Hello, I’m Alex Trebek. Are you ready to guess the questions, contestants?
We’ll take ‘Oneida Tribal Housing’ for $200, Alex.
Oh, goody! Let’s make it a true Daily Double.
HERE’S THE CLUE:
Wait… what?
$5+ Million reimbursement from the Oneida Business Committee to HUD?!
Or else the Oneida Tribe has to go 3 Years without any HUD Funding?!?!
REALLY?!?!?!
That will cost the Oneida Tribe as much or more than Artley Skenandore, and Oneida Seven Generations Corporation, and the Oneida Business Committee flushed away with Nature’s Way Tissue!!!
Hmm.
As you ponder the Clue, here’s some ‘thinking music’ from the album ‘Kihnspiracy‘:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF9uuobnAOA
“HUD funds in jeopardy, baby.
. . . Oooh-oo-ooh-oooh!”
Psst. Here’s some hints!:
Tribal CFO Larry Barton Didn’t Tell General Tribal Council / GTC The Truth About The Finance Committee & the Oneida Business Committee Paying Tribally-Owned Oneida Total Integrated Enterprises (OTIE) Too Much To Build HUD-Funded Tribal Housing, including the 8 Elder Cottage units that OTIE forgot to install plumbing for washing machines in, which is estimated to cost an additional $115,000.
- (Sources say that OTIE’s contract was finally reduced by over $700,000 in April 2015, well after the January 2015 GTC Meeting when CFO Larry Barton claimed it was already under HUD’s limit.)
- Nevertheless, OTIE still wanted the Tribe to cover those additional costs created by OTIE’s own negligence, and now we’re supposed to trust OTIE to build a gas station?
Or did you know about OTIE ‘winning’ (haha) the contracts to design and to rebuild the new Hwy 54 OneStop?
The Highway 54 OneStop Casino is currently scheduled to shut down on September 20, and the last day of the Retail operations is scheuduled for September 29.
Demolition work and replacement of two underground storage tanks (UST) is slated to begin sometime in October…
even though the Highway 54 OneStop Project Planning Team’s recommendation to delay that project until next Spring has been overruled by Who Knows?, and the OBC is now rushing to get OTIE’s contracts for demolition, underground storage tank removal & hazardous soil remediation going ASAP… despite these facts:
- OTIE doesn’t have a final design nor a final guaranteed maximum cost;
- the contracts approved by the Finance Committee & the OBC contain clear conflict of interest involving OTIE Board member Wayne Metoxen being listed as the Tribe’s ‘Project Manager‘;
- Gaming staff were told at the beginning of August that the Hwy 54 OneStop would be shut down on AUGUST 17, but employees pushed back against that foolish plan (which had been promoted to management by Communications Director Bobbi Webster) because the Tribe had NOT even given any form of notice to the State of Wisconsin’s regulatory bodies about the closure of a gaming facility nor of a gas station;
- (In fact, Kalihwisaks already had a big article ready to go to print that had to be cancelled and the newspaper’s layout re-edited at the last minute after gaming staff informed PR Dir. Bobbi Webster and Retail Div. Dir. Michele Doxtator that their plan to shut down the Hwy 54 OneStop on August 17 was impossible, which was the reason behind the delay in the publication of the August 6 Kalihwisaks in which there was still no mention of any plans to the community)
- the EPA’s Region 5 Wisconsin Tribal UST Programs Lead Kevin Hill told Oneida Eye’s Publisher that he hasn’t heard from any official of the Oneida Tribe in months;
- and the current plan as stated is to dump as much as two feet off the area’s surface termed ‘poor soil’ from the OneStop to “Oneida’s Adams Road site” next to the Oneida Tribal Cemetery, which is near the area designated as ‘Where The Water Birds Nest’ and a ceremonial sweatlodge in an environmentally sensitive wetlands area
…as was explained along with other problems to the OBC at the August 17, 2015 OBC Regular Meeting by Oneida Eye Publisher Leah Dodge right before the OBC recklessly approved the contract with negligent OTIE anyway.
Click here for an MP3 excerpt of the detailed explanation to the OBC of the faulty contract with OTIE which the Finance Committee & the OBC approved, plus lame excuses by Tribal CFO Larry Barton (although he does admit that the canopy over the Hwy 54 OneStop gas pumps poses a danger to customers and their vehicles, and has stated that the building and the current UST’s are past the lifetime of safe use.)
How many more wasted millions will this new fustercluck by the OBC and the Finance Committee cost the General Tribal Council of the Oneida Tribe of Indians of Wisconsin?
Questions for the THURSDAY SEPTEMBER 10 OneStop Hwy 54 Public Meeting, 5:30 P.M., Norbert Hill Center – 2nd Floor – OBC Conference Room:
- What was HUD investigating on the Oneida Reservation recently?
