Maine tribal leader dies at 59 Lt. Gov. Saunders remembered fondly

INDIAN TOWNSHIP – Friends and family called her a great leader and a caring individual.

Lt. Gov. Phyllis M. Saunders, 59, died Tuesday at Calais Regional Hospital after a bout with cancer.

For eight years Saunders served on the Passamaquoddy Tribal Council. For the past seven years she has been lieutenant governor at Indian Township.

“It’s a big loss,” Gov. Richard Stevens said Thursday. “She has been a friend, godmother and my hunting partner.”

The governor said Saunders enjoyed the outdoors. “I am not sure how many moose she’s killed, but I think it’s probably over 10,” he said. He said he and Saunders would hunt together “to a point where I couldn’t keep up with her.”

A moose rack that measures at least 58 inches across hangs in the conference room at the Indian Township tribal office. Stevens said the rack was from a moose that Saunders bagged.

Stevens said Saunders was a leader who helped him greatly during his first term in office. “She has helped keep the community moving forward,” he said.

In her obituary, Stevens and Pleasant Point Gov. Rick Doyle were referred to as “her two special boys.”

“Losing Phyllis is losing part of our tribal family,” Doyle said. “She was a mother of four, yet her maternal instincts were extended to many other members of the tribe. Her leadership position was well-deserved; she made our government more loving, human and real for all Passamaquoddies. I will miss her physical presence deeply, yet I know part of her spirit will always be with me.”

Pleasant Point Lt. Gov. Eddie Bassett said that with Saunders’ death, the tribe had lost a person who was clearly interested in battling the opiate drug problem on the reservations. “She saw [opiates] as very destructive,” Bassett said. “She was of the age when she had seen a community that did not use these drugs. She saw the difference, and she definitely wanted to do something about it.”

Stevens said Saunders was determined in her battle against drugs on the reservation. He called it “Saunders’ war on drugs.”

Bassett said that with her death, part of the tribe’s history also had been lost. “She was very fluent in the language, and any time we lose a fluent speaker it is a definite loss,” he said.

Elizabeth Neptune, director of the Indian Township Health Center, said, “Phyllis was a true leader all her life. She was always willing to help anyone who needed it until her last days. I will miss her.”

In 1998, when it appeared that politics might divide the Indian Township reservation, it was Saunders who offered conciliatory words and helped heal the breach.

“We are a unique people who should never allow ourselves to become affected in the process,” she told the Bangor Daily News at the time. “Our people are few, and the few we have should work together and be counted as one. We don’t need to form a destructive pattern for our children to follow. Instead, let’s understand each other, and let no one stand alone.”