State Housing Board to Meet in Crow

By Montana Board of Housing

The Montana Board of Housing will hold their monthly public meeting Monday. The meeting begins at 8:30
a.m. and will be held at the Crow Tribal Housing Authority.

“The Montana Board of Housing is a champion for housing issues across Montana,” Gov. Brian Schweitzer said. “I support the board’s continued efforts to make safe, affordable housing accessible to every Montanan.”

Community leaders and members of the public interested in programs offered by the MBOH will have a chance to talk with board members about housing issues at the beginning of the meeting.

“The working relationship between local leaders and citizens across the state and the MBOH has been critical in the development of several wonderful and affordable properties that clearly benefit the hard-working people of Montana,” said Chairman J.P. Crowley. “I look forward to meeting members of the Crow Agency Tribal Council and the Crow Tribal Housing Authority as we look forward
to the new challenges facing us in 2008.

To date, the MBOH has provided the following financing for area counties.

• Big Horn County -- 142 home loans for $7,152,014 and 2 TANF loans for $10,305

• Carbon County -- 165 home loans for $9,492,619 and 2 RAM loans for $136,000

• Rosebud  County -- 108 home loans for $5,813,987 and 1 RAM loans for $20,800

• Stillwater County -- 140 home loans for $9,808,136 and 5 RAM loans for $379,000
  and 1 TANF loan for $5,000

• Treasure County -- 1 home loan

• Yellowstone County -- 9,407 home loans for $633,715,657 and 24 RAM loans for $1,904,644
  41 TANF loans for $349,283

In total, 9,963 home loans have been financed by the MBOH for a total of more than $633 million for
these counties, as well as, 32 Reverse Annuity Mortgages totaling nearly $2.5
million and 44 TANF loans for over $364 thousand.

Since 1990, Big Horn County has been awarded $77,324 in tax credits by the Montana Board of Housing in
Hardin for 40 units which equates to nearly $500,000 in investor equity.
The MBOH will make reasonable accommodations for persons with disabilities who wish to participate
in the public meeting. A person in need of accommodation should contact the
Housing Division at (406) 841-2840 no later than May 2, 2008.

Editor's note: This article is a Montana Department of Commerce release and was posted April 30.

Tribe Honors Tuff Harris

Story & Photos by Ben Cloud

Apsaalooke tribal members gathered at the multipurpose building on Wednesday, March 12 to honor a dedicated and disciplined Christian man who always excelled athletically and now plays in the National Football League.

Chester David “Tuff” Harris, an enrolled member of the Apsaalooke Nation and a player for the Miami Dolphins, has accomplished just about everything he has set out to do in education and athletics. In addition to his accomplishments, Harris is now giving back to his tribe by spending part of the off-season talking to and sharing his experiences with the youth on the Crow and Northern Cheyenne reservations.

With family, friends, clan uncles and Apsaalooke government officials in attendance, Harris was brought into the building in a traditional ceremony with his uncles from the Greasy Mouth clan singing their clan song. After entering the building, Tribal Chairman Carl Venne and other officials gave Harris gifts for his accomplishments.

“Recognizing Tuff’s contributions with his success has been a very good
thing for Native youth and everyone in the tribe is proud of him,”
Venne said.

Secretary Scott Russell said, “Tuff not only is
successful in achieving his goals but he has acquired a degree in
sociology while at U of M in the process, this is a very important
note. He also is one who epitomizes against the norm that Native
athletes cannot get beyond college level.”

Joking with Harris,
Russell said, “I am sorry to inform you, I’m a Bobcat fan. But I
converted from a Chicago Bear fan to a Miami Dolphin fan now.”

Harris
shared some of his stories with the crowd about what is like to be in
the NFL and how he got there. He spoke of the importance of his
Christian beliefs, which give him motivation when times get tough.

“When
I was competing for a spot on the team it was very difficult because of
the 100-degree heat as well as the humidity. I never experienced such
conditions. What carried me was that I knew there was a nation of
people behind me and praying for me, “ Harris said. “What I have
achieved is not mine, it belongs to everyone.”

