Boise fort netting on vermilion

[mcmsek]

The Boise fort tribe is having a banner year netting on vermilion and trying to sell walleye to everyone!

[delcecchi]

And you know that how?

[Cliff Wagenbach]

The Boise fort tribe is having a banner year netting on vermilion and trying to sell walleye to everyone!

Selling them is illegal! They are to be netted for sustenance only!

But....not anything new either. It has been going on for as long as I can remember.

I guess that is better then throwing them into the woods to rot!

Cliff

[laker1]

So does each band have a quota for the lake?

Much of these programs are growing as they get more sophisticated equipment. Only hope is nce they done it for awhile some will quit.

[Cliff Wagenbach]

No quota for the Bois Forte band.

Fond Du Lac bands do have a quota, but on many lakes it is 1/2 of the DNR's safe harvest quota. That would be around 32,000 pounds for them on Vermilion!

Cliff

[delcecchi]

No quota for the Bois Forte band.

Fond Du Lac bands do have a quota, but on many lakes it is 1/2 of the DNR's safe harvest quota. That would be around 32,000 pounds for them on Vermilion!

Cliff

I think the ruling for the ceded lands by the judge is that the native americans were entitled, as a group including any eligible bands, to up to half of the safe harvest level.

In the case of Mille lacs, that includes several bands from Wisconsin as well as the locals. Fon du Lac sold their portion to the DNR as I recall.

[StillFishin']

I'm confused by some of the latest posts. I could be wrong but previously there were posts were that Boise weren't netting on LV and that they stopped the Millac band from netting. Now a post that they(Boise)

So it may it's just me, but I'm cufusssed on what's going on.

StillFishin'

[Cliff Wagenbach]

I'm confused by some of the latest posts. I could be wrong but previously there were posts were that Boise weren't netting on LV and that they stopped the Millac band from netting. Now a post that they(Boise)

So it may it's just me, but I'm cufusssed on what's going on.

StillFishin'

The Boise Forte Band has always netted Vermilion. They live on the lake.

Fond Du Lac does not live on this lake but decided to net it as their treaty gives then that right if they wish to exercise it. Many of their netters are actually from Wisconsin!

The Boise Forte band and The Fond Du Lac band came to an agreement and the Fond Du Lac band agreed not to net on Vermilion at this time.

Cliff

[Sculpin]

In addition, Fond Du Lac has returned to Mille Lacs, and it appears their harvest has been primarily night spearing. Although there were still gill nets in the lake as of this morning, not sure which band is still harvesting. The Mille Lacs band, and at least five WI. bands net and spear Mille Lacs.

[laker1]

The Fond Du Lac band has been one of the more aggressive bands as far as traveling around Minnesota or Wisconsin in doing these activities.

[northender]

In addition, Fond Du Lac has returned to Mille Lacs, and it appears their harvest has been primarily night spearing. Although there were still gill nets in the lake as of this morning, not sure which band is still harvesting. The Mille Lacs band, and at least five WI. bands net and spear Mille Lacs.

I hear nets were scattered all over in the Wealthwood area last night at Lake Mille Lacs. Both north Garrison and Wealthwood accesses have multiple Band boats and trucks at them today according to my contacts over there. They say the tubs are full of walleyes. One group for sure is from the Bad River Band. Even in a crisis state, the Bands still gill net during the spawn without Mn. DNR making any attempts to stop it.

Why would things be any different at Vermillion in the future?

[BringAnExtension]

Even in a crisis state, the Bands still gill net during the spawn without Mn. DNR making any attempts to stop it.

The DNR has absolutely no say in the matter. The courts have ruled on the subject.

[upnorth]

I hear nets were scattered all over in the Wealthwood area last night at Lake Mille Lacs. Both north Garrison and Wealthwood accesses have multiple Band boats and trucks at them today according to my contacts over there. They say the tubs are full of walleyes. One group for sure is from the Bad River Band. Even in a crisis state, the Bands still gill net during the spawn without Mn. DNR making any attempts to stop it.

Why would things be any different at Vermillion in the future?

This is a federal issue, the State of MN, much less the MNDNR has no say it what happens. None! Pointing fingers at the MNDNR is a total waste of time. The Treaty that allows them netting etc was signed with US govt not the state of MN.

[northender]

This is a federal issue, the State of MN, much less the MNDNR has no say it what happens. None! Pointing fingers at the MNDNR is a total waste of time. The Treaty that allows them netting etc was signed with US govt not the state of MN.

[upnorth]

Quote:

FYI--Ask Tim Faver, former Beltrami county attorney--who dictates to him/the county attorney's office, how illegal Tribal harvest is dealt with. The Mn. AG. --so go figure...

The real key word there is illegal.

