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Ph.D. Steven Haberfeld, Indian Dispute Resolution Services Executive Director, sends scathing letter to Klamath Basin Alliance and off-Project representatives. Response is from a KBC editor, and not from Bartel, Nicholson, or Klamath Basin Alliance.
(there have been a few changes by the contributing editor in the response to Haberfeld)
From: Steven Haberfeld <steven@indiandispute.com>
To: thebasinalliance@yahoo.com
Sent: Wednesday, May 21, 2008 10:34:35 AM
Subject: FW: INVITATION - Tribal member Philip Brendale speaks on KBRA
 
To: 'klamathfish@hotmail.com'; 'mstopher@dfg.ca.gov'; 'abaggett@waterboards.ca.gov'; 'alan.r.dale@state.or.us'; 'Alexandra_Pitts@fws.gov'; 'belsky.dennis@deq.state.or.us'; 'brian@nccsp.org'; 'caknight@jps.net'; 'chairman@hoopa-nsn.gov'; 'ckaras@mp.usbr.gov'; 'cnota@fs.fed.us'; 'corbett4@aol.com'; 'Darla_Eastman@fws.gov'; 'dheinrich@waterboards.ca.gov'; 'DKoch@dfg.ca.gov'; 'erica@yournec.org'; 'FISH1IFR@aol.com'; 'greg@kwua.org'; 'greg@yournec.org'; 'guyphil@ix.netcom.com'; 'hotroot2@cot.net'; 'jdepree@co.siskiyou.ca.us'; Mohiswaqs@aol.com; 'jgeist@co.humboldt.ca.us'; 'jhicks@mp.usbr.gov'; 'jim.lecky@noaa.gov'; 'kirk.miller@resources.ca.gov'; Larry Dunsmoor (lkdunsmoor@aol.com); 'Larry_Finfer@ios.doi.gov'; 'lyle_marshall@hotmail.com'; 'mary.s.grainey@wrd.state.or.us'; 'mhampton@dfg.ca.gov'; 'Michael.Carrier@state.or.us'; 'nmurray@dfg.ca.gov'; 'parroyave@mp.usbr.gov'; 'phillip_detrich@fws.gov'; 'ptb92day@gmail.com'; 'RKANZ@waterboards.ca.gov'; 'ron_cole@fws.gov'; 'SFRY@mp.usbr.gov'; 'shirley_gammon@or.blm.gov'; Gary Bess (bess@sunset.net); 'steve.edmondson@noaa.gov'; 'STurek@dfg.ca.gov'; 'suzanne.knapp@state.or.us'; 'thoward@waterboards.ca.gov'; Will Hatcher; 'bullman3@earthlink.net'
Subject: RE: INVITATION - Tribal member Philip Brendale speaks on KBRA
 
Dear Frank Wallace, Ed Bartel, Roger Nicholson, and the Klamath Basin Alliance:
 
P 1 I just received your invitation to come and listen to Philip Brendale to speak about the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement and lend weight to your opposition. 
 
P 2 The Settlement Agrement that you so vehemently oppose was crafted by a cross-section of stakeholders in the Klamath Basin who spent huge amounts of their time and money to talk the problems through, to put the old grievances aside, and to come up with a way to live and work together in relative harmony. After two and a half years of open hearted and sincere regard for people who had different interests, over twenty-five different stakeholders found a way to put together a package deal that would work to some satisfactory degree for all concerned.  The Agreement is fair and balanced with everyone giving up something significant in exchange for something in return that would help offset the sacrifice they have made.  These parties were constructive and creative and were tired of the rancor, the lengthy and costly court battles, the nasty behaviour that hurt peoples sensitivities and undermined relationships.  They sought a different way of solving problems, and should be heartily congratulated.
 
P 3 You were invited to participate in this wholesome activity but instead you were never prepared to participate in the "give and take" of the negotiation process.  You did not listen and look for common ground like everyone else did.  You stuck to your non-negotiable demands and failed to learn another way of being. It is clear now that you were driven by your baseless hatred of the Indian people who have lived in the Klamath Basin for centuries, since "time immemorial" according to the courts. It is clear now that no proposal could have satisfied you short of taking the Klamath Tribes' water and giving them nothing in return.  The whole basis of your relentless opposition to this hard won settlement is that the Settlement Agreement set aside certain benefits for the Klamath Tribes just as was done for every other participant in the negotiations.  Because of your hatred for the Indian people and your narrow context, you are willing to reject a Settlement Agreement that has solved some very thorney problems, a Settlement Agreement that promises to bring predictability and economic viability to the agricultural community, that promises to restore water quantity and quality that will benefit tens of future generations of your fellow citizens, that will bring back the natural beauty and health of the rivers, lakes, springs and streams, and that will restore eco-systems in ways that will once again support fish and wildlife.    
 
