Michael Decorah, senior intergovernmental affairs specialist for St. Croix Chippewa Indians of Wisconsin, said Wisconsin’s tribes still strongly support the tribal regalia proposal. (Screenshot via WisEye)
Wisconsin’s Special Committee on State-Tribal Relations considered the resurrection of three bills, including one that would protect students’ rights to wear tribal regalia to graduation, as well as other ideas that could become bills next session.
The committee, chaired by Rep. Jeff Mursau (R-Crivitz) and includes five other lawmakers and members of Wisconsin’s tribes, is tasked with studying issues related to Native Americans, tribes and bands in WIsconsin and developing recommendations and legislative proposals.
Mursau said that the committee would likely reintroduce three recently unsuccessful proposals in the next legislative session — all of which passed the Assembly but never received a vote in the Senate.
One would prohibit school boards and charter schools from preventing students from wearing tribal regalia to a graduation ceremony or to school-sponsored events. Fourteen states have laws on the books that protect public school students’ rights to wear tribal regalia at graduation ceremonies.
Michael Decorah, senior intergovernmental affairs specialist for St. Croix Chippewa Indians of Wisconsin, said the proposal is one that Wisconsin’s tribes strongly support, and he wants to see it reintroduced. He noted the bill had support in the Assembly.
“This is part of our sovereign acts that we try to do to continue to be a sovereign nation,” Decorah said. “Having to sometimes get permission is sometimes hard to do.”
Joey Awonohopay, secretary of the Menominee Tribal Legislature, said it was “heartbreaking” that it didn’t receive a vote on the floor as he continues to hear about the issue from graduating students.
“We absolutely would like to see this bill go forward this year,” Awonohopay said.
Liz Arbuckle, a tribal council member of the Bad River Band of the Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians, said that as a mother of two tribal members who have graduated, she valued allowing students to graduate wearing emblems of their tribal membership.
“It can be very challenging, very difficult. We get hammered a lot on graduation rates and why aren’t kids doing better, and this is something they should be very proud of to be able to represent their tribe, represent themselves, show they did it right, which can sometimes be beating odds,” Arbuckle said. “It’s a very big deal.”
Another proposal would allow tribal governments to copy certified copies of vital records for administrative use.
Lisa Liggins, secretary of the Oneida Nation, recalled that the proposal was initially introduced after personnel from the Ho-Chunk Nation who had been making photocopies of certain records were notified that was illegal.
“All those records were purged and then the submission process changed where we were requiring originals and then those originals stayed on file. We would keep them, but that just incurs a cost unneeded,” Liggins said. “I know additional copies are usually only three dollars but if you’re not aware that you have to turn one over, it can be an additional cost and a burden to tribal members, who are just trying to enroll their kids.”
Another proposal would give tribes a say in whether applicants can receive a lifetime license to teach American Indian languages associated with the tribe. If a tribe were to notify the state Department of Public Instruction in writing that it wants the right to approve those applicants, DPI would be prohibited from issuing a lifetime license without the tribe’s clearance.
The committee also considered ideas that will be discussed in future meetings. One idea is creating a dedicated tribal office in Madison, and another is to require a “tribal impact statement,” when new bills or administrative rules are introduced, similar to the fiscal estimate that is required for bills that incur a potential financial effect to the state.
Decorah of the St. Croix Chippewa Indians of Wisconsin said the tribe would also be prepared to support any progress on a medical marijuana bill, which could “allow our people access to an option to treat the many ailments that we deal with, from addiction to cancer to chronic pain.” He noted that tribes are dealing with these issues at sometime triple or quadruple the rates of other communities in Wisconsin and that marijuana legalization has led to a reduction in opiate use and overdoses in some states.
An Assembly Republican proposal to legalize medical marijuana by establishing a handful of state-run dispensaries in Wisconsin failed this year. Democrats criticized the proposal, urging broader legalization of marijuana, and Senate Republicans opposed the idea of state-run dispensaries.
“The reality is the tribes cannot wait no longer for inaction,” Decorah said. “[We’re] watching our people bury our young — we’re burying a mother a week before their children’s Head Start graduation — and that’s just unacceptable.”
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