If you think we’re “going off the rails” again…..you’re right. But we can’t leave out the good that happened resulting from the February election. Cromwell holdovers were reduced to a three-member minority on the Council …Winnona, the only one elected out of 6 candidates, Bobby who became treasurer on a technicality and David who is up for election in February 2025 with the officers. It appeared the chairman was not happy about that at all. That’s because the Council is all powerful. Nothing happens unless the Council votes to make it happen. Firing, hiring, committee appointments, contracts, budgets, grant approvals, anything
Brian has worked hard to empower himself at the expense of a Tribe weary of standing still and languishing.
involving tribal governance. That’s according to the Tribal Constitution, that also spells out the duties of the Tribal Chairman. Most people don’t know it, but the chairman does not vote, unless there’s a tie. And he signs contracts (even that’s tenuous now). That’s the extent of his power. It’s a perception thing and Brian has exploited that.
The influence of the chairman is another thing. The Chairman has always empowered himself as a leader that develops strategies to move the Tribe forward. He’s the face of the Tribe as spokesman and our emissary to the world. Now, like them or not, Russell Peters, Glenn Marshall and even Cedric (early on) were leaders with ideas. Russell and Glenn had a passion to serve tribal members. Our current chairman has his priorities. They are mostly traditional in nature and getting our land back. We’re prohibited from doing the later and neither put food on the table or get us help of any kind.
Let’s rewind for a minute. So, the chairman’s alleged episode in November 2022 and the resulting Council action caused him to throw a lot of tantrums. Ironically, he turned to Paula Peters (Smoke Signals) and her son Steve to defend him against the nationwide avalanche of embarrassing negative press. Just months earlier, he wanted to fire them. By January 2023 he made security march a qualified new employee out of the building, ordered important projects stopped (without authority) as he ranted through the building. That was just a few bad actions. So, by February 2023 when the new Council was elected, he was convinced they would remove him. So, he stalled swearing them in for weeks, went on vacation. He made moves to usurp administrative authority from the Vice Chair based on an illegal resolution used by Cedric under the guise of a non-existent “Executive Order.” Well, the Council stopped him by voting to rescind the resolution. But now we’re back here again.
STATE OF EMERGENCY
Indeed. The homeless problem is huge. The Del Sol facility should be able to provide substantial relief, by
Those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. That’s what they say.
housing 40 people. But a bunch of problems create the “State of Emergency.” First, the renovations have been slowed dramatically by the red tape coming from TERO (Tribal Enforcement Rights) officer Ellen Frye Sharp. TERO is an enforcement mechanism designed to ensure that qualified Tribal contractors get the jobs. It appears that she’s complicating the process rather than expediting it, on large or small simple jobs (under 25K) that do not need to be bid out. Tribal contractors had to ask Council members to intercede to get the work going again.
Meanwhile, there’s an ongoing struggle to get the necessary staff, security and community partnerships to run the facility properly. Right now, one person oversees the operation. That’s Robyn Sweeting. It’s been that way for a while. And, for a while we’ve been waiting for policies and procedures, let alone the badly needed staff. When a state declares a State of Emergency, it is usually an appeal to the Federal Government for money. For now, a task force was appointed. That’s it. This is not the best way to accommodate the homeless. Because we can’t get out of our own way,
Robin can’t run the shelter alone. Ahem.
things are mismanaged.
The bright spots over the last 5 months have been the Sober House, the shellfish farm project and the homeless shelter. Also added to the list is the $9.3 million federal Broadband grant that Ellen also oversees. This is where it gets very dicey or funky. Back around 2006, Ellen was in charge of a project that provided funding to pave the old council parking lot. It was a sizable amount of money that was never accounted for. So, the Council stipulated that Ellen would never be allowed to work for the Tribe again. But here we are. Again.
Best management practices need not be applied.
The TRIBAL ADMINISTRTOR HAS A PROBLEM and it is OURS
The guy doesn’t hide his impropriety or his lack of professional integrity. We have paid a heavy price with the failure to correct violations in many areas.
Back to mismanagement. On a technicality, the chairman reversed the Council vote by having Tribal Administrator report to him. Well, that did it because Greendeer who manages the tribal staff and departments became even more trifling. Staff call him “The Ho Chunk Ghost” who is under the chairman’s protection. They’re literally in it together. He answers only to him. All Greendeer’s indiscretions are ignored. Greendeer promised to use his “connections” to bring major deals to the tribe. Nothing happened. He philandering was outrageous and went unchecked. Even a vulgar sexually explicit text to a female council member was ignored by the chairman. Any other tribe or corporation would have fired the Ghost a long time ago. When it looked like he was about to get canned he said he was looking for a job. So are we his employment agency? Who’s going to hire him? He was supposed to resign at the end of July. Then he said he was only staying through December.
By the way, the November episode has had a chilling effect on investors that is stalling the (half dead) casino project. That serves to remind us that the TA and the Chairman make a lot a money… $125k each a year and no one can tell you what they do to earn it.
But The Ho Chunk Ghost gets his job evaluation August 9. It’s time to stop paying for nothing.
There are few things more dangerous than a mixture of power, arrogance and incompetence.
