Story and photo by Karin Eagle, Native Sun News Staff Writer

WOUNDED KNEE – On a cold, windy morning, the mass grave site of the victims of the 1890 Wounded Knee Massacre is lonely and desolate.

The grave itself is surrounded by a cemetery, and backed by a log cabin church. Trash blows in from the surrounding area, empty beer boxes blowing up against and getting hung up on the chain link fence. There is little honor and reverence to be found in what should be the most revered site of the Lakota people.

With a strong mind and a generous heart, one Oglala man has taken on the responsibility of caring for the resting place of those victims of such a tragic and devastating event in the history of the Lakota people.

Julian Brown Eyes, a member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, and owner of Competitive Masonry out of Rapid City, has taken the initiative in redoing the brick area surround the mass grave.

Donating all the materials needed as well as asking his employees, all Natives, to volunteer for such a poignant task, the renovation is being done at no cost to the descendants or the tribes who have people buried there.

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Montana State University grad William Mendoza has been named by President Barack Obama the head of the White House Initiative on American Indian and Alaska Native Education.

Mendoza earned a master’s degree in educational leadership from MSU in 2010, a press release from MSU said, and will be the first leader of the new federal initiative to increase and improve educational opportunities for Indian Country.

One focus of the initiative will be to help drop-outs find ways back into the education system.

“We’re working hard to reduce the American Indian and Alaska Native student dropout rate and making sure students who stay in high school are ready to start their career by the time they complete college,” Mendoza said.

Previously, Mendoza was acting director of the White House Initiative on Tribal Colleges and Universities, or WHITCU. The office works to ensure that the nation’s tribal colleges and universities are more fully recognized, better informed and given full access to federal programs.

Mendoza, who is an enrolled Oglala Sioux and has deep Sicangu Sioux roots, grew up on the Pine Ridge and Rosebud Indian Reservations in South Dakota.

Jenna Cederberg

Final votes on Election Day were cast almost 25 days ago, but election commissioners only just finished wading Tuesday through the controversy to finally certified general election results on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota.

John Yellowbird-Steele will be new OST president. He defeated incumbent Theresa Two Bulls and her administration. The delay of official results not only stirred up controversy, but cost the tribe $160,000. Along with filing complaints about election mismanagement, Two Bulls has called for the removal of several of the OST Election Commission members.

Last week, the outgoing Two Bull administration comprised of President Teresa Two Bulls, Vice President Shorty Brewer, Treasurer Dean Patton, Secretary Rhonda Two Eagle and Fifth Member Myron Pourier, filed the complaint citing: the Election Committee leaked information to the media prejudicing voters prior to elections; the chairman of the election commission is not old enough to serve on the election commission; and election results were released to the media without affording the candidates time to request recounts.

Here’s the full story from Ernestine Chasing Hawk, Native Sun News Staff:

Board certifies election results
PINE RIDGE – Despite of formal complaints filed by the outgoing Two Bulls administration, the Oglala Sioux Tribe Election Commission has certified the 2010 General Election results, including certification of John Yellowbird-Steele as president.

Amid ongoing controversy, Francis Pumpkin Seed, OST Election Commission Chairman said the commission is moving ahead with election protocol.

Letters have been sent out to winning candidates notifying them of their certification and the newly elected tribal officials will be sworn into office on Dec. 7, 2010.

“The Election Commission will continue to move forward in a respectful manner until such time the Commission is allowed due process or the new Yellowbird-Steele/Poor Bear Administration is sworn in. The OST Election Commission wishes each winning candidate good luck with their future endeavors and thanks to each and every person involved with this successful election and smooth transition to electronic voting,” the commission released in a statement.

In a last ditch effort to regain control of the Oglala Sioux Nation, Theresa Two Bulls and the Executive Committee filed a formal complaint alleging violations of election guidelines.

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Fetal alcohol syndrome and its toll on families are front and center in this Native Sun News piece:

Photographed and written by Randall Howell, Native Sun News Correspondent

KYLE – They’re numbers may have been small, but their voices were strong.

