Reel Wamps has been gathering information about the Tribal Housing misappropriations and discrimination for several years. There are many things that have contributed to the complete disintegration of a program that is designed to help fledgling tribes like ours improve the quality of life of their people. God knows we deserve a break.
Let’s be clear…..the Mashpee are masters of survival and have a nearly 400 year record to prove it. The benefits of recognition were anticipated as the ultimate reward for years of punishing insult, encroachment and disdain from Cape Codders who resented our right to exist.
But that battle is nothing compared to sustained abuse of the 1001 by the Cromwell Administration that began in 2009 and is ongoing right now today.We’re not going to talk about the $90,000,000 debt that is clearly a money laundering mechanism for the investor Genting.
THE MELTDOWN BEGINS
Let’s just look at Housing. After Alice died, for almost 5 years, there was never a permanent director or honest broker in Housing. No one to keep the wolves away. No one to stop the pilfering of designated money for tribal members who need help. Leon the Lumbee consultant and countless others were running the office off and on. It is an office staffed by tribal members who have no education nor the experience to run a federally funded housing program. They were in everyone’s business, blatantly discriminating against all the primary families and partying down.
THE HARDING CHRONICLES
Mark Harding’s ( former Treasurer ) reign of terror is on the record with letters from the BIA telling him and the Council that as a tribal council member, and the treasurer no less, he could not be awarded contracts paid for with federal money. That would be HUD. Harding continued to openly accept contract rehab work that should have gone to tribal contractors who were struggling during the depression that was crushing us. He was a sub contractor to White companies grabbing up everything, again shutting out certified tribal members who would have done the jobs right the first time. And to top it off, Leon was telling tribal members that they had to use Harding for the work on their homes. It was disgusting and illegal. Those are just a few of his violations of federal law.
THE MOST AWESOME AUDIT
The internal audit recently showed what everyone knew. The Housing program, like the Tribe was the victim of years of gross mismanagement and misappropriation. The trouble for all those mishandlers is that they were tinkering with federal dollars, and the federal government don’t look too kindly on that sort of thing. Just ask the Narragansett and the Pequot.
So the audit was only a year of bad news and it showed that Valerie, primarily, was handing out thousands of dollars in HUD money to people who did not qualify, she had no record of anything, (applications etc) to justify doling out really huge amounts of money. Relatives and friends got rehab contracts without insurance or licenses and of course the work was shoddy at best. Nelly has waited for years to get her storm door fixed properly. Elders can’t get a break from these awful people.
THE 184 DEBACLE
The 184 program was the poster child for discriminatory practices that were the only consistent thing that occurred around there. A few Tobes slipped in but for the other 80%, you know the saying ” If you’re not a Frye you need not apply. “ HUD has form 903 for housing discrimination. It has NO tolerance for discrimination when its money is being spent. Leon with his ” worst practices” busied himself in getting his friends paid and concocting strange deals. He covered up long as he could, but when it really got hot he was fired ( he worked for the Tribe at least 4 different times, screwing things up).
Valerie was officially fired after the Costume Circus, (formally know as the Mashpee Wampanoag Pow Wow). Well she emptied the hard copy files….brilliant. We all know you can’t erase a hard drive. Or better yet. Marge and Robbie have to have a record of the draw downs. So the trail will be tracked easily. In July the 184 was shut down by HUD. Course it didn’t show up on the website until last week.. In a letter HUD Demanded that the Tribe answer a bunch of questions.
“DON’T GIVE ‘EM NOTHING“
According to our sources, Francie (Frye) and Robbie Hendricks said ” don’t give ’em nothing.” Even if we had sovereignty,the federal government could come in and take everything out of that basement and serve everyone one with warrants etc. They can’t hide anything from them.
Anyway Robbie won’t do whats right for the Tribal members but he wants to take on the real government?
STUNNEDED ain’t ya boy? You should have gotten in witness protection when you could.
It gets worse.The so called Housing Commission is just as guilty of wrong doing because they are supposed to monitor the department, who was hired and basically keep them in check. The Commission itself was corrupt with the mother and daughter team of Carole Lopez and Tah Tah whose erratic behavior and mental health issues are known Cape wide. As the tribal secretary, she should have nothing to do with that entity. Se has reportedly taken HUD money allocated for tribal members in need while making over $80K. More troubling is what tribal members witnessed Tah Tah doing. Very very troubling. She needs help not a cover up. She should not be on the council.
The Chair of the Commission has been the chair for over 5 years and never did a damned thing. She whispered and whined but she did not lift a finger to stop the misappropriation to council members, their kids and other family members or tribal members who did not need the help and would not qualify.
What happens next should not be a surprise, but we guarantee Francie or Robbie won’t be denying the federal government anything they ask for.
