Sorted by date Results 1001 - 1025 of 1085
HELENA, MT—Native women advocates in the United States are praising lawmakers for passage of an inclusive, bipartisan Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act that would afford protection to all women and victims of domestic violence. The bipartisan bill, S. 47, passed by the Senate in February 2013 and now by the House, 286 to 138, includes critical provisions to restore and strengthen tribal authority to protect Native women from violence in Indian Country. The hard-fought passage comes over 500 days after VAWA expired a...
PINE RIDGE, SD—Nearly fifteen years ago (in August of 1998), Bruce BonFleur and his wife Marsha came to live among and serve God’s beloved Oglala Lakota Sioux people on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. The Pine Ridge Indian Reservation is an Oglala Lakota Native American reservation located in the U.S. state of South Dakota. Drugs, gangs, alcohol, violence, sickness, disease, suicide, and demons corrupt this tiny community that has seen so much since the massacre of the nea...
VANCOUVER, BC—According to new unpublished research about Residential Schools in Canada, some 3,000 students died while attending boarding schools run for First Nations children. “These are actual confirmed numbers,” Alex Maass, research manager with the Missing Children Project, told The Canadian Press. “All of them have primary documentation that indicates that there’s been a death, when it occurred, what the circumstances were.” Disease was the biggest killer of students at...
For special meals like those on birthdays and Christmas, members of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians include hominy on the menu—but hominy, essentially dried corn kernels, is expensive to purchase. That’s why USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service is working to help the tribe grow and harvest hickory king corn and other heirloom white varieties and process them to make hominy. Hominy is a traditional food for Native Americans during the winter. To help resto...
WASHINGTON, DC—President Barack Obama will nominate Sally Jewell, the chief executive officer of Recreational Equipment Inc., to run the Interior Department, according to news reports. Jewell led REI in 2000. She also has 19 years of commercial banking experience and has worked for Mobil Oil Corporation in Oklahoma and Colorado. Jewell currently serves as a regent for the University of Washington. She was nominated twice to the post by tribal-friendly governors but o...
PRIOR LAKE, MN—A 15-week experiential, intensive beekeeping course will be offered this spring and summer by staff from Wozupi, the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community’s organic garden, orchard, honey, maple syrup, and organic egg producing enterprise. Open to the public, this course will be held Saturdays from 10:00 a.m. to noon from April through October. The course will cover all phases of beekeeping, including extracting and bottling honey. The course is designed for tho...
WOUNDED KNEE, SD—Just recently, flyers were distributed across the Pine Ridge Reservation asking the residents to honor the “Liberation of Wounded Knee in February of 1973.” Those who would celebrate and hand out flyers have a delusional recollection of the past. Wounded Knee was a small village on the Pine Ridge Reservation. There were homes where approximately 35 families dwelled and there was a so-called Trading Post which was the only grocery store for miles to serve the r...
Throughout the autumn and winter of 1812-13 the residents of Akwesasne were being drawn into the war between Britain and the US. Since the controversial Seven Nations of Canada treaty of 1796 there had been restrictions on the movement of the Native people living on the “reservation” but the international border had not yet become internally divisive. Both English and American authorities recognized the importance of the St. Lawrence River as vital to the movement of tro...
PHOENIX, AZ—“Picture this!” It’s a fitting name for a fascinating visual tale as well as a new Heard Museum exhibit of weavings that tell stories, Picture This! Navajo Pictorial Textiles, which opened Saturday, February 16 and will be on display through September 2, 2013. The exhibit’s weavings tell stories that date to when dinosaurs were on Earth, even though the oldest of those to be displayed were created in the 19th century, according to Dr. Ann Marshall, the museum’s...
RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL—A group of Indian activists in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, is being threatened with eviction in order to make way for the 2016 Summer Olympics. The group consists of representatives of various tribes in Brazil. They have been living at the site of an abandoned Indian museum for years, the Associated Press reported. Police surrounded the site over the weekend. But they apparently did not have an eviction order and eventually left the scene. The government says it needs the site to build a new stadium for t...
Del Laverdure, a member of the Crow Tribe, is joining the Indian law and policy practice at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld. Laverdure has spent the last three-and-a-half years in leadership roles at the Bureau of Indian Affairs. He’ll be bringing his management and policy expertise to his new job, where he will serve as a strategic advisor and will help tribes with tax, infrastructure, natural resource and other issues. “Akin Gump has a strong and growing American Indian law...
Red Cloud Mahpíya Lúta (1822-December 10, 1909) was a chief of the Oglala Lakota. He led as a chief from 1868 to 1909. One of the most capable Native American leaders the United States Army ever faced, he led a successful campaign in 1866-1868 known as Red Cloud’s War over control of the Powder River Country in northeastern Wyoming and southern Montana. Red Cloud was renowned as a warrior and highly respected as a leader. He is quoted as saying: “I am poor and naked, but I am...
Many of us are in the crowd that annually makes resolutions and keeps them for a day or two. What are these noble intentions about? Most of them deal with losing weight, getting more exercise, having a better diet, giving up tobacco in any form, quit drugs and gambling. Being grossly overweight is one of the big problems in our nation. It may bring on diabetes, heart problems, difficulty in breathing, ability to get around is hindered, high blood pressure becomes dangerous...