Following the
presentation, school children from Crow Agency Public School performed
a dance and then Harris signed autographs and posed for photos.

Head Start Hand Games

    

Photos by Casey Kills Pretty Enemy
CrowNews.Net

Tiny tots from Lodge Grass, Pryor, Fort Smith and Crow Agency gathered in the Crow Multi-Purpose Building Friday for the reservation-wide Headstart Hand Game Tournament.

Editor's note: You can also click here to view Casey's photos on flickr.com.

Samuel Kohn to lead Native campaign for Obama

Here is a recent blog post on RezNet by Kevin Abourezk about Samuel Kohn, a member of the Crow Tribe, who was chosen to lead Sen. Barack Obama's effort to enlist Native voters in Montana.

Kohn said in his press release Friday, "I've been waiting for a long time for a presidential candidate who
listens to Native Americans, because our issues and concerns are rarely
heard."

To read the post, click here.

Absaloka Mine May Expand

Here's a recent Billings Gazette article that details Westmoreland Coal's plan to expand the Absaloke mine southward onto the Crow reservation. According to the Associated Press, the expansion would allow mining of 77 million tons of coal and extend the life of the mine.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs will host a public hearing on the issue in Hardin on April 23.

Read the full article on the Billings Gazette web site here.

A Place for Crow Kids

Jules Seminole, 18 stands next to Ben Jefferson, Director of Tribal
Youth Planning. Seminole comes to the courts 8-9 times a week to play
basketball. See more photos of the youth complex on Flickr.Photo by Matt Unrau.

By Matt Unrau
CrowNews.Net

Ben Jefferson is a runner. He started running when he was young and now at 64 he’s still exercising to stay healthy. Now he's sharing  the benefits of an active lifestyle with the youth of Crow Agency.

Jefferson took over for Tim Yarlott as the director of tribal youth planning in April 2007 and inherited responsibility for the Apsaalooke Youth Sports Complex on Gas Cap Hill. 

“I wanted to work with the kids, help them get off alcohol and drugs, and make a safe place for them to play,” he said.

The project started a few years ago when about two dozen boys ranging from 9 to 12 years old approached Tribal Chairman Carl Venne with a petition for a new skate park.

Download a diagram of the proposed expansion.

Joshua LaForge, now a 20-year-old student at Little Big Horn College,
was one of the boys behind the petition.  He said they just needed
a place to skate.   “We were sick of pooling all our gas money together
to go to Billings every weekend, and everywhere we went [around Crow
Agency] we were kicked out,” he said. 

As a result of the petition, Venne promised the kids a new skate park in Crow Agency as well as several basketball courts.

Construction began in April 2005 when the Crow tribe settled a trust
accounting lawsuit with the federal government. The lawsuit,
filed in 2002, resulted in a $10 million settlement for the tribe. More than $300,000 of that money was set aside for a youth sports complex.

When Jefferson took over the project two years later, however, there
was much more to do.  Cement for the courts and skate park had been
laid, but the complex didn't have lights, court markings, hoops or a
halfpipe for skaters. Jefferson made up his mind to finish the basketball courts,
skate park and lights by Crow Fair in August.

He told the skaters the new timetable and promised them that it would get done. The boys were skeptical.

Jefferson kept his word, finishing the project in time for Crow Fair.
Now the skaters have a place of their own away from the crowded skate
park in Billings and the prying eyes of the police looking to keep them
off the rails around town.

Typically Jefferson can be found stopping by to turn off the lights
when all the kids have left. At the most he has seen 50 kids there,
but he says usually about 30 will there on any given night.

The project is not finished yet. Plans for two softball fields, a
volleyball court, restrooms, showers, concessions, horseshoe and arrow-throwing
pit are in the works. Jefferson estimates the entire project will ultimately cost $1 million.

The Tribal Youth Planning office is currently searching for grants from
companies around the area, but the project will most likely rely
heavily on support from the tribe. Donations are being
accepted as well.

