CALIFORNIA INDIAN OVERSIGHT HEARINGS TUESDAY, AUGUST 28, 1973 UNITED STATES SENATE, SUBCOMMITTEE ON INDIAN AFFAIRS, OF THE COMMITTEE ON INTERIOR AND INSULAR AFFAIRS, San Francisco, Calif. The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 9 a.m., in courtroom 3, U.S. Appeals Court, San Francisco, Calif., Hon. James Abourezk presiding. Present: Senator James Abourezk. Also present: Forrest Gerard and Sherwin Broadhead. Senator ABOUREZK. The hearing of the Senate Subcommittee on Indian Affairs is now in session. OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES ABOUREZK, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA This is an open public hearing before the Subcommittee on Indian Affairs to take testimony from Indian people and others interested in Indian affairs. The hearing today, for the most part, has been organized to receive testimony from individuals actively involved in urban Indian work. The committee is aware that California, perhaps more than any other State in the Nation, has attracted large numbers of reservation Indians to urban settings where the prospects of employment were considered to be better than the traditional reservation areas. Unfortunately, not all of the Indian people migrating to urban areas possess the necessary academic and vocational skills to compete successfully in the highly competitive society of metropolitan centers. The same social ills manifested on reservations and in Indian communities are prevalent among urban Indians. This hearing represents the first formal action of the Senate Subcommittee on Indian Affairs to explore this important problem in the Indian field. We look forward to receiving your testimony on the urban Indian problems and the manner in which you have sought to deal with such problems. Rather than scheduling a specific bill before the subcommittee, this hearing has purposely been structured on an open forum basis to accommodate the Indian people and others who will be testifying today. It is my belief that this type of hearing will provide a better opportunity for the committee to hear directly from the Indian people on those issues and problems that you consider to be of major importance in the Indian field. If any of the witnesses desire to address their com(239) ments to specific legislative measures pending before the committee, your comments in this regard will be welcomed. There is no need for me to impress upon the audience that the Indian people and the Government together are faced with a formidable challenge in their joint efforts to improve the social and economic conditions of Indian people wherever they may reside. Our committee is dedicated to fulfilling its role in this undertaking and the extent to which we are able to fulfill this role will depend to a large degree on the kind of record we develop through hearings such as this. Because of our desire to hear testimony from as many witnesses as possible, we have requested each witness to present his testimony within a specified period of time. Your cooperation in this regard will insure that all witnesses will have an opportunity to be heard. However, I want to emphasize that your written statements and other pertinent documents submitted for the official hearing record will appear in full when the hearings are printed. Before calling the first witness to the table, I want to express my extreme pleasure at having the opportunity to bring the subcommittee to you today and to meet many of you in person. The first witness is Mr. Sam Eaglestaff, of the American Indian Center in San Francisco. Mr. Eaglestaff, is Mr. Moya here? STATEMENT OF SAM EAGLESTAFF, DIRECTOR, AMERICAN INDIAN CENTER, SAN FRANCISCO, CALIF., ACCOMPANIED BY PAUL MOYA Mr. MoYA. For the record, Senator Abourezk and members of the audience, my name is Paul Moya, representing the American Indian Center today. I am speaking to Senator James Abourezk and the audience. Much of what I am about to say has been said, at other times, in other places, in English, and every known tongue to the Amerindian, known as "the forgotten American." It is society's common assumption that the majority of us here are Indians. I can never be but what I am and I suppose we can all blame society and Columbus for depriving the people in India of their rightful name when he was lost and started a label and definition of the term Indian. It should be further understood that society today has and wants vivid illustrations of the native American. But who wants a still image? What impressiveness does a still image make unless non-Indian people of every race, color and creed understand that to every definition of poverty, and educational, economic deprivation, there must be a start-not the stepping stone start that all other people have developed in using the native American to achieve their needs. Look at the penal systems with abundant men and women now incarcerated. In Washington-Montana-Arizona-MinnesotaNorth Dakota-South Dakota-and juvenile halls, unwed mothers, absent fathers, the lowest health, education and welfare standards, must I go on? Yes, native Americans suffer, they get sick, they also die. Just recently, one of my classmates at U.S. Berkeley could not go immediately to the spirit world because there were no moneys at the local bureau and Sacramento area offices in transporting and caring for his body in South Dakota. Yes, there are nonbenevolent, un-American bureaucracies of a general so-called American content that have been approached by the native American bereaved, just to send a body home. By now, you are probably wondering, what is this speaker going to do after his dynamite effort and patterned appeal? If my dignity is contagious here today, those of us who are free to pursue the truth should damn sure be able to assume responsibility in that the Washington people from GS-4's all the way up to 15's and 16's, supposed Indian leaders, native American law firms, self-styled rhetoricians, and those of us and you that don't holler for the half a meal that the true-native American