Remember back when I discussed the contracting of CFEDS surveyors and even Appraisers? Remember when I said that accountability walked out the door, when Office of Special Trustee and Bureau of Indian Affairs, and Bureau of Land Management all CONTRACTED their work out?
Here is what happens when anyone, I mean anyone, contracts work out to civilians who are under no authority to be reprimanded. Boo Hoo! Their contract service goes away and then you wonder what happened to their stolen documents, the stolen information, the breach of security of sensitive documents, sensitive information. It happened at the State Department as seen on Yahoo, news page by the Associated Press Writers, titled 3 CANDIDATES PASSPORT FILES BREACHED.
Now for any Natives out there, ask yourself if you want a CONTRACTOR to the Federal Government who also has an elected position in their county, their state, their city, to come on the reservation and survey your land. If this contractor who works for another government does come on the reservation and surveys your land, he is now privy to information such as the title of the land, and the description, and the owner. If you are the owner who has been waiting for years to have your land changed from Fee (tax) to Trust land, congratulations, the tax man just came onto your land!
If you are a County Treasurer wondering how much you should charge that crazy Indian living in the corner of your county that is on the reservation for land that he didn't know was out of Trust, congratulations! With a quick phone call to the appraising firm that works for the BUREAU OF INDIAN AFFAIRS, or the OFFICE OF SPECIAL TRUSTEE, you are also on the list of people who will gain access to this information.
If you are with Office of Special Trustee, DO NOT TELL ME IT DIDN'T HAPPEN, DON'T TELL ME IT WON'T HAPPEN, DON'T SAY ONE WORD!
Look at the State Department. You think you're more intimidating than Condoleeza Rice? You think you can control someone who isn't an employee of yours?
If you do, then you're stupid. What am I saying "if?"
For those of you on reservations, listen up. They, meaning Office of Special Trustee, Bureau of Land Management, and the Glorious Bureau of Indian Affairs have all been contaminated with a dose of guillability.
We currently have CONTRACTORS performing
ALL OUR APPRAISALS
ALL OUR SURVEYS
on our reservations. Well maybe not all the appraisals, maybe not all the surveys, but they could................
Makes you wonder if they'll be walking your property next week don't it?
P.S. Ever wonder how power companies get easements? They have to provide appraisals, and surveys. Ever wonder who did that for them? Look at their employee records. In the words of Borat, Wowwie Wow Wow Wow! They have appraisers and surveyors on staff! How come they didn't contract out for that? And more importantly, why didn't a Federal Surveyor and a Federal Appraiser do it for us? Check your power lines, check your negotiations for payments on the land that these power companies use. There better be a Federal survey, and a Federally reviewed appraisal.
P.P.S. IT CAN GET REALLY DEEP AROUND HERE SO PUT YER WADERS ON!!!!!!!
Friday, March 21, 2008
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
The poorest of the poor.
I listened to a human rights activist, whose heart is in the right place speak about some work he was doing in Africa. He said when he got there he was continually surprised to see the local population was always happy, always smiling, even though they had very little in material means.
My question then is, why would you change that? If they really are happy having school under a tree, why would you give them a modern building with doors that separate classes, separate cultural mentors from younger children, separate the student from the environment?
And then I reflect on how the reservation effects affected many of our tribal nations. The Navajo lost much of their culture when they were put in houses with separate rooms separated by doors. What was once a family classroom 24 hours a day in a one room hogan, was replaced by a "modern" house which instilled that "this room is mine, and this house is my family's, and this is our food in our refrigerator.
The Nisqually Indian Tribe were already in houses. So while reservations were made to centralize most other Indians, the U.S. Government created the Nisqually Indian Reservation and then gave them houses because they were too close, so while the effect was to herd up plains Indians, it was also to spread out other coastal tribes.
And now here we sit today and place values on the crops we cultivate on our reservations. Only, "we" is an appraiser contracted by the Office of Special Trustee to come in here with no exposure to a closed tribal market and place a S.W.A.G. (scientific wild ass guess) on the value of our land, our crops, our leases, our timber, our resources lost as a result of rights of way, and easements.