For the second consecutive year Jefferson has set
August's Crow Fair as the deadline for the completion of the two softball fields as well as the horseshoe and arrow-throwing pit.

Please send all donations to the Crow Tribe and designate them for Tribal Youth Planning.

 

Hardin High Program Raises Student Voices

Members of Hardin High's RSVP Leadership Team
include from left, Hayden Hooker, Joseph Doyle, Jordan Minnick, Damon
Eastman and the group's advisor Mr. Mitch Evans. (not pictured: Kemule
Bull Shows and Jarvis Weibert).





By Jordan Minnick
Hardin High School

Hardin High School is breaking ground with a student-facilitated school improvement program called RSVP (Raising Student Voice and Participation). Amazingly, Hardin High is also the only Class-A school in Montana to administer the program


.

RSVP was pursued by the HHS Student Council upon its introduction at
the state student council conference last fall in Glasgow. Interest had
sparked the HHS Student Council who thought Hardin High could benefit
from the school-wide program; a program that gave every student the
power to express their opinions of their high school and left
improvement ideas to the student's creativity. Six student council
members then went to the RSVP training in Highwood, where we learned
how to facilitate the different summits, or steps, of the program.

In summit one, students compile a list of if issues and concerns within
the school. After completing summit one here at HHS, the most popular
issues proved to be bringing back DECA (a snack store run by the DECA
club), being able to use cell phones in school, extending our 35 minute
lunch period, having a student lounge, having longer holiday breaks,
switching out the power reading period, and having water fountains with
refrigeration.

This week, in summit two, the students will be presented with the top
ideas mentioned above and will also assess the reality of each. For
instance, if a longer lunch is strongly promoted, the students must
keep in mind where the extra time will come from. DECA will definitely
be tough to figure, being that there is no longer room for an actual
store as it is now the teacher's lounge. With factors such as these in
mind, the seven ideas will be voted on in order to further narrow them
down.

Summits three and four have yet to be planned, but the steps of the
RSVP program should be completed by the end of the school year in order
for changes to take place in the 08-09 school year.

The RSVP team has branched out, lending their expertise on the program
to others also. Recently, they presented to a district principal's
meeting and also at the District IV Student Council Spring Meeting,
reaching 125-plus students from other student councils in Montana. It is
our hope for other Montana high schools to also take part in RSVP, to
be trained and to implement the program.

Hardin Halls Decked in Native Designs

By June Gregory
2nd grade teacher, Hardin Primary School

My second grade class recently did some fun and educational projects related to the Crow tribe.  First, each child found and plotted each reservation in Montana.  Of course, the class was the most excited and interested in the Crow Reservation! 

Next each child made a Crow tribal flag. As we colored each part we discussed what it represented.  Then we cut out the circular part in the middle and mounted it on royal blue.  Finally, the children trimmed their flags with gold glitter.  The flags looked beautiful displayed in the hall and classroom.

The last project was spurred by receiving "Honor the Circle" wristbands
from our behaviorist, Mrs. Bauman.   The first day we discussed what
that meant and what each of the four different colors stood for. The
"Honor the Circle" theme is based on the historic Native American
medicine wheel with four colors representing the unity of:
* All races: white, yellow, red, black
* All stages of life: birth, childhood and adolescence, adulthood, old age and death
*All directions: north, east, south, west

This theme teaches children and adults that we all must take
responsibility for our behaviors and decisions. They affect us, others
and future generations. The next day we discussed what we could do to
honor the circle. 
Each
child received a round piece of paper and wrote about what they were
going to do to honor the circle.  These were bound together into a
class book.
Later, one of my boys acted inappropriately.  Mrs.
Bauman took him to our book hanging up in the hall and explained how
that was not honoring the circle. He said, "I'm never going to do that
again!"
All the children's work was displayed in the hall for all to see.

Daily Specials at the Trading Post Cafe

Slideshow by Adam Sings In The Timber
CrowNews.Net

Click on the image above to view the audio slideshow.

