There is always a first time – I got terminated – Retaliation at its best.
Let me elaborate a little more since I am not bound by them.
The Tribal Courts hears Confidential Children’s cases and other cases as well.
I don’t think the Council and the Executive Director are versed with Tribal Authority or their own laws.
Because the Tribal Social Services did not want to transfer a certain case from the State OCS, the extended family filed a petition with Tribal Court to get the case transferred. As a Court, we cannot pick and choose like the Administration on what case gets transferred.
When the Administration heard about the petition by the family in State Court, they brought their Tribal Attorneys in to fight so that the case would not get transferred. The Native Village of Barrow is one of two tribes in Alaska that has Exclusive Jurisdiction on our Children. The State Court system knows that authority and after a 4 month long fight, the Judge issued a transfer Order immediately.
Because the Tribal Council and the Executive Director were involved in a confidential Children’s matter, the Tribal Judges issued contempt Orders on them as well as the Tribal Attorneys. The Council did not like that and had a “Special council meeting” with no notice for the membership and no reason why they were having this meeting.
The next day, I was given termination papers. The Judges saw this as retaliation, they issued another contempt order, and because the Council and Executive Director did not like the 2nd contempt Order, they passed a resolution to remove me as a tribal court judge. I, never signed those contempt orders and there were reasons behind it, we had enough judges to sign them.
In the meantime, one council member has resigned because of all the unethical behavior by our tribal elected officials and Executive Director.
This brings our Tribal Government to a very critical stage. All those years that our past Tribal Council had worked so hard for, our past executive directors that worked hard to keep our Tribe strong, is being torn down by a few that know nothing about all that hard work and the authority that our tribe holds. We will lose it if we allow them to continue.
I hope our Tribal Membership is listening.
Your voice matters