Time Capsule: Tribes to vote on enrollment criteria

The Lake County Leader, January 14, 2003

Tribes to vote on enrollment criteria 

PABLO — This Saturday, members of the Confederated Salish & Kootenai Tribes who are eligible to vote will trek to the polls throughout the Flathead Indian Reservation to cast votes in what is perhaps the single most important election in the history of tribal confederation. 

The Secretarial Election, if successful, would amend the CSKT Constitution to allow the enrollment of anyone who can prove lineal descendancy from an enrolled tribal member. 

The issue has been the top of impassioned discussions among tribal members for years. However, the passions have intensified since September 2002, when Bureau of Indian Affairs Northwest Regional Director Stanley Speaks validated the petition requesting to put the issue to a vote of the tribal membership. 

The Split Family Support Group spearheaded the petition drive to amend the CSKT Constitution. Regina Parot, spokesperson for the group, said the SFSG originally approached the CSKT Council during the constitutional review process in the late 1990s and asked them to do something about the split family situation. “I have one son who is enrolled and one who is not,” Parrot said. 

The split family situation is common for some tribal member families who have children born before and after 1960 with less than one-quarter Salish or Kootenai Indian blood quantum. In 1960, enrollment criteria in the tribal constitution were amended to require at least one-quarter degree of Salish or Kootenai blood quantum ...

Montana Supreme Court shoots down Shook’s appeal 

HELENA — The Montana Supreme Court shot down Sandra Shook’s appeal of a District Court ruling that she illegally hunted big game on the Flathead Indian Reservation. However, Shook said she plans to reload and take her case to the nation's high court. 

Shook shot and killed a whitetail buck on private property within the exterior boundaries of the Flathead Indian Reservation on or about Nov. 16, 1997. She was hunting on land owned by Robert “Beau” Rawlins on the Dixon bench. She was charged with hunting within a closed area in violation of Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Commission regulations that prohibit non-tribal members from hunting big game on all the Indian reservations in Montana. Shook is a non-tribal member. 

Shook pleaded guilty in justice court, but she reserved her right to review the adverse determination of her initial motion to dismiss that the closure to non-tribal members was invalid for several reasons. 

The District Court addressed Shook’s motion to dismiss and concluded that the regulation limiting big game hunting on reservations to tribal members did not violate the Montana Constitution and was a valid exercise of the powers of the commission … 

Chiefs beat Corvallis, lose to prayerful ‘Dogs 

RONAN — Every game, the Chiefs get a little better. 

The Ronan squad was good enough last week to beat the second-best team in the conference on the Hail Mary short of being good enough to beat Whitfish. 

Ronan may be dead last in the Western A at 2-5 in conference and 3-7 overall, but those losses haven’t been by much. 

“We may be the best 3-and-7 team in the state,” Ronan coach Aaron Griffin said. 

His boys certainly played that way last week with a solid 78-66 win over second-place Corvallis on Friday and a heartbreaking 54-55 loss Saturday night at home to fourth-place Whitfish. 

“All seven of the seniors had a really good weekend. In the last four games, we could have won every one of them,” Griffin said. 

Ten players scored for Ronan against Corvallis, led by Dan Mays (17), Kelsey Buhr (12), Craig Rogers (11) and Marcus Wood (10). 

After a quiet, seven-point first quarter, the offense kicked it up a notch for 22 points in the second and 20 in the third to take a 49-37 lead …