By Benny Polacca
Osage News
EDMOND, Okla. – Twenty-five Osages running for office in the June 7 election addressed a standing-room-only crowd here at the VFW Hall during a March 16 political rally hosted by the Revard family.
The candidates for the Nation’s executive and legislative branches and the Minerals Council asked the crowd for their votes during the candidates’ individual speeches which touched on several topics including their political platforms, their family relations, concerns about the current government body, prior work experience, and humor.
The Osage News attended the rally which had more than 60 people which included candidates, their family members and fellow tribal members in attendance. Here is a sampling of what some of the candidates shared with the public.
Revard family member Jim Ryan, who helped arrange the rally, asked the candidates to draw numbers written on paper from a hat to determine the order of speakers.
Congressman William “Kugee” Supernaw, who is seeking a second term, drew No. 1 and advised the crowd they should “do the best job they can” and “call back home” to study the candidates. He said candidates should have three things: “integrity, intelligence and energy.”
“During this campaign, all you’re going to know about us is what we tell you,” he said. “I would suggest that you take the time to find out more about people, about their performance in the past, and study as much as you can.”
Charles Pratt, who is a plaintiff in the Fletcher v. United States case concerning non-Osage shareholders, is running for the Osage Minerals Council. Pratt and four other plaintiffs in the case are seeking an accounting and restoration of trust shares from non-Osages.
“We’ve been up and down, back and forth, but on Minerals (Council), we’re going to have to have someone that is prepared to deal with the return of those shares we are able to get back through the Fletcher case,” Pratt said. “Contact me if you want to know more about Fletcher,” he said of the lawsuit.
Curtis Bear, who is running for the Minerals Council, said he has been attending council meetings for several years and the knowledge he gained will help him serve, if elected. “The Minerals Estate and the shareholders must be protected in this time of economic uncertainty.”
“The Osage Nation is currently facing major lawsuits and some unnecessary lawsuits. I believe that you must vote for leaders that have a foresight not only in the future, but now in our travesty of time,” Bear said. “Our Minerals Estate has brought us into the future and it will take us forth into more prosperous years ahead.”
Jeff Irons, who is Federal grants program manager in the Nation’s Strategic Planning and Grants Management Office, is running for assistant principal chief.
“As your assistant principal chief, I will try to work with whoever’s in office to take legislation to the Congress, encourage them to support the recommendations of the legislation of the chief,” Irons said. “That being said, if Congress has legislation they want passed and want the chief’s support, I will feel obligated in part to go to him and encourage support there.”
Also running for assistant principal chief is former Oklahoma State Representative Scott BigHorse. “I think I’m the only candidate… that has any experience in a three-branch government that has been in operation for over 100 years, so I do have some expertise in developing policy,” he said, adding he’s worked with both state and national legislators.
“As assistant chief, I think one of the biggest things I’d like to see is the transparency issue. To me, transparency is showing every bit of revenue that is made by the tribe, excluding the minerals,” BigHorse said. “I would like to see a flow chart with the reasons why all that money came into the tribe… I’d also like to see a flow chart of all the monies that leave the tribe and where it goes and why.”
John Red Eagle, who is a critic of Principal Chief Jim Gray’s administration, is running for principal chief and shared his concerns about the current government. “I am presently serving as your assistant principal chief and as the stepchild of the Executive Branch - that was a joke, people,” he told the crowd which laughed.
“With the money that comes in, I think we have to have a real accounting… I want to know how much this (Osage Limited Liability Company) makes, what types of investments are they making? You need to know that because it’s your money,” Red Eagle said. “There needs to be a quarterly report of all the revenue that comes in, whether it’s through the casino, investments.”
Retired nurse Cecelia Tallchief is running for the assistant principal chief’s office, which she describes as an “important” one as a “mediator. You have to be able to look at what’s best for the Osage people, not what’s best for Congress, not what’s best for the Executive Branch, what’s best for all.”
Tallchief said her experience which includes serving on the Osage Home Health Board, and working as an Indian Health Service nurse makes her the best candidate for the job. “When (the Home Health Board) took the program over, it had been running in the red. We - with our expertise - have been able to turn that around and for the past two years have not asked for any money from Congress.”
James Schooling, who is running for the Minerals Council, said he has “worked in the oil and gas business for 40 years in various areas. I think you have to work with other branches of the government,” he said adding he’s learned to work with other people in prior employment.
“I see a lot of in-fighting and that’s got to stop. I think you got to get out there and do everything you can to make it work,” Schooling said. “When I’m elected, I want you to contact me anytime you’ve got a problem … I’m for honesty, integrity and transparency.”