Historically the courts have sided with the Native Americans when it comes to Treaty rights. Most likely the MNDNR doesn't want to fight a battle it pretty much knows it is going to lose.

[northender]

]

The real key word there is illegal.

Historically the courts have sided with the Native Americans when it comes to Treaty rights. Most likely the MNDNR doesn't want to fight a battle it pretty much knows it is going to lose.

[upnorth]

They have done what they should do. They give notice to where they are going to net, they give Law Enforcement every opportunity to legally stop them.

I will repeat myself. Could very well be they don't want to start a battle they may not and may very well open a can of worms they can't contain.

I am going to go on record saying that I really am not in agreement with the way Tribal Fishing is going, actually a few years back(well more than just a few) when things started heating up with netting dang near got in to a brawl about it at a bar. Fortunately calmer heads prevailed.

What I do know is our govt signed an open ended contract with the Native Americans giving them certain rights in return for peacefully turning over rights to land. I can see where our govt doesn't want to go back on that agreement.

[northender]

I wonder if the Gov. officials at the time of signing the so called "open-ended agreements", intended to allow EXCLUSIVE TRIBAL RIGHTS OVER AND ABOVE THE REST OF THE U.S. CITIZENS ( does not say that anywhere ). Or--did they simply intend to allow the Tribal members to subsist via what was typical ways and means of ALL U.S. citizens at the time of the signings/agreements. Hmmmmm.....

In all other legal cases, the INTENT/SPIRIT of the law is how the courts rule. But if it is about Tribal rights, no one looks back at the INTENT of the law at the time of making the law.

My bet is someday the INTENT of those signings will take legal precedent. The ongoing needless Tribal greed we see nowadays will be the beginning of the end.

[upnorth]

Legal harvest is sustenance harvesting.

Was what is today their intent, probably not. Most likely figured they would just assimilate. But that is not what happened in some cases. Not everyone want to throw their heritage away for "progress". right or wrong, I just don't think the president or congress want to go down that path, at least not anytime soon.

[northender]

And sadly, your "Legal harvest is sustenance harvesting." is baseless/needless and fraud--in place only to flaunt those unintended rights. That is what gill netting is at Vermillion and all over the land.

I am done ....

[laker1]

Gull lake mentioned above is in no treaty area what so ever. Tribal members only have the right to fish like the rest of Minnesota citizens.

[northender]

laker1--read the first paragraph of this piece form the Bemidji paper in 2010. The map they offer virtually covers all north of Interstate #94.

BEMIDJI – Leech Lake and White Earth Ojibwe bands want to co-manage all northern Minnesota resources with the state of Minnesota, asserting treaty rights allowing that.

That goal became clear Monday in a letter from Leech Lake Tribal Chairman Archie LaRose to state Natural Resources Commissioner Mark Holsten to call off a hastily arranged meeting which would have been this morning in St. Paul.

The meeting was set in reaction to a statement last week that tribal members planned to assert their treaty rights to hunt, fish and gather by illegally fishing on Lake Bemidji May 14, the day before the official walleye season opener.

Tribal leaders, however, later urged that there be no protest, that tribal officials were working for a diplomatic solution. Both Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Holsten were unaware of the desire to exercise treaty rights, thus today’s meeting.

“I regret that a tribal member attending our ongoing 1855 (treaty) meetings went to the press before you or Governor Pawlenty were provided this notice,” LaRose wrote Holsten. “Our legal director anticipated to get in front of the story but could only clarify potential objectives and outcomes of the 1855 meetings that had not yet been presented to the Leech Lake RBC (Reservation Business Committee).”

The ongoing meetings have been held to discuss what the bands should do to exercise rights under an 1855 treaty that provides the right to hunt, fish and gather, and have been working in concert with the White Earth Band as both bands are in the 1855 territory.

LaRose, Leech Lake District Rep. “Ribs” Whitebird and White Earth officials have been holding 1855 Ceded Territory Rights Committee meetings for months, a Leech Lake Tribal Council statement said Monday.

The meetings are for “development of the options and strategies for Minnesota’s recognition of 1855 Ceded Territory hunting and fishing rights – just like those in the 1854 Ceded Territory and Tri-Band agreement with other MCT bands,” the statement said.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe in that case, ordering co-management of Lake Mille Lacs, the state’s premier walleye fishery.

“These are the People’s Rights,” LaRose said in the statement. “Too often many people are living in poverty and they could live healthier and earn a modest living with more resources available to them.

“Members of my family hunt, trap, fish, gather wild rice and medicines and make maple sugar – these traditions are important parts of our culture,” LaRose said.

“I know that tribal members are very interested in co-management of ceded territory resources and that an 1855 off-reservation fishing code has been drafted and nearly ready for presentation to Leech Lake and White Earth reservations to consider adopting,” LaRose wrote to Holsten.