Now my only caution to any of you is that when you take an appraisal from the Office of Special Trustee, take the appraisal and neatly file it away in a quiet, secluded, dark corner, locked away for eternity.
An appraisal is the MINIMUM AMOUNT YOU SHOULD BE GETTING, NOT THE STANDARD! Think about it. Ever bought land? When you did, did you ask if the land had been appraised? Of course you did, because that is the maximum amount you wanted to pay. If you're a savvy buyer, then you pick the property apart to refute or even LOWER the amount you will offer to below the appraised value.
Ever looked at land to sell and wondered how to increase the appraised value if you were selling? Of course you did! You knew the appraised value held some value because it will be used against you. You will want your appraised value to be as high as possible because you know that a buyer will hedge against that value.
If you're sneaky, you don't get an appraisal, and sell to a unwitting buyer who either has a lot of money to throw away or has the credit line to swallow your enthusiastic selling attempt.
So, when your reservation gets a reservation wide appraisal, glance at the amount that land is going for, but don't stare at it. We don't want to get used to that amount. We want to actually NEGOTIATE like we mean it. If all else fails let BIA tell everyone that the lease meets the appraisal quote, like Gerald Ben said they do in this article on The Authentic Voice.
Gerald said, "The only thing the bureau has to do is make sure the rate meets the minimum approved rate."
hmmmm....would that minimum rate be the APPRAISED QUOTE? Hmmm?
That doesn't sound like much of a negotiation does it? Well let's hope that Gerald Ben isn't the one "negotiating" for your best lease on your land. As a matter of fact, lets hope that more tribal members are empowered with knowledge so that like Ernestine Werelus, we all negotiate the most advantageous leases from an obviously lucrative resource that all tribes share in common, the land.
And yet, he challenges us to question appraisals: at an ITMA Listening Conference at Wild Horse Resort in 2004, he responded to...
...a question from the audience about appraisals showing Indian land as less valuable than off-reservation land, Gerald Ben stated that if a landowner has questions about an appraisal, “ask them to come back and explain to you so you know for yourself that what you sold your property for was really what it was worth.” He said that the BIA is trying to get local appraisers how know the reservation to work on contract so that appraisals can be done more quickly.
But then he would never question the fact that BIA sends out requests for Authority for BIA to negotiate your leases for you; insted the BIA will merely sign off on leases that went to bid, with no respect to the the minimum approved rate because it is "in your best interest," according to 25 CFR.
And they smile at us at every conference, at every public engagement. They smile at fellow Indians whose leases rob them of the chance to be prosperous.
I would think that much like our fellow human beings in Africa, we'd be better smilers too if we had far less to deal with. Let me live on the land, let me be poor, just don't let someone else profit at my expense--it makes me feel abused. I guess my thanks for that feeling go to my friends, my fellow human beings, my fellow tribal members at the BIA who fail to speak up for me and for all tribal people. Don't feel guilty, just act for me, act for my aunties, my cousins, your relatives.
Restore the smiles we all had wayyy back when.
My question then is, why would you change that? If they really are happy having school under a tree, why would you give them a modern building with doors that separate classes, separate cultural mentors from younger children, separate the student from the environment?
And then I reflect on how the reservation effects affected many of our tribal nations. The Navajo lost much of their culture when they were put in houses with separate rooms separated by doors. What was once a family classroom 24 hours a day in a one room hogan, was replaced by a "modern" house which instilled that "this room is mine, and this house is my family's, and this is our food in our refrigerator.
The Nisqually Indian Tribe were already in houses. So while reservations were made to centralize most other Indians, the U.S. Government created the Nisqually Indian Reservation and then gave them houses because they were too close, so while the effect was to herd up plains Indians, it was also to spread out other coastal tribes.
And now here we sit today and place values on the crops we cultivate on our reservations. Only, "we" is an appraiser contracted by the Office of Special Trustee to come in here with no exposure to a closed tribal market and place a S.W.A.G. (scientific wild ass guess) on the value of our land, our crops, our leases, our timber, our resources lost as a result of rights of way, and easements.