Congressional candidate Jake Heflin, a Long Beach, Calif. paramedic/ firefighter, said it’s important to revisit the Nation’s 25-year strategic plan which sought input from Osages living outside Oklahoma to “enable that to occur.” As part of improving the Nation, Heflin said he believes health and senior services should improve.
“The reality is we do have the resources now to do that,” Heflin said. “There’s no reason why we shouldn’t have assisted-living facilities on our reservation for our elders… we’ve always been taught that we need to take care of our youth and we need to take care of our elders. Well we need to start doing that right now.”
Galen Crum, who is president of the Osage Shareholders Association, recently retired from working with the fire service and is now seeking a Minerals Council seat. “I think fire service is a great place to be… you get instant gratification from it,” he said, describing a firefighter’s role as turning “chaos into order and you get to meet people or help people that are having the worst day of possibly their life.”
“That’s kind of what I want to do for the Minerals Council,” Crum, a 2006 Congressional candidate, said of extending his public service experience. “I think the Minerals Council need to work with the tribe.”
Congressional candidate Margo Gray-Proctor, current principal chief Jim Gray’s older sister, is president of Horizon Engineering in Tulsa and said she’s worked with on over 150 tribal projects nationwide. “I’ve also been able to share in the resources and have the opportunity to improve Indian Country and that’s what made me come here today.”
Gray-Proctor also worked for the former Osage National Council in writing legislation and said she brings an expertise in economic development in serving on Congress. “We want to create economic development for our own people,” she said of creating more job opportunities for tribal members.
Minerals Council candidate James Revard said his oil and gas industry experience makes him the best candidate to serve. He is executive director of the Commission on Marginally Producing Oil and Gas Wells for the state of Oklahoma.
“My job at the state agency is to protect oil and gas, to keep oil production running as long as we can… I strongly believe we can do the same thing for the Osage (tribe),” he said. “The key is more drilling, optimize the wells we have and to work together.”
Osage Nation Principal Chief Jim Gray is seeking his third consecutive term and said “elections are primarily about the future – they’re about ‘where do you want to be four years from now?’ – And I think that’s one of the reasons I’ve decided to run again.”
“In some cases, we’ve been defined by our differences, but in many ways we‘ve been defined by our successes,” Gray said of the relationship between the executive and legislative branches. “In 2002, we had about $300,000 in tax revenue in the bank, we had about 200 employees. Today we employ about 1,700 people, we have $50-$60 million in the bank - depending on which number you want to go by: the end of 2009 or where we are today,” he said.
Attorney Geoffrey Standing Bear, who is seeking a Congressional seat, said “we really have to work together because the last four years have brought out some of the worst in us.” He said the need to work together will come into play if the Nation’s casinos are affected by the recent 10th Circuit Court decision.
Standing Bear previously served as assistant principal chief in the early 1990s and has practiced law for entities including the Oklahoma Indian Gaming Association. “We’ve got to find ways to diversify (revenue), but we have to do it in an intelligent way,” he said citing another gaming tribe’s spending and saving plan.
Retired state district judge Doug Revard is seeking a second Congressional term. He served on the Nation’s government reform commission in 2003 after retiring from the courtroom before deciding a Congressional run.
“What an experience it has been,” Revard said. “What did I learn from that? Well, No. 1, I learned you better have alligator skin… I think I have been a conservative voice, I believe we are spending your money every time that we do something and we should look at it in that light.”
Congressman Raymond Red Corn, who is seeking a second term, listed legislation he has sponsored including the open records act, the whistleblower act, the “Speak What’s on Your Mind” act and the bill creating the Osage LLC. Referring to the recent U.S. 10th Circuit Court decision ruling against the Nation, Red Corn said there is “now more emphasis than ever on the diversification” of the Nation’s non-gaming business efforts.
A second Revard rally was scheduled for March 20 in Pawhuska, but it was postponed due to snowy weather which struck Northeast Oklahoma that weekend. Ryan told the Osage News the Pawhuska rally will be rescheduled with a tentative date set for May 1.
Attending the March 16 Revard Rally: William “Kugee” Supernaw; Charles Pratt; Cecelia Tallchief; Curtis Bear; Jeff Irons; Scott BigHorse; John Red Eagle; James (Jim) Schooling; Jenny Miller; Galen Crum; Myron Red Eagle; Margo Gray-Proctor; James Revard; Jim Gray; Raymond Red Corn; Danette Daniels; Geoffrey Standing Bear; Roy St. John; Randolph Crawford; Doug Revard; Jake Heflin; Louis Gray; Tim Tall Chief; Carl “Chico” Sellers and Andrew Yates.
For more information on the candidates, see their submitted articles online at www.osagenews.org.
