Our ancestors and parents sacrificed their lives, time, money and property to protect the inherent rights of all tribes especially their own which was Puyallup . They went to jail, were beaten, had their fishing gear and their means to make a living for their families, confiscated. Their parents empowered them to speak out against tyranny, dictatorship and to protect the inherent rights of their peoples, to protect the future, to ensure that our grandchild has a tribe. TO HAVE A VOICE!

WE AS THE INDIGENOUS PEOPLES OF THIS LAND, and who were made trustees by the United States of American through your treaties do hereby request your assistance to protect the TREATY RIGHTS AND TRIBAL ASSETS that are now controlled by the elected leaders of the Puyallup Tribal Council.

Our grievances are as follows:

1. The Puyallup Tribal Council uses casino revenue to purchase their re-elections. Through personal loans, salary advances, housing fix up and whatever anyone with a voting block wants. This is a blatant violation of our election code which states in section 9.03.730:

WRONGFUL CONDUCT : “any person who uses menace, force, threat, deceit or other corrupt means at or previous to election held pursuant to the laws of the Puyallup Tribe of Indians, toward any voter to hinder, deter, pay or deceive such voter from voting or to influence his or her vote at such elections shall be guilty of a crime as proscribed by the Puyallup Tribal Criminal Code.”

And the election process is being hindered and deceived by moving the voting polls before elections.

2. Certain Tribal Council member have exceeded, through salary advances, allowable wages. Essentially, receiving more wages than their current term of office would allow. Their wages are split between tribal revenue and indirect costs.

3. The tribal council has established departments that are not functional to the tribe, but have staff that are over paid and under qualified, Travel, funeral & medical, per capita staff and Property Manager formally known as Cascade Casino.

4. We as concerned members of the future of the Puyallup Tribe have made several attempts to take our grievances directly to the Tribal council to no avail---they deny us meetings, censor the minutes, deny us our civil rights, freedom of speech, freedom of the press and freedom to assemble.

5. One council member received a down payment from the housing authority even though she exceeds the qualification which we (as the Puyallup Tribe) are being fined by HUD for 1.6 MILLION DOLLAR SETTLEMENT. This same councilmember who was a director of a program received a $20,000 check from this tribal council because she failed to pay her IRS taxes.

It is perceived by many that if current tribal employees voice criticism that they may be terminated, thus placing a chilling effect of the entire work force.

This tribal council has placed the Puyallup tribe in deeper dept than any prior council. They have nothing to show for this enormous deficit. As soon as the tribe make another loan or shows an advance in money they spend it by giving themselves raises and making it retro pay. Thereby getting a check for over $25,000.00 in the year 2004, (AS AN EXAMPLE).

We have no alternative than to demand help from the outside. We are asking for an in-depth investigation into the Puyallup Tribal Council mismanagement and exceeding their moral authority to the People of the Tribe.

If you have any questions or would like to meet with us please don't hesitate to call us, time is of the essence as they just signed another Bank Loan and this will be gone quickly.

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