Defending Abenaki identity

[Okwes]

www.vermontguardian.com/local/0105/AbenakiChildren.shtml

Defending Abenaki identity
Tribe decries attempt to remove their name from state contract
By Maryann Ullmann | Special to the Vermont Guardian

Posted April 15, 2005

Although the ties of modern Abenakis to their ancestors are being
politically challenged in Vermont, it is the future of their youth that
has them most worried.

The Vermont Attorney General's office has edited out the word
"Abenaki" from a state contract between the University of Vermont
Department of Social Work and the Vermont Department of Children and
Families, formerly known as Social and Rehabilitative Services. The
contract deals with a program meant to ensure Abenaki foster children
get placed in homes that honor their heritage and culture.

"We're not naive here," said Abenaki Child Welfare Project
Coordinator Gary Widrick, "but we were surprised they did this in a
unilateral fashion without talking to us."

Chief Assistant Attorney General Bill Griffin told the St. Albans
Messenger that he was responsible for the change. He said contracts
like this can be used to fulfill Bureau of Indian Affairs criteria for
the pending Abenaki federal recognition petition, which he says could
lead to land claims and casinos.

"It's racism," responds Chief April Merrill of the St.
Francis/Sokoki band of Abenaki in Swanton. "He's trying to erase
our culture and our heritage." A press release issued by the tribe
declares Griffin's action as an attack that "seems to target
indigenous Vermonters' most endangered resource - their
children."

The Abenaki Child Welfare Project got off the ground in 1993 when
Abenaki leaders expressed concern that too many of their children were
ending up in foster care outside of their community, losing their way,
and dropping out of school or winding up in jail. The project takes
preventative measures by training social workers and foster parents in
"cultural competency knowledge" which helps them understand and
respect the need for Abenaki youth to maintain cultural and community
ties.

"You don't just pull a kid out of the Abenaki community and find a
warm bed for them anywhere in the state and hope for the best," said
Widrick.

He said it breaks their connection with the culture, and they can
become disaffected and angry. Widrick pointed out that this affects
everyone in Vermont, because if they end up in the criminal justice
system, they become the responsibility of society.

Approximately 50 percent of children who wind up in DCF custody are
Abenaki, according to Jeff Benay, chair of the Governor's Advisory
Commission on Native American Affairs.
"To the Abenaki, young people are sacrosanct," said Benay. "The
future is with the children - to have opportunities their elders
never had. That's why this is so painful."

A syllabus for a UVM course developed with tribal members quotes an
Abenaki elder: "Culture is not just about survival for Indians
nowadays, but a path to guiding our youth to a better future."

Widrick said that while UVM stays out of the politics, it has to work
within the context of a long struggle for social justice between the
Abenaki and the state of Vermont that continues to the present day.

The fear, common among tribes, is that over time, native children are
more likely to be adopted by Anglo families, he said, and that over
time, Native American culture will wither away. "It's not an idle
threat. Historically, that's been the case. There's a lot at
stake."

Throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the federal
government took native children away from their homes and put them in
boarding schools as part of a policy of assimilation. In the 1950s and
60s, the national Adoption Project again took native children away from
their homes, placing them with primarily white families.

In Vermont, said Benay, the Abenaki have been through the genocide of
the 1860s and eugenics movement that began in the 1920s. "And now, in
the year 2005, it's frightening for them in terms of the
similarities," he said. "As a Vermonter, I can understand their
concern."

"Bill Griffin says his responsibility is to protect all
Vermonters," Benay added. "But you look back at the language used
by proponents of eugenics and see similarities. This is very, very
scary."

The federal Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 was passed to reverse the
trend of policies like the Adoption Project, ensure sovereign tribal
jurisdiction over custody of their youth, and protect them from
insensitive state agencies and social workers. But ICWA only protects
federally recognized tribes.

Tribes without federal status must rely on cooperative programs like
the Abenaki Project to keep their young in the community. The project
is viewed both nationally and internationally as a creative and
successful model.

The Abenaki Project was arranged through UVM so that the state would
not have to contract directly with the tribe. It uses federal funds,
and the contract has run for five years using the word "Abenaki"
with no previous objections.

"Out of nowhere, the Abenaki contacted me and said they got some
disturbing news that the language of the contract has been changed,"
said Benay. "It was absolutely numbing in terms of how frightening it
was that every reference to the Abenaki was deleted and replaced by
'indigenous', 'Native American,' or 'Indian Education.' It
was outrageous."

Widrick said that he was concerned that this might affect the
Abenaki-specific nature of the cultural competency trainings, but UVM
received adequate assurance that nothing would change before signing
the contract. They plan to iron out the language deviation in next
year's contract.

Benay said the governor's office had no prior knowledge of the
language change and is investigating the feasibility of changing it
back.

Meanwhile, the Abenaki have sent a letter to the Vermont Human Rights
Commission in hopes that the incident can be addressed as a human
rights violation. But while the commissioners may be sympathetic, their
ability to act may be limited since the Abenaki do not have even
minority status.

After three hearings, Vermont Joint Senate Res. 9, which recognizes the
Abenaki people as a minority group, is still sitting in the Senate
Economic Development, Housing and General Affairs Committee - even
though the majority of senators are cosponsors. Committees have buried
similar resolutions in the past.

"Bill Griffin has been making the same argument for years, scaring
legislators," Benay said, mentioning land claim and casino fears. He
charged that Griffin is using this as an excuse to change the contract,
even though the tribe has other adequate documents to fulfill federal
recognition criteria. "This is all part of the campaign saying the
Abenaki don't exist."
"I'm Abenaki, and I'm not going to disappear when Bill Griffin
takes the word 'Abenaki' out of things," said Chief Merrill.
"Whether we're state or federally recognized or not, I'm still
Abenaki."