It was the shooting that did it, says Connie Rohde. Two years
ago, she was living in what she thought was a safe neighborhood
in Salem with her then 7-year-old son, Kyle. One day, while
the car was parked outside her house and Kyle was in the back
seat, someone shot out the back window, showering her son
with the shards. That's when she knew it was time to listen
to her mother, get out of the city, and go home to Grand Ronde.
"Here it is safe," she says. "I don't have to lock my doors
at night. I'm known here, my mother is known here. It's
a family."
Rohde is at least one-quarter Grand Ronde. In 1983, her
mother, Annabelle "Peachy" Hamm, enrolled her and her five
siblings into the tribe--as soon as it was legally possible
to do so.
Although she grew up in the Grand Ronde valley, Rohde didn't
see her future there. When she was 19 she married a white
man and moved away. In 1998, she moved her family back to
the tribe. Her husband came with her, but the marriage broke
up.
Now she is on a mission. The 39-year-old single mother
is trying to put past mistakes behind her by grabbing every
opportunity the tribe can offer. With the assistance of
the tribe's housing fund, she bought a home in Grand Meadows,
a 36-unit modular housing park in Grand Ronde. She works
in the tribal human resources department as a data files
coordinator.
Although the dividend checks from the tribe's casino and
timber operations help, Rohde is certainly not wealthy.
"A lot of people have the image we're rich Indians here,
and we're not," she says. "The majority of the money goes
for the programs, to the health center and the elders."
While working days, Rohde took a 10-week course in which
she learned to be a blackjack dealer. Now she works Friday
and Saturday nights from 9 pm to 5 am. Sundays are her day
off, and she spends them with Kyle.
Using the tribe's education fund, she is now taking night
classes at Chemeketa Community College; when she has enough
credits, she'll transfer to either Western State or George
Fox University to pursue a management degree.
Kyle, now 9, will have opportunities his mother never dreamed
of. Every Grand Ronde child receives dividends from the
tribe, but the dividends are put into a trust fund that
can be accessed when the recipients turn 18. Kyle's education,
too, should not be a worry. The tribe helps with some tuition
and textbook costs now, but it expects to provide full college
scholarships in the future. Kyle will have tribal health
insurance. When he reaches 55, he will have an elder pension,
as his mother does now.
To be sure, Rohde says, the financial stability is a relief,
but she sees an even greater dividend in store for Kyle.
He will grow up surrounded by Native American culture. "It's
like a family circle," she says, "where family and friends
are the most important things--not having a new car every
year or a house on the best side of town."
That's what people should remember when they criticize
the tribe for making money off gambling, she adds. "Everyone
asks if we feel guilty," she says. "It's a real touchy subject
with some people."
Rohde feels no guilt. "People seem to live and breathe
in Nevada and Atlantic City just fine," she says. She points
out that the casinos have done good, not just for the tribes
but for the rest of the state with the community fund.
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LEAD STORY SIDEBAR
As
Indian As He Wants
-And Needs- To Be
Justin Martin says his experience outside the Grand
Ronde world will benefit the tribe.
BY
PATTY WENTZ
pwentz@wweek.com
photo
by Basil Childers
|
Justin Martin is one of the new faces of the Grand Ronde.
The 30-year-old lobbyist doesn't look Indian, didn't grow
up on a reservation and doesn't speak Chinook jargon.
But with a 3/16 blood quantum of Grand Ronde, he's as Indian
as he needs to be.
Martin had a typical Willamette Valley childhood, growing
up in Salem with a mom who ran a beauty parlor and a dad
who worked as a press-brake operator. But there was one
big difference: His mother is Indian. The feds had disbanded
her tribe, the Grand Ronde, when she was 4 years old, but
she kept close ties to the core of people who were working
to get it reinstated.
Martin, however, gave the past little thought. Stories
of how the federal government broke its treaty with the
tribe were ancient history to the budding baseball star.
Martin, who attended McKay High in Salem, was one of the
premier pitchers in the state; he was recruited out of high
school by a farm team for the California Angels on the strength
of his fastball. But he was unable to control his erratic
arm, so after four years of struggling, the team sent him
home. His dream of being a major-league player dead, he
used a league scholarship to go to Chemeketa Community College,
then Western Oregon State University.
He got his first break in politics thanks to coastal state
Rep. Terry Thompson. Thompson was recruiting for a tribal
member as an intern, and the Grand Ronde recommended Martin.
Thompson says he was taken aback by his first impression
of Martin. "They sent me this kid who looked like Mr. T.,"
Thompson says. But Martin soon proved himself to be savvy
on policy and long on personality.
Martin graduated in 1995 with a degree in public policy,
then went to work for a title company in Salem. By that
time the casino had opened and was bringing in tens of millions
of dollars for the tribe. With his grandfather on the tribal
council, and his mother now working in the tribe's vocational
rehabilitation program, Martin started paying attention
to his heritage.
In 1997 the tribe asked Martin to work in its government
affairs office. Now he has what he calls a dream job. He
is learning the ropes from the tribe's heavy-hitting contract
lobbyist, Dave Barrows, an experience other young politicos
would kill for.
Martin, like many people working for the Grand Ronde, took
what he learned in non-Indian culture and has put it to
use for the tribe. He contrasts that with Native Americans
who grow up on reservations, separated from the rest of
society.
"I would never ever say termination was a good thing,"
he says, "but there was one positive--we were forced to
go to the outside world and learn some skills."
Now Martin straddles the chasm between Indian and white,
which isn't usually a problem. His tribe maintains its own
culture without turning its back on the rest of the state.
He says the "us vs. them" dynamic is rarely felt.
In that respect, Martin says, the difference between his
tribe and tribes with a long reservation history was evident
when the Grand Ronde hired Ted Mala, an Indian from a northern
Alaska tribe, to be the executive officer in 1998.
Shortly after his arrival in Grand Ronde, Martin says,
Mala told him his suit and tie wouldn't play well in Indian
country. The way to be an Indian, Mala told him, is to dress
like one.
"I was very offended," Martin says. "I don't pretend to
be the most Native American person in the world. I didn't
grow up in that."
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Willamette Week | originally
published December 22,
1999
|