Now my only caution to any of you is that when you take an appraisal from the Office of Special Trustee, take the appraisal and neatly file it away in a quiet, secluded, dark corner, locked away for eternity.
An appraisal is the MINIMUM AMOUNT YOU SHOULD BE GETTING, NOT THE STANDARD! Think about it. Ever bought land? When you did, did you ask if the land had been appraised? Of course you did, because that is the maximum amount you wanted to pay. If you're a savvy buyer, then you pick the property apart to refute or even LOWER the amount you will offer to below the appraised value.
Ever looked at land to sell and wondered how to increase the appraised value if you were selling? Of course you did! You knew the appraised value held some value because it will be used against you. You will want your appraised value to be as high as possible because you know that a buyer will hedge against that value.
If you're sneaky, you don't get an appraisal, and sell to a unwitting buyer who either has a lot of money to throw away or has the credit line to swallow your enthusiastic selling attempt.
So, when your reservation gets a reservation wide appraisal, glance at the amount that land is going for, but don't stare at it. We don't want to get used to that amount. We want to actually NEGOTIATE like we mean it. If all else fails let BIA tell everyone that the lease meets the appraisal quote, like Gerald Ben said they do in this article on The Authentic Voice.
Gerald said, "The only thing the bureau has to do is make sure the rate meets the minimum approved rate."
hmmmm....would that minimum rate be the APPRAISED QUOTE? Hmmm?
That doesn't sound like much of a negotiation does it? Well let's hope that Gerald Ben isn't the one "negotiating" for your best lease on your land. As a matter of fact, lets hope that more tribal members are empowered with knowledge so that like Ernestine Werelus, we all negotiate the most advantageous leases from an obviously lucrative resource that all tribes share in common, the land.
And yet, he challenges us to question appraisals: at an ITMA Listening Conference at Wild Horse Resort in 2004, he responded to...
...a question from the audience about appraisals showing Indian land as less valuable than off-reservation land, Gerald Ben stated that if a landowner has questions about an appraisal, “ask them to come back and explain to you so you know for yourself that what you sold your property for was really what it was worth.” He said that the BIA is trying to get local appraisers how know the reservation to work on contract so that appraisals can be done more quickly.
But then he would never question the fact that BIA sends out requests for Authority for BIA to negotiate your leases for you; insted the BIA will merely sign off on leases that went to bid, with no respect to the the minimum approved rate because it is "in your best interest," according to 25 CFR.
And they smile at us at every conference, at every public engagement. They smile at fellow Indians whose leases rob them of the chance to be prosperous.
I would think that much like our fellow human beings in Africa, we'd be better smilers too if we had far less to deal with. Let me live on the land, let me be poor, just don't let someone else profit at my expense--it makes me feel abused. I guess my thanks for that feeling go to my friends, my fellow human beings, my fellow tribal members at the BIA who fail to speak up for me and for all tribal people. Don't feel guilty, just act for me, act for my aunties, my cousins, your relatives.
Restore the smiles we all had wayyy back when.
An "amootment" of sorts!
Ok,
I have been following this issue on the Northern Cheyenne Reservation with some excitement. It matters because I side with those who believe that this is a matter for corporate money or dirty per caps. Dirty per caps are those that corporate people offer up to the poorest people to give the smallest amount possible to take the greatest amount from those who need it the most.
I have followed the coal bed methane issue for a while now and I am convinced that it is just as dangerous as the faulty software that predicted that the National Nuclear Waste dump would be a safe facility. The problem in that scenario was that the software only projected 50 years out. That did not endear me to the EPA when I applied for a job there out of college, but you know I really didn't care. And I still don't. If I have an opinion, then you can be assured that it has been forged from my exposure on a daily basis to those who, daily, have unmet needs the most.
So why would I form an opinion on the matter? Well, I can remember very vividly a man speaking to me about the policy for land acquisition. The position was that the government through BLM and BIA, and various other agencies, departments, cabinets, and legislation is in a position to continually keep the reservations in a poor state of affairs. The reasoning behind that was to continually keep offering the lowest deals to the people with the highest needs to gain the most beneficial returns because they are indeed the poorest people in the United States.
