modoc tribal meeting 012710

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Modoc tribal meeting is Friday

Separation proposal will be discussed

By LEE JUILLERAT, Herald and News 1/27/10

A group of Modocs interested in terminating their political relationship with the Klamath Tribes will host an informational meeting Friday in the Klamath County Government Center.

The meeting starts at 6:30 p.m.. in the hearing room.

About 30 Modocs, who are members of the Klamath Tribes, attended an inaugural meeting in October on a proposal to create a new Modoc tribal unit, according to Perry Chesnut, an adopted member of the Modoc Tribe. He said Friday’s meeting is for those who want to learn more about the separation movement.

Chesnut said Modocs need to end 136 years of subservience to the Klamaths.

“The only practical way to preserve the Modoc Tribe’s unique ethnic and cultural identity, and protect and advance the Modoc people’s political and economic interests, is to set up their own government, separate from that of the current Klamath tribal government,” he said.

Since that meeting, he said, some Modocs have gathered about 60 signatures supporting a proposal to create a Modoc tribal government.

At Friday’s meeting, M. Sean Manion, a Modoc who is a civil engineer and has spent the last seven years in Iraq managing various rebuilding projects, will present an economic development model used for Arab tribes in Iraq.

Manion believes the model can be used by tribal entities, including the Modocs, to create large tribally owned enterprises as well as smaller, individually owned business ventures.

Manion plans to discuss eligibility for tribal membership by contrasting the blood quantum standard now used by the Klamath Tribes with the lineal descent standard being used by some other tribes.

“I’m going to talk about the kind of businesses we could have given our land base,” Chesnut said, including the possibility of a casino resort near the Modoc Point area.

He also will present a map of Modoc ancestral lands ceded to the government in the Lakes Treaty of 1864 and discuss opportunities for economic development on those lands and the potential restoration of wetlands that constituted Lower Klamath Lake, Tule Lake and Clear Lake prior to reclamation projects of the early 1900s.

Chesnut and Manion will be available for a question and answer session following their presentations.