- Why did the OBC not allow HUD access to certain Oneida Housing Authority offices? (or was it the Office of the Inspector General/OIG?)
- Why is reinstated OHA Executive Director Dale Wheelock not allowed back into his office?
- Who is in charge of and responsible for the Oneida Tribe of Indians of Wisconsin’s Tribally Designated Housing Entity (TDHE)?
- Does HUD’s investigation involve work done by or contracts with OTIE?
Oneida Eye expects the OBC to be exactly as forthcoming about those questions as they were about questions asked by Oneida Eye’s Publisher at the November 15, 2014 GTC Meeting regarding an investigation into the Oneida Housing Authority by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
By which we mean, the OBC will most likely totally ignore any questions and continue to pretend that everything is fine.
Yet even OBC Chair Tina Danforth’s staff are denied access to public information, as explained by the OBC Chair in comments to Oneida Land Claims Commission member Amelia Cornelius at the Thursday August 27, 2015 continuation of the arrestingly interesting & exciting Wednesday August 26, 2015 Oneida Business Committee Regular Meeting, which is definitely worth a listen to in its entirety.
Here’s what OBC Chair Cristina Danforth had to say about Land Claims employee Jennifer Stevens refusing to even have a meeting after requests for access to public Tribal records by the OBC Chair’s newly appointed Senior Policy Advisor, Dawn ‘Mitzi’ Moon (Mineau) Kopetsky:
If the OBC Chair has to go grovelling to a Commissioner to get access to Tribal documents being illegally withheld by Tribal employees, what chance do GTC members have to avail themselves against violations of their civil rights given an OBC & OBC Chair & OBC Chief Counsel determined to keep GTC in the dark while continuously violating GTC’s rights?
The SATURDAY SEPTEMBER 12 GTC SPECIAL MEETING, 10 A.M., Oneida Casino/Radisson Hotel & Conference Center works, too. It kicks off with a continuation of the ‘Litigation Update.’
That should be interesting.
As will be the MONDAY SEPTEMBER 21 GTC FY-2016 BUDGET MEETING, 6 P.M. at the Radisson.
(Why would the OBC schedule any GTC Meeting on a Monday – not to mention a topic as big as a $450+ Million Tribal BUDGET – when the OBC claimed they wanted to amend the Constitution to avoid Monday meetings? Most likely because the the OBC is nakedly corrupt and afraid that GTC will realize OBC Treasurer Trish King’s budget team’s work is little more than another FY to GTC. ..and act accordingly.)
UPDATE: GTC’s FY-2016 BUDGET MEETING will be CONTINUED ON NOVEMBER 14, 2015.
See also:
UPDATE:
OBC Chair Cristina Danforth’s newly appointed Senior Policy Advisor, Dawn ‘Mitzi’ Moon-Kopetsky, has informed Tribe members that Tina’s outgoing Executive Assistant Mary Graves (who’s moving to an Internal Audit position that some wonder if she’s qualifed for) will be temporarily replaced by Lora Skenandore, which would seem to be the elected Oneida Gaming Commissioner who on September 1, 2015, was found guilty of Welfare Fraud.
- October 19, 2016 U. S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development’s Final Report, On-Site Monitoring Review of Oneida Tribe of Indians of WI, by the Eastern/Woodlands Office of Native American Programs (E/WONAP) Grants Evaluation Division, William O. Dawson III, Director
May 23, 2017 UPDATE:
- May 23, 2017 Federal Indictment, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, Case No. 17CR92, United States of America v. Jay L. Fuss [Fmr. Oneida Housing Authority Construction Supervisor]
THE GRAND JURY CHARGES:
1 . Beginning in approximately September 2012, and continuing thereafter until at least May 2013, in the State and Eastern District of Wisconsin,
JAY L. FUSS
as an agent of an Indian tribal government that received benefits in excess of $10,000 in a one-year period from a federal grant program, did knowingly obtain by fraud, and convert without authority to his own use, and intentionally misapply, property valued at $5,000 or more that was under the care, custody, and control of the Indian tribal government and its agency.
- September 29, 2017 Information, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, Case No. 17-CR-92, United States of America v. Jay L. Fuss [Fmr. ONWI Housing Authority Construction Supervisor]
- September 29, 2017 Change of Plea Hearing Minutes, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, Case No. 17-CR-92, United States of America v. Jay L. Fuss [Fmr. Oneida Housing Authority Construction Supervisor]
- January 3, 2018 Sentencing Minutes, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, Case No. 17-CR-92, United States of America v. Jay L. Fuss [Fmr. ONWI Housing Authority Construction Supervisor]
