State of the Tribes hints at virus toll, focuses on rights
The president of one of the six Ojibwe tribes in Wisconsin did not dwell long on the COVID-19 pandemic or its devastating impact on casinos, which are an economic engine for tribes, in the annual State of the Tribes speech before the state Legislature.
John Johnson Sr., president of the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians, instead focused mostly on environmental concerns, treaty rights and mascots that depict Native Americans — issues that continue to be of concern to the 11 federally recognized tribes in the state.
Over the last year, tribes that rely heavily on casino revenue to run government and provide services have been devastated by the pandemic. In the beginning, casinos closed for months at a time. When they reopened, they did a fraction of their normal business.
In a nod to those struggles, Johnson pointed out Tuesday that unlike cities and states, tribal governments do not have a tax base for generating revenue.
“Many people think any tribe with a casino sits on top of a never-ending pile of cash,” he said. “But most people fail to realize casino revenue supports much of the tribe’s government services.”
The sudden revenue loss caused tribes to lay off thousands of tribal employees and cut or scale back programs and services for tribal members.
The casinos are the economic lifeblood of tribal governments in Wisconsin, generating nearly $1.3 billion in gaming revenue for the tribes in the year ending June 30, 2019. It is unclear how much in gaming revenue the tribes earned in the last year.
For some tribes, the financial struggles persist. “We’re trying to stabilize,” said Marlon White Eagle, president of the Ho-Chunk Nation, whose six Wisconsin casinos generated more than 80% of the tribe’s annual operating budget.
The Ho-Chunk Nation is in the middle of finalizing the next fiscal year’s budget. White Eagle said the pandemic has underscored how reliant the tribe is on gaming revenue.
“We need to find another way to bring in revenue,” White Eagle told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel after the speech. “We want to have a safeguard in place. If it occurs again, what do we fall back on?”
In his hour-long speech, Johnson highlighted the ways tribes contribute to the local economy and benefit the community as a whole. He said tribes in Wisconsin are often the largest employer in their communities and that many employees are non-Native.
Johnson also urged state legislators to take measures to protect the environment and to confront issues such as algae blooms and water contamination from so-called forever chemicals.
Democratic legislators in Wisconsin recently introduced a bill that would provide money for testing drinking wells, disposing of firefighting foam that contains the chemicals, mitigation efforts and more.
Those issues are particularly important to Native people, Johnson said, because they have lived off the land for centuries.
The Ojibwe people, including Lac du Flambeau members, practice off-reservation hunting and fishing, including spearfishing, every year, rights that they reserved in 19th century treaties with the United States when they ceded millions of acres of territory in northern Wisconsin to the federal government.
Johnson said his people “paid a high price” for those rights and that they aren’t “special rights.” Rather, they were negotiated in exchange for ceding their land, he said, comparing it to a real estate contract.
Johnson also called on legislators to reject mining industries that could cause pollution.
A proposed large, open-pit ore mine in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan has drawn pushback for years from the Menominee Indian tribe of Wisconsin, which has burial grounds in and around the project area. The mine would also be near the Menominee River, which is an important part of the tribe’s creation story and history and where people still fish.
Johnson commended the passage of a bill that will require Wisconsin schools to provide education on the Holocaust and other genocides in at least two different grade levels. It was signed into law by Gov. Tony Evers last month.
Johnson hoped the instruction would include genocides involving Native people.
He also called on the remaining school districts in Wisconsin with mascots depicting Native Americans to retire them.
A little under 30 school districts in Wisconsin use Native American images as mascots.
In his two-year state spending plan, Evers proposed using $400,000 to help school district officials to pay to adopt a new nickname or logo. Republicans in the state Legislature have begun reworking that budget plan, but the money for the new nicknames and logos remains intact at this point.
“Any and all Native mascots, regardless of intent, portray us as subhuman,” Johnson said.
Sarah Volpenhein is a Report for America corps reporter who focuses on news of value to underserved communities for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Email her at svolpenhei@gannett.com. Please consider supporting journalism that informs our democracy with a tax-deductible gift to this reporting effort at JSOnline.com/RFA.