennessee Department of Transportation officials whose road construction project ran into a Native American burial site. On the commission's office answering machine. Heape's voice takes on an edge of pleading"Please keep in mind that Tennessee is a large state and we are a very small agency, so it could take some time for me to return your call." With the decision on the commission's future set for Thursday, members of various Native American organizations will hold a joint press conference tomorrow asking that the commission be allowed to continue. They are trying to show solidarity, said April Tramel of Nashville, although Tramel and others said they consider it unrealistic for McAfee to want a harmonious group. "Would he look at another ethnic group and say, 'We're not going to give you what you need because of your infighting?' ... I think he's placing expectations on a group of people that are unfair. If we could have that, we would have world peace." © Copyright 2000 The Tennessean
The Tennessean - Tuesday, 10/17/00
Native Americans cite offer to keep commission alive Native Americans from across the state said yesterday they have a proposal to keep the Tennessee Commission of Indian Affairs alive but want more time to review their suggestions with Indian groups and organizations. At a hearing to decide the commission's fate on Thursday, the group will ask for at least another 60 days to gather consensus, said Ruth Knight Allen, a former Indian Affairs commission member. Their request will go to the legislature's Agriculture and Natural Resources subcommittee, whose chairman said in August he wanted to see the state's Native Americans "get together and try to reach some sort of agreement among yourselves." Chairman Rep. Bill McAfee, R-Chattanooga, said last week he plans to recommend that the commission be phased out temporarily "unless something unforeseen happens." There has been too much infighting in the community, he said. Some Native American residents and proponents of the commission say it is a lack of commissioners, not internal disagreements, which have stymied the group. Of the five commission seats, three must be filled with people who are at least one-quarter Indian. But two of the five seats are open, both of those vacated by people who had the blood quantum. Without those seats occupied, the commission cannot make any official decisions. At a press conference on the steps of the War Memorial Plaza at noon yesterday, 16 people representing a half-dozen Native American organizations said they feared a temporary "sunset" of the commission would stretch into a permanent moratorium. "It would be the death of the voice of Native Americans in Tennessee," said Shelley Allen, a Memphis resident of Cherokee, Choctaw and Sisseton descent. "It would be a final treaty broken by the state of Tennessee as far as I'm concerned." © Copyright 2000 The Tennessean |