WASHINGTON, DC—A bill that will allow tribes to request disaster declarations directly from the federal government is headed to President Barack Obama for his signature. Under the Stafford Act, only states can request declarations. The new bill, H.R.152, amends the law to recognize tribal sovereignty. “For more than a decade Indian tribes have sought a direct line to the Federal government in order to expedite aid during an emergency or major disaster,” said Rep. Nick Rahal...
RAPID CITY, SD—Bryan Brewer, the new leader of the Oglala Sioux Tribe of South Dakota, returned to work January 16 after suffering injuries in a one-vehicle accident. Brewer sustained several significant injuries including a broken pelvis and several broken ribs in the December 29, 2012, accident. He spent two weeks recovering in a hospital. Brewer was elected last November. He was sworn into office on December 7....
WASHINGTON, DC—Tribal and Native groups from across the country marched with the U.S. president for his second inaugural parade on January 21, 2013. This year’s participants include the Navajo Nation Band, a 55-member delegation representing North Dakota’s tribes, the Native American Women Warriors from Colorado, the Wind River Dancers from Wyoming, the Utuqqagmiut Dancers from Alaska and the Kamehameha Schools Warrior Marching Band from Hawaii. “The talented groups chosen to participate in the Inaugural Parade reflect...
WASHINGTON, DC—Robert Odawi Porter has joined SNR Denton’s Washington, DC, office as a senior counsel in the Native American Law and Policy practice and the Public Policy and Regulation practice. He joins the firm following the completion of his term as the 67th President of the Seneca Nation of Indians. A citizen (Heron Clan) of the Seneca Nation of Indians, Porter has held various positions with the Nation throughout his career, including as its chief legal counsel in the...
ANDAMAN ISLANDS, INDIA—India’s Supreme Court reportedly reversed its previous ‘interim order’ to ban ‘human safaris’ in the Andaman on March 5, 2013, dealing a major blow to the campaign against the controversial tours. Before the interim order, hundreds of tourists traveled along the illegal Andaman Trunk Road every day in the hope of seeing the isolated Jarawa tribe. Tourists used to throw biscuits or force Jarawa women to dance for food. The January order had reduced the...
President Barack Obama honored civilians with the second-highest civilian honor—the 2012 Presidential Citizens Medal—on Friday, February 15 and the list of 13 includes Indian country’s own Billy Mills. “It is my distinguished honor to award these individuals the 2012 Citizens Medal for their commitment to public service,” Obama said in a White House press release. “Their selflessness and courage inspire us all to look for opportunities to better serve our communities and our country.” Mills, along with the 12 other honoree...
FRANKLIN, LA—The Chitimacha Tribe of Louisiana identified Rick Riggenbach as the police officer who was killed in the line of duty. Riggenbach, 52, was shot while responding to an incident just off the reservation. He leaves behind a wife and four children. “Sergeant Riggenbach is a true hero and his actions saved the lives of many other people,” Police Chief Blaise Smith said at a press conference on January 28, The Zachary Plainsman-News reported. “Our department and our...
VANCOUVER, WA—Dr. Richard Leo Twiss, Lakota, co-founder and President of Wiconi International (www.wiconi.com), succumbed to a major heart attack while in Washington, D.C., to attend the National Prayer Breakfast. In the late morning hours of Saturday, February 9, 2013, Richard stepped from this life into the presence of his Creator and Savior whom he loved. In the final hours of Richard’s journey on this side, he was surrounded by his wife Katherine, four sons, Andrew, Phi...
RAPID CITY, SD—The Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs Kevin Washburn announced on Jan 10, a partnership between the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Spirit Lake Tribe of North Dakota. The partnership will aim to better protect Native American Children placed in foster homes there. The Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006 requires that all adults in a home where foster children are to be placed must be fingerprinted as an integral part of the background i...
HELENA, MT—Native women advocates in the United States are praising lawmakers for passage of an inclusive, bipartisan Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act that would afford protection to all women and victims of domestic violence. The bipartisan bill, S. 47, passed by the Senate in February 2013 and now by the House, 286 to 138, includes critical provisions to restore and strengthen tribal authority to protect Native women from violence in Indian Country. The h...
On December 19, 2009, the United States apologized to its Native Peoples—but no one heard it. Over 300 million U.S. citizens were apologized for, and don’t know it. Nearly five million Native Americans were apologized to, yet only a handful are aware of it. December 19, 2012 marked the third anniversary of an “Apology to Native Peoples of the United States” signed by President Obama on December 19, 2009. Among the ironies of this apology, is the fact that it was buried...
VICTORIA ISLAND, ON—The Christmas festivities took on an unusual tone with flash mobs, a rail blockade and continued social media campaigns that have swept across Canada and don’t show signs of letting up. Coinciding with this is a hunger strike by Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence whose fast is aimed at gaining a meeting with Canada’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper together with First Nations leaders and a member of the Crown. According to those close to the chief, Spenc...