To view similar photos, visit the CrowNews.Net Flickr group.

One Lucky Baby

By Brett Thomas-DeJongh
CrowNews.Net

She’s not a superdelegate, she hasn’t donated money to any campaign and she won't be eligible to vote until 2025.

Yet Tazawana Jo Barlow got face time and photo ops with both Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama when they appeared in Missoula last weekend.

How did she manage the kind of access most journalists and lobbyists can only dream about? 

Well, it helps to be 10 months old and very cute. That, and her mother has a knack for being in the right place at the right time.

Amid some 8,000 people at an Obama rally held at the University of
Montana's Adam Center Saturday, Twila Old Coyote finagled VIP seats
behind the lectern and stage for her and her daughter. She also got
within arm’s length of Hillary Clinton during a Sunday event attended
by nearly 2,000 people at the Neptune Aviation hangar near the Missoula
International Airport.

And both times, the candidates seized the opportunity to create the kind of ‘aww’ moment that wins hearts and minds. 

After finishing his speech, Obama was shaking hands but refusing photo
ops -- that is until he spotted Taza.

Old Coyote remembers he had just told a supporter, I’m not posing for pictures, but upon seeing her daughter, quickly added, Except with babies.   

Once Taza was in Obama’s arms, Old Coyote snapped a picture with her camera phone to preserve the moment. 

At the Clinton rally a day later, Old Coyote was ready with her digital camera -- this time, with freshly charged batteries.

After her speech, Clinton shook hands with supporters and took
questions. 

“I had Taza on my shoulders, but we were about four people
deep,” Old Coyote said. 

She had given up getting closer, she said, but then Clinton
looked her way saying, Oh, there’s a baby. 

People in front let
mother and child through, and soon Taza was in Clinton’s arms.

She’s
so sweet, Old Coyote recalled Clinton saying, I want to take her with me.

Taza seemed to be at ease with both candidates. Old Coyote, who works at
UM’s office of American Indian Student Services, is not as impartial.

She is an Obama supporter, she said, because she sees him as someone who will do more to
address Native issues. 

“He wants to meet on a yearly basis with tribal
leaders, and not have them go through the bureaucracy,” Old Coyote said.

She also expressed that Obama’s background better equips him to understand
the Native perspective. 

“He gets it,” she said, “And I don’t think
[Clinton] does.” 

On the Net

For other Native viewpoints on the Democratic candidates, have a look at Jodie Rave's recent articles for the Missoulian.

Here's a Reznet piece about presidential candidates and the Indian vote.

Video of both Clinton's and Obama's speeches in Missoula is available here. (Windows Media Player 9 is required.)

Taza, Meet Hillary

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton introduces herself to 10-month-old Tazawana Jo Barlow at the the Neptune Aviation hangar near Missoula International Airport on Sunday, April 6.

Tazawana is the daughter of Twila Old Coyote, Crow, and Albert Barlow, Paiute.

Twila captured the moment with her digital camera and sent it into Adam
Sings In The Timber, Crow News photo editor, via email.

Crow News Photo/Twila Old Coyote

Taza, Meet Barack

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama introduces himself to 10-month-old Tazawana Jo Barlow at the Adams Center in Missoula on Saturday, April 5.

Tazawana is the daughter of Twila Old Coyote, Crow, and Albert Barlow, Paiute.

Twila captured the moment with her cell phone and sent it into Adam Sings In The Timber, Crow News photo editor, via text message.

Crow News Photo/Twila Old Coyote

Share News and Photos

We welcome your stories and photos.  In fact, the success of CrowNews.Net depends on contributions. 
This site is intended to serve the news interests of the Crow Nation, and we hope that members will be reporters and photographers of the issues affecting them. 

Suggestions for contributions:





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Handgame Tournament Time

Crow News Photo/Adam Sings In The TImber 

The junior hand game tournament will be held April 24-27 at the Multi-Purpose Building in Crow Agency. The senior tournament will be held the following weekend, May 1-4, and will also happen at the multi.