“Don’t Steal Children,” said a sign carried by Leonora Young Bull Bear.

Young Bull Bear said she has lost two grandchildren – both with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) – to the state’s Department of Social Services.
During her protest across the street from Little Wound School in Kyle on Thursday, Oct. 21, Young Bull Bear, Kyle, said her children belonged at home with her and their family members, “not in some boarding school in Aberdeen or who knows where.”
As a spotted eagle circled high overhead, Young Bull Bear was joined by Josephine Kills Enemy, a protester who also said her challenged children were taken from her and that now she has “visitation every other weekend” instead of raising them at home.

“I’m trying to get my great grandson, Jessie, back,” said Kills Enemy, also from Kyle. Jessie Black Tail Deer, 16 months old, has yet to meet his father, Bryan Kills Enemy, said the demonstrator. “He (the father) wants to meet him.”

During a gusting October wind, the demonstrators made it clear that they were displeased with the “lack of support” from Little Wound High School – a school “that’s supposed to provide transportation, supervision and instruction for my boys,” said Young Bull Bear, who has been raising her FAS boys for nearly 10 years now.

The boys, Aleondreaux Shae Peters, 16, and Micha Lamar Peters, 15, are her sister’s daughter’s children – teens who “will not learn beyond their current level,” she said. “They were happy at home,” said Young Bull Bear. “They just needed the support that Little Wound was supposed to provide for them. Instead, they (LOWO) took them away. I’m not even sure where they are … I think one’s in Aberdeen.”

One of the Peters boys is visually handicapped; the other is both visually and hearing handicapped, said Young Bull Bear, who was driving them to and from school daily, despite the district’s published special-needs policy of providing transportation.

In most cases, last week’s protestors said they already had tried to get redress from the Little Wound School Board, the school’s instructors, the Oglala Sioux Tribe, the state Department of Social Services and the South Dakota State School for the Visually Handicapped – all to no avail.

Young Bull Bear said she was scheduled for an October custody hearing on the teen boys, but instead the teens were “picked up and taken … They just showed up and took them.” That’s why, she said, she made a protest sign that said: “Don’t Steal Children.”
Meanwhile, Kills Enemy also said she had tried the court system.

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From the Rapid City Journal in South Dakota:

Nearly 3,000 registered voters are expected to vote today at local precincts on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. Polls will be open from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Voters will need to present a photo ID at their respective districts to vote for executive and council representatives, according to Dorothy Brown Bear of the Oglala Sioux Tribe Election Office.

Election judges went through training Monday for the first reservation-wide voting using electronic balloting, Brown Bear said. Precinct locations include Crazy Horse School, Eagle Nest District; Lacreek Community Action Program office, Lacreek District; Kyle CAP office, Mediator Church and St. Henry’s Catholic Hall, Medicine Root District; Oglala CAP office, Brother Rene Hall at Our Lady of the Sioux and Red Shirt School, Oglala District; American Horse School, Pass Creek District; Billy Mills Hall, Pine Ridge Village; Sharp’s Corner Baptist Church and Porcupine Clinic, Porcupine District; Calico CAP office, No. 4 Payabya LTLI Building, Slim Buttes, Red Cloud, Blue Community Building at Wolf Creek, Blue Community Building at Wakpamni Lake and Batesland College Center, Wakpamni District; and Manderson CAP office, Rockyford School and Wounded Knee Community Center, Wounded Knee District.

Every Saturday, Buffalo Post features stories from Native Sun News, published in Rapid City, S.D.

By Randall Howell
Native Sun News Correspondent

PINE RIDGE –– A candidate for the Oglala Sioux Tribe’s Pine Ridge District representative continues to await a response to a complaint he has filed with the tribe’s Election Commission.

Bruce Whalen, a first-time candidate for tribal council representative in Pine Ridge District, said he filed his complaint early last week.