This week, all six bands of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe will hold their quarterly meeting and LaRose said he wants to gain input. “My plan is to meet face-to-face with White Earth elected leaders to develop our joint approach for our meeting with you,” LaRose stated.

He added that it would be “premature” to meet today on the issue.

“As tribal chairman, we want to be good neighbors and continue to build on the positive relationships we already have with local governments: tribal, county and state,” LaRose stated.

He included a copy of a research paper written by American Indian legal issues attorney Peter Erlinder, William Mitchell College of Law, on the exercise of off-reservation usufructuary treaty rights in all of northern Minnesota. He requested that the Pawlenty administration submitt a written response to the research.

“In Minnesota, on-reservation tribal sovereignty has been recognized with respect to functions similar to state government civil functions, such as the regulation of gaming, auto registration, traffic regulations, sale of tobacco and other state-regulated commodities, on-reservation enforcement of tribal conservation regulations, and state court enforcement of tribal civil judgments,” Erlinder writes in the introduction to the report.

“However, the recognition of off-reservation hunting, fishing and gathering usufrucuary rights have not kept pace with the development of on-reservation tribal civil regulatory sovereignty issues,” he wrote.

Erlinder proffers that the most important way to recognize off-reservation rights “in all of northern Minnesota will be recovery of the political and economic sovereignty rightfully do the Anishinabe Nation in areas of Minnesota ceded to the United States in the 19th century, which the state of Minnesota has failed to honor during most of the 20th century.”

The paper “accurately reflects the correct legal analysis supporting off-reservation rights to hunt, fish and gather for tribal members in the 1855 Ceded Territory,” the statement says.

“The governor states his position in the news last week, so we need to see a response from DNR to Erlinder’s paper so we have the issues we need to resolve identified ahead of time, so we can talk about the problems,” Whitebird said.

Tribal members have been seeking to exercise the treaty rights for years, the statement said.

“It’s not about the money,” LaRose said. “It’s about recognizing our rights as tribal members so I have asked Commissioner Holsten to wait on meeting until we first meet with MCT tribal leaders and get a written response to Erlinder’s paper.”

The 1855 Committee next meets May 6 at Mahnomen, Minn., and LaRose said he wants a Leech Lake public hearing on May 7’

The Bemidji Pioneer and the Herald are Forum Communications Co. newspapers.

FYI-- the "fishing code"

spoken to above lists all the lakes they intend, someday, to net/spear.

[northender]

Gull lake mentioned above is in no treaty area what so ever. Tribal members only have the right to fish like the rest of Minnesota citizens.

Take a peek at this:

http://minnesotahumanities.org/Uploads//...%20Treaties.pdf

Treaty of Washington also known as the Treaty with the Chippewa (10 Stat. 1165) was a treaty conducted in on February 22, 1855, in Washington, DC between the United States and the Pillager Chippewas and the Mississippi Chippewas. The treaty was ratified on March 3, 1855, and proclaimed by the President on April 7, 1855.

In this treaty, the two Ojibwe groups ceded a large tract of land covering northwest Minnesota, excluding the northwest-most corner of Minnesota, retained their usufruct rights upon the land, and had nine small Indian Reservations established for the said groups:

Pillager Chippewas Cass Lake

Leech Lake

Lake Winnibigoshish

Mississippi Chippewa Gull Lake

Mille Lacs Lake

Pokegama Lake

Rabbit Lake

Rice Lake

Sandy Lake

Of these reservations, Rice Lake Indian Reservation was never established. Gull Lake, Pokegama Lake and Rabbit Lake Indian Reservations were extinguished. Later, the three Pillager Chippewa Reservations were consolidated to form the Greater Leech Lake Indian Reservation.

That's it--I am out this thread now...but had to add these tidbits of info to clarify what I was saying above.

[laportian]

Here is a treaty area map. Why you so mad dude? Would a few Natives harvesting game, fish, or rice really have an effect on you, other than being butt hurt cause they are harvesting per their right to? I've been to a couple of the 1855 Treaty Commission Meetings and they are far from plotting anything major. Mostly a bunch of grass root/tribal dissident types jawboning over it all. Two years ago they got on a kick about not buying state ricing permits to harvest in our treaty area. I heard there are a few guys that got ticketed by state co's over in Itasca County last year for not having state permits. None have gone to court yet, seems like the Beltrami deal where the county will stand down as they know they can not win. But anyhow, all these rights to harvest were never given up. The kicker here though is who is off harvesting ? No one. We really don't have it together as a group or tribe or whatever to really go too far forward with anything to fast. Counties are actually playing this stuff smart by not going to court. Tribes would win and that actually could get the tribal governments involved which in turn could lead to actual harvesting etc.