man, woman and child has been deprived of. Example-high, technical and skilled professions, day care centers for the young and old so that the children of well intentioned native Americans can forget that they are labeled and defined as so-called minorities in that they can have day care centers, decent meals, and proper counseling and guidance before today's errant society guides them wrong. This half a meal I speak of will someday make a full meal for native Americans in rural and urban societies, only if we, together understand that through trial and error, someone-anyone with BIA-Better Indian Aspirations or those with technical collegiate expertise, true cultural heritage and attorneys, and our elders, will see that tax moneys are helping native Americans to help themselves. ExampleThursday, August 23, 1973, the Small Business Administration in Washington exceeded $500 million in 1972, the General Services Administration doled out a minority firm award of $5,767,000, Federal contract money for a new U.S. Courthouse in St. Thomas V.I., a blackowned Virgin Island firm. The news release is dated August 14, 1973. All the moneys awarded were for so-called minorities and I have always dreamed of small business native Americans on and off reservations. [The news release referred to follows:] [News Release] U.S. GOVERNMENT, GENERAL SERVICES ADMINISTRATION, MINORITY FIRM AWARDED $5,767,000 FEDERAL CONTRACT A $5,767,000 contract for construction of a new U.S. Courthouse and Federal Office Building in St. Thomas. Virgin Islands, was awarded to Luther Benjamin Associates, a black-owned Virgin Islands firm, the General Services Administration announced today. The contract is the largest ever awarded by the Federal Government under special provisions of Section 8(a) of the Small Business Act. Arthur F. Sampson, head of GSA, cited the contract as, "a milestone in GSA's cooperative efforts with the Small Business Administration to encourage growth and development of firms owned by socially or economically disadvantaged persons. President Nixon has emphasized the 8(a) program as a means to help minority firms become successful competitors in commercial as well as government markets," Sampson added. The Courthouse and Federal Office Building will be located within the Barracks Yards Urban Renewal project, Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, the Virgin Islands. The four story, brick faced structure will house the U.S. Courts, Department of Interior, and nine other agencies which will be consolidated from their present locations in Charlotte Amalie. The building was designed by the joint venture of H. D. Nottingham and Associates, Inc. and Reed, Torres, Beauchamp and Marvel of Arlington, Va. Section 8(a) of the Small Business Act permits the Federal Government to award contracts to a minority-owned firm on a non-competitive basis for up to three years. Contracts are awarded to the Small Business Administration, which then sublets them to the minority firm. GSA has awarded more than 1,200 service, construction, concession and manufacturing contracts to minority-owned firms under the program since its inception in 1969; total value of these contracts is more than $103.7 million. The Charlotte Amalie contract is the second major construction contract awarded by GSA under the 8(a) program. A $3,375,947 contract for construction of the Las Cruces, N.M. Federal Office Building and Courthouse was awarded in November 1972 to the joint venture of Urban General Contractors and Engineering of El Paso, Texas and Carlos Blanco, Inc. of Las Cruces. [From the Oakland Tribune, Aug. 23, 1973] HALF-BILLION INVESTED IN MINORITY BUSINESS WASHINGTON.-Small Business Administration investment in minority business development in 1972 exceeded $500 million, the SBA reports. This compares with slightly more than $300 million in 1971. Mr. MoYA. Let's face it, the Bureau should be like a chain of shining links, hard working native American links, that work for native Americans and not for the Bureau. The general population is still asking, "Will native Americans ever become integral parts of society's mainstream?" Within the native American realm, it cannot be done by exchanging hardships, inter-personal squabbles, damage, challenges for ease, comfort, and security. Hell-just because Watergate can, doesn't mean we have to. As an interesting and important sidepoint, how about alcohol? Just because alcohol is the No. 1 killer and deterrent for American betterment, doesn't mean that native Americans should perpetuate a drunken stereotype, nor is it fair to well-intentioned native Americans when Bureau employees cringe at their superiors because militants and so-called wards of the Government want action now on matters that must go through an appointed one by the President of the United States. Why should well-intentioned native Americans be deprived, while bureaucracy-do-gooders and detrimental forces cause antagonistic feelings for the whole American population? Don't you think that the native American will shortly enter into a state of consciousness in which the individual ego disappears into self-help programs in every conceivable field of academic and cultural control both on and off reservations? What about political deterrents to non-Indian lawmakers before unexamined official versions become the power to define and label the American Indian. Example, jail for the native American criminal who doesn't know what the great American dream means, and last but not least, praise for the practitioner. As students of this so-called American system, shouldn't we compete so that we are no longer voices crying in the wilderness? I won't even mention the cutback amounts from the Nixon administration on self-help tax moneys that the native American sometimes sees. Have you heard this message to Congress of July 8, 1970, on American Indians? Check it out. It was a beautiful dream. Now, when we speak of American Indians that cry, yet shed no tears, I am reminded of the time that I was declared the best under |