The complaint was filed by Whalen in connection with his inability to get a copy of the commission’s meeting minutes wherein it reportedly altered the candidate filing frame because several “chose by their own free will” to go off-reservation to get the drug tests – decisions that several candidates said would delay paperwork establishing
viable candidacy.

“They are changing the rules … changing horses in mid-stream, changing the rules in the middle of the game,” Whalen told Native Sun News. “Not only did they change the rules, but also they won’t provide me with the minutes of the meeting where it happened.”

Meanwhile, Whalen has charged the commission and the Tribal Council with violating its own open-meeting rules and then meeting to extend the filing deadline to accommodate candidates who went off-reservation for those drug tests. Several candidates reportedly complained that because they did so they could not meet the filing time frame.

Hence, the Election Commission apparently adjusted the time frame to meet the filing needs of those candidates, contends Whalen.

The tribe’s top election commissioner – Francis Pumpkin Seed – conducted the ballot positioning session for the tribe late Wednesday but did not supply minutes of the time-frame-change meeting, though Whalen was present.
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Every Saturday, Buffalo Post features stories from Native Sun News, published in Rapid City, S.D.

By Talli Nauman
Native Sun News Correspondent

PINE RIDGE – The Oglala Sioux Tribe has “grave concerns” about AT&T’s bid for the cell phone service on the reservation, it told the Federal Communications Commission in a filing Sept. 10.

AT&T petitioned the FCC on July 30 for authorization to take charge of the cell phone service on Pine Ridge Reservation, which is controlled by Verizon.

The officials of the Oglala Sioux Tribe “wish to take this opportunity to advise the commission that they still harbor grave concerns about the provision of service on Pine Ridge by AT&T,” the tribal government says in its most recent filing with the FCC.

The statement comes in the midst of contract negotiations between the tribe and AT&T, which seeks FCC approval to assume Verizon’s status as the Eligible Telecommunications Carrier (ETC) on the reservation.

The tribe complained to the commission in an earlier filing on May 24, that transferring authorization to AT&T would void the OST’s contract rights in the Tate Woglaka Service Agreement (TWSA).

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Every Saturday, Buffalo Post features stories from Native Sun News, published in Rapid City, S.D.

PINE RIDGE –– The list for the office of OST tribal president and vice president are lengthy for the October 5 Primary Election.

For President the candidates are: Donald Steele Jr., Lloyd Goings, incumbent Theresa Two Bulls, Garfield Steele, Denver American Horse, John Yellow Bird Steele, Darla Black, Elvyn Doug Bissonette, incumbent Vice President William “Shorty” Brewer and former OST Chairman, Harold Dean Salway.

For Vice President the candidates are: Tom Poor Bear, Melanie Two Eagle, Alvin Slow Bear, Myron Pourier, Henny Cleone Whalen, Pete Swift Bird, and Phyllis Wilcox.

(For districts and chief judge, click more)

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Every Saturday, Buffalo Post features stories from Native Sun News, published in Rapid City, S.D.

By Randall Howell
Native Sun News Correspondent

PINE RIDGE – Twostripes, you’re out: Out chewing on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation’s vegetation – cheat grass, mostly. But this year’s infestation – reported to be the largest in nearly a quarter of a century – is likely to be nothing compared to next year’s prospects.

Of course, that too depends on so many things, according to Bruce Helvig, South Dakota state plant health director. For one, it depends on the number of eggs that survive the first hard frost to await next spring’s hopper hatch.

“This is the worst I’ve seen it in the 24 years I’ve been in the state,” Helvig said, noting that 1985-86 also climbed the charts of hopper invasion history. From there, he backed up into the history of grasshopper plagues in the late 1920s and early 1930s.

Nonetheless, Helvig was on the reservation “about two weeks ago” to check out reports that already had predicted a hopper infestation for Western South Dakota this summer.

And, of course, what’s in the middle of Western South Dakota – none other than the Oglala Sioux Tribe’s nearly 4,000 square miles of trust and non-trust reservation land.

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