Beneficial was to the corporations who made the deals while the government winked an eye toward nefarious deals.
It has some history going way back. You know that the Black Hills were part of the reservation dontcha? Well very few of you will know that the generals in the army at the time were communicating with the president asking if they should wink a knowing eye toward the miners, the mining scouts, the railroad surveyors--all the people who were trespassing in the Black Hills. And we all know the results. Now the Black Hills is purported to have been bought by the Government from the Indian Nations. No money has been accepted, from some of the poorest people on this soil called the United States.
I would hope that the Northern Cheyenne people and all tribes rally behind the "supposedly ousted," legally elected Tribal President, Eugene Little Coyote. There is an interesting article on his site The New Front Line that calls all tribes to unity. There is also an article where one of our dubious leaders in the BIA, Carl Artman, seems to refute his whole argument which fueled the incident even more. He uses "mootment" as a term that seems to be serious although the result is anything but serious.
And we all here on this blog know that "results is what matters!"
I would hope that the Northern Cheyenne reach the most beneficial use of their land, no matter the cost. I won't say what the most beneficial use will be, because that really is best left to them. And the Bureau of Indian Affairs had best not make the MOOTSTAKE of interfering with the sovereignty of the Northern Cheyenne. Lets hope it works out for the best for those people and all of Indian Country.
I would encourage everybody to read up on this issue and decide for yourselves whether joining the amicus brief would be a vote for tribal sovereignty everywhere.
I have been following this issue on the Northern Cheyenne Reservation with some excitement. It matters because I side with those who believe that this is a matter for corporate money or dirty per caps. Dirty per caps are those that corporate people offer up to the poorest people to give the smallest amount possible to take the greatest amount from those who need it the most.
I have followed the coal bed methane issue for a while now and I am convinced that it is just as dangerous as the faulty software that predicted that the National Nuclear Waste dump would be a safe facility. The problem in that scenario was that the software only projected 50 years out. That did not endear me to the EPA when I applied for a job there out of college, but you know I really didn't care. And I still don't. If I have an opinion, then you can be assured that it has been forged from my exposure on a daily basis to those who, daily, have unmet needs the most.
So why would I form an opinion on the matter? Well, I can remember very vividly a man speaking to me about the policy for land acquisition. The position was that the government through BLM and BIA, and various other agencies, departments, cabinets, and legislation is in a position to continually keep the reservations in a poor state of affairs. The reasoning behind that was to continually keep offering the lowest deals to the people with the highest needs to gain the most beneficial returns because they are indeed the poorest people in the United States.
Beneficial was to the corporations who made the deals while the government winked an eye toward nefarious deals.
It has some history going way back. You know that the Black Hills were part of the reservation dontcha? Well very few of you will know that the generals in the army at the time were communicating with the president asking if they should wink a knowing eye toward the miners, the mining scouts, the railroad surveyors--all the people who were trespassing in the Black Hills. And we all know the results. Now the Black Hills is purported to have been bought by the Government from the Indian Nations. No money has been accepted, from some of the poorest people on this soil called the United States.
I would hope that the Northern Cheyenne people and all tribes rally behind the "supposedly ousted," legally elected Tribal President, Eugene Little Coyote. There is an interesting article on his site The New Front Line that calls all tribes to unity. There is also an article where one of our dubious leaders in the BIA, Carl Artman, seems to refute his whole argument which fueled the incident even more. He uses "mootment" as a term that seems to be serious although the result is anything but serious.
And we all here on this blog know that "results is what matters!"
I would hope that the Northern Cheyenne reach the most beneficial use of their land, no matter the cost. I won't say what the most beneficial use will be, because that really is best left to them. And the Bureau of Indian Affairs had best not make the MOOTSTAKE of interfering with the sovereignty of the Northern Cheyenne. Lets hope it works out for the best for those people and all of Indian Country.
I would encourage everybody to read up on this issue and decide for yourselves whether joining the amicus brief would be a vote for tribal sovereignty everywhere.
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