TRIBAL GAMBLE

Gov. John Baldacci’s veto of Penobscot Nation plans to install slot machines on Indian Island has grabbed headlines. But tribal frustration with state officials goes way beyond gambling. The Legislature’s failure to make meaningful updates to the tribes’ status and a massive cut to the commission that provides the only formal link between the state and the tribes fueled that frustration. But severing tribal ties with the state won’t help the situation, and will actually move both the state and the tribe in the wrong direction.

Rebuilding the Maine Indian State Tribal Commission, with both money and good will, is necessary to move both the tribes and the state forward.

Earlier this month, Gov. Baldacci vetoed a bill to allow the Penobscot Nation to install 100 slot machines. The Legislature failed to override the veto. Gov. Baldacci vetoed the measure because he believes all slot machine proposals should be voted on by the public. The tribes may dislike his stance, but he has been consistent.

Penobscot Nation Gov. Kirk Francis responded by saying his tribe would sever relations with the state and may install the slot machines anyway. Both would be counterproductive. Gov. Francis also has positive ideas, such as a legislative committee or cabinet-level position to coordinate tribal issues, that merit further consideration.

After voters in 2003 rejected tribal plans to build a casino in southern Maine, the Penobscot Nation and Passamaquoddy Tribe left the Maine Indian Tribal-State Commission. It was more than a year before they returned to MITSC, which has since gained strength and had proposed a set of changes to the act that sets the framework for tribal and state interaction.

Those changes were the result of the Tribal-State Work Group, which was made up of lawmakers, representatives of the state’s five tribes, gubernatorial representatives and the chair of MITSC. The group examined the need for changes to the Maine Implementing Act, which resulted from the 1980 Maine Indian Claims Settlement Act.

Among the recommended changes the group agreed on were requiring state agencies to consult with the tribes before changing state laws, regulations and policies that effect the tribes; exempting the tribes from the state’s freedom of information law; and requiring mediation by MITSC before taking a dispute to court.

The changes were mostly set aside by the Legislature, which only enacted a recommendation that largely put the Maliseet Tribe in Aroostook County on the same footing as the state’s other tribes.

At the same time, lawmakers cut funding for MITSC by more than half. The tribes view the massive budget cut as a unilateral decision that the commission is not valuable, leading the tribes to also withhold funds.

While the state should not respond to threats from the tribes, $38,000 is a small amount to pay to stop a further deterioration of tribal-state relations. Improvements in tribal-state relations have been painfully slow and not always straightforward. But what is needed now is not threats and walkouts but a renewed commitment to look for economic development beyond gambling and to reconsider changes in policy that will benefit the tribes and the state.