As the readers may recall in a previous Native Sun Times issue reports came out on excessive Tribal Council travel. Expenditure reports on the Tribal President Theresa Two Bulls and Council Representatives Barbara Dull Knife from Oglala, Kim Clausen from LaCreek, Sonia Weston from Wakpamni and Robin Tapio from Pine Ridge districts all have unreported travel expenses totaling in excess of $320,000.00.

According to Tribal Ordinances also known as “Tribal Law” and while working as a tribal employee, prior to making any trips you must submit a Request for Travel Advance or TA. The TA will identify where you are going, how much it will cost and the purpose for your travel request. Once processed the traveler will receive a 100% advance travel check and is supposed to use that to make the necessary trip for whatever reasons.

Once the traveler returns they are to submit what is called a Travel Report or TR and all of their motel receipts. The TR is a form that is used to report the activities, contacts and progress that the traveler made while on the trip and the motel receipts are proof positive that the traveler actually made the trip.

In terms of the Tribal Program employees, if they don’t submit their TR’s when they return from a trip they will have the travel money deducted from they’re pay checks almost immediately by the Tribal Contracts office, by the Financial Accounting Office (FAO) folks or by the Program Director. This is the incentive they have to insure the trips were actually made and that tribal business was actually conducted as proposed in the Travel Advance request.

In terms of the Tribal Council, the FAO and Tribal Contracting office folks never and I repeat never question or report any type of travel expenses that were taken by council representatives. Why? Because they will get threats from those council representatives who are delinquent in they’re reporting and may end up losing their jobs! This is exactly what happened to our recent Treasurer. The result; we have runaway travel expenses that total nearly 320 thousand dollars from 5 council members. What about the rest of the council members? There are 19 of them altogether. I’m not saying they are all delinquent with reporting their travel because some of them don’t like to travel at all. But the majority of them are delinquent with their travel reports.

What is the impact of not properly reporting your travel expenditures in a timely manner? The traveler can pick up a Travel Advance check and go spend all of it at the local casino or go to Wal-Mart and spend the entire travel check or go anywhere else and spend the travel money as they please. Some of money can be put into the bank in a savings account owned by the individual council reps or they can simply go home and keep the money for a rainy day. Why? Because they don’t have to report anything. This is why there are checks and balances established in the system, but when Council Representative abuse those laws who is responsible? So now we currently have 320 thousand dollars worth of documented Travel Advances that 5 council representatives did not submit Travel Reports to account for their travel activities. It’s like handing them a blank check and saying; “go spend our Tribal funds anyway you want to and don’t worry, we don’t need reports.”

Myself and several other individuals approached the FBI in Rapid City with documents proving excessive travel and unreported Travel Advances being made by these 5 council representatives. The FBI said they didn’t have authority to prosecute and suggested that we go to the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) and tell them. I ended up going to the OIG by myself and they were pretty concerned but wanted to know how much of the money was actually federal funds vs. Indirect Cost funds. So I showed them how to read the reports and how to find out the differences. A few weeks later I got a letter that indicated the OIG was not going to take the case and referred me to the BIA. Then the acting Regional Director at Aberdeen BIA sent me a letter indicating that I should “take up that tribal matter directly with your Tribe’s internal forums.” So basically the feds don’t care. The “tribal internal forums” are controlled by the Tribal Council representatives who are (some, not all) the very one’s guilty of mis-spending travel funds. You go around the circle and end up back where we started with the folks who are the perpetrators.

What is the impact of the fed’s decision? This means that nobody including program folks should have to submit any Travel Reports. This means that every tribal employee who makes trips can collect the Travel Advance checks and go anywhere they please to spend the money and not have to report where they have been. If our elected leaders are doing it and can get away with it, then why can’t everyone else? The delinquent council members are leading by example and unfortunately they are leading the Tribe into huge debt with travel expenses.

What is the solution? I would suggest that Travel Advance checks be restricted from 100% to 80%. Once the traveler returns and submits the Travel Reports they will get another check for the remaining 20%. I would also suggest that Tribal Council pass an ordinance that prevents council members from traveling if they do not submit Travel Reports from the previous trip. In other words, if they owe travel reports then they can’t travel at all until they submit those reports. I also suggest that all the travel money that is unreported be taken from the council members pay checks starting immediately and if those council members harass individuals from FAO or the Tribes Contracting office or anyone else involved in the recovery process, that they be suspended from council immediately. I, for one am very tired of the games Tribal Council members play with our lives and if I have to I will stand up alone against them for the benefit of everyone else. This is what true leaders do.

If you look at Ordinance 92-12 which is the Tribes Organizational Structure you will see that the Tribal members and the Tribal Constitution are above the Tribal Council and even more important you will see that the Districts are above the Tribal Council as well. Yet the some of the Tribal council members act as if they are supreme beings and above the law. If all the district officers came to a council meeting and told the Tribal Council to pay the travel money back, the Tribal Council would have no choice. According to Ord. 92-12 the Tribal Council does not have any power or authority over the Districts as a whole. Remember, when those Tribal Council members took travel money and didn’t report it, they stole money from each and every one of the Oglala Sioux Tribal members. Be strong and stay safe, ignore the illusion and fight for the truth.