P 4 Thanks but no thanks.  Philip Brendale has for years had his own private axe to grind but he is not entitled to come to the Klamath Basin area to lend your distorted arguments and deliberate misinformation any credence.  He does not realize how you are using him, and you should be ashamed for doing so. The truth should be known.The Klamath Tribes were terminated in 1956 by the federal government. The Tribes were deprived of their land base and means of economic livelihood--they were forced to sell over 1.2 million acres of rich timberland. Much of it ended up in the hands of private landowners and the rest went to the federal government to manage.  This policy of "termination" was later judged to be misguided and the Congress restored the Klamath Tribes to full legal status in 1986. No land was returned, however, and the Tribes have had to complete their own restoration process. Purchasing private forest lands as part of a comprehensive economic development strategy is a right all citizens in a democratic country enjoy. To begrudge the Tribe from doing so, to falsely attribute ulterior motives to the Tribe for having an interest in private forest land, only reveals that your motives are not pure and that you have learned nothing from your fellow citizens who chose to embrace uniquely American values, to treat all people with dignity, and to finally bury race prejudice once and for all.     
 
Have the courage to look into your heart and discover and dissolve the hatred that is eating at you. You will be healthier and happier men for it.
 
Steven Haberfeld, Ph.D.
Executive Director
Indian Dispute Resolution Services, Inc
1621 Executive Court
Sacramento, CA 95864
(916) 482-5800
(916) 482-5808 Fax
 
"Working things out by talking things through"

 

From: Ed Sheets [mailto:ed@edsheets.com]
Sent: Tuesday, May 20, 2008 8:47 AM
To: Subject: FW: INVITATION - Tribal member Philip Brendale speaks on KBRA

 

I am forwarding information about a meeting sponsored by the Klamath Basin Alliance.

 

Sent: Monday, May 19, 2008 4:51:52 AM
Subject: INVITATION - Tribal member Philip Brendale speaks on KBRA, brought to you by Basin Alliance

INVITATION

 

The Klamath Basin Alliance, Inc. invites you to a meeting on the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement featuring tribal member Philip Brendale.

 

MAY 27, 2008, 7:OO P.M. at Shasta View Grange
(Corner of Shasta Way and Madison)

 

Expert in tribal law and Federal Indian Policy (FIP), Cowlitz Tribal member Philip Brendale, grew up on Indian reservations. As a young man, he watched the obstacles that tribal government placed before his grandfather as he exercised his legal right to transfer his allotted land to fee land.

 

As a result of these injustices, Philip has studied FIP, tribal government and court case histories for 45 years. He took the Tribes to the United States Supreme Court and won the Brendale case, a ruling that gives zoning jurisdiction to counties.  He also won a district court case allowing non-tribal members to access roads and private properties within a closed section of the Yakima Reservation where they had been denied access.

 

Philip's wife Sandra has been an activist for the rights of citizens for nearly 17 years. She attended school in the middle of Indian Country and is an Eagle Forum trained lobbyist and media expert with extensive experience. She hosted a local TV show for three years, IF NOT YOU…THEN WHO? She taught others how to lobby from home and often took viewers to lobby in person. She headed several citizens' committees and is Yakima's leading taxpayers' advocate.

 

Brendale has also mentored and advised citizens' groups on how to prevent tribal expansion and how it affects communities economically and socially. Philip and Sandra founded "Brendale Belzer, Federal Indian Policy Trouble Shooters."  He mentored Cherokee, Elaine Willman, author of  Going to Pieces; the Dismantling of the United States of America, regarding tribalism and tribal law. Administrator for the town of Hobart, Wisconsin, Willman served as chair for CERA/Citizens for Equal Rights, was a member of Toppenish City Council, and a teacher in the Masters Programs of Public and Business Administration. With a 15 year career in city planning and administration, she encourages all city and county representatives to attend Bredales's presentation. "You must protect their constitutional, civil and property rights from inappropriate goverment decisions, whether from federal, state, county, city or tribal governements. Government decision-making is a very seperate issue from respect for culture".

 

Philip will explain how tribal expansion, the purchase of 92,000 acres of the Mazama Tree Project included in the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement with federal funds for the Klamath Tribes, would affect all citizens of Klamath County. The Tribes could place this property into federal trust thus paving the way to an interagency trade with the U.S. Forest Service for up to 690,000 acres of their old reservation which they previously sold. Sandra will tell us what we can do about it.

 

The future of our community is at stake so please join us for an interesting evening with the Brendales.  There will be an opportunity at the conclusion of the presentation for comments and questions.

 

The Klamath Basin Alliance, Inc. Frank Wallace, Chairman
541-798-5759
541-882-6562

 

5/24/08

To PhD Steven Haberfeld from a KBC News editor,

FYI, KBC News, Klamath Basin Crisis, is the Voice of Klamath Irrigators and their Community, voices of farmers, ranchers,
miners, loggers and fishermen. We allow peoples' voices to be heard because we believe in America, even if they do not all have the same opinions.

First, the Brendale presentation was an invitation only meeting since the room is small. Your invitation did not come from Basin Alliance (BA) but by someone who was invited, who sent this to their email lists. Basin Alliance will try to first accommodate their invited guests, then if there's room others may attend. You did not receive an "invitation to come and listen to Philip Brendale to speak about the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement and lend weight to your opposition" because I don't think anyone at BA had ever heard of you before your letter. We hadn't.

We at KBC know that Off-Project representatives Edward Bartell and Roger Nicholson are not part of the decision to bring tribal member Philip Brendale to talk in Klamath Falls about tribalism and tribal expansion and the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement. They have never met the man or corresponded with him as far as we know. They are invited to attend by BA as were several other interested community members.

BA invited Philip to speak. You say in your Paragraph 3 that they "were invited to participate in this wholesome activity of creating an agreement." We at KBC saw the Klamath Settlement protest VIDEO where Roger's group was not allowed at the settlement table. Basin Alliance was not allowed at the table either, however the Klamath County Commissioners assured them that a land gift to the Klamath Tribes would not be decided in another closed-door negotiation as attempted a few years ago.

It is apparent in your P3 that you write this letter as a venue to blast Bartell's point of view in the Settlement meetings, as he is the only one you address in this letter that attended those settlement sessions. We at KBC are not seeing a connection with why you are detailing your dislike for Bartell in a letter about Brendale, when Bartell has nothing to do with Brendale, BA's invitation, or Brendale's appearance here.

Philip Brendale is 100% Native American and is a tribal member who was not allowed access to his property by a corrupt tribal government, took his case to the Supreme Court and won. You say BA is "using him" in one sentence, and say "he is not entitled to come to the Klamath Basin area..." in another.

Philip must be an intelligent man if he won a Supreme Court case, so I doubt he would allow us farmers and ranchers to "use him." But if you fear for his welfare, perhaps you should warn him of BA's "prejudiced" "hateful" intents.

Why would you state that Brendale is not "entitled to come to the Klamath area?" Has tribalism expanded so far that you have the power to tell us who we can invite and what race or opinion they may have? Perhaps some farmers and ranchers would like to hear people other than those you want to permit us to talk to. In our America, freedom of speech is not a "racist" "hateful" sin.

If BA has "race prejudice" and "hatred," why, Dr. Haberfeld, would they invite an Indian to speak to us about documented effects of tribalism and tribal expansion? 

You are correct in saying the Tribes sold their land base. If you had done your homework you would know that they voted to sell. There was one man who did not sell his land; they had a choice. Our generations of families, some tribal, live here and have a memory of these things.

You state: "Purchasing private forest lands as part of a comprehensive economic development strategy is a right all citizens in a democratic country enjoy" or we are "race prejudiced" if we don't agree. Does that mean that since we whites sold land, the federal government should buy it for us again, and if you don't agree, that makes you "race prejudiced?"

The Klamath Tribes have spoken openly of wanting to expand gaming and their land base, create logging operations and power production, enforce their senior water rights that they want, and trade a federal land gift for the Winema Fremont National Forest. When you state in P 4, " to falsely attribute ulterior motives to the Tribe for having an interest in private forest land, only reveals that your motives are not pure..." seems a bit judgmental and unfair when in fact they have stated their motives.

In P 3, among other claims, you state that, "Settlement Agreement that promises to bring predictability and economic viability to the agricultural community..." Since the Upper Basin has given up around 100,000 acres of ag land in the Upper Basin already, and of the 50,000 that remain of their surface irrigated land, the settlement agreement demands 30,000 acre feet more. Their cattle industry had been decimated already, and evaporation has doubled the water use by making swamps. Yes, there would be "predictability" that ag would mostly vanish. Where would their "economic viability" come from?

How does your bullying by name calling and character assassination of our neighbors gain the confidence of all parties?

It seems you and others have such a fear of people listening to voices other than their rulers, you are resorting to some ugly tactics.

Ph.D Steven Haberfeld, Executive Director, Indian Dispute Resolution, we don't need your hostile treatment of our fellow farmers and ranchers who want to keep farming and ranching, and want to live side by side with our neighbors, the Klamath Tribes, with equal rights for all, and not for rights based on race.

 

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