Lee Pulaski, lpulaski@wolfrivermedia.com
Leader Photo by Lee Pulaski Menominee Nation supporters leave the tribal offices Friday morning armed with signs urging Gov. Scott Walker to reconsider his rejection of a proposed casino in Kenosha. Among the marchers were students and staff from Menominee Tribal School who carried signs signalling that a Kenosha casino might help to improve the school.
Leader Photo by Lee Pulaski More than 200 Menominee tribal members walk along state Highway 47-55 in Keshena on Friday morning with signs showing their support for a Menominee casino in Kenosha and urging Gov. Scott Walker to reconsider his rejection of the project.
Many members of the Menominee Nation are unhappy with Gov. Scott Walker’s rejection of a proposed $800 million casino in Kenosha, so they’re marching to Madison to have a word with him.
The rub is that Walker’s office in Madison is 156 miles from the tribal offices in Keshena, where the march started Friday morning.
That is not deterring tribal officials from marching for a casino they believe would be the catalyst to help lift the tribe out of poverty. More than 200 tribal members marched from the tribal offices to the College of Menominee Nation, and about two dozen are continuing the trek for the rest of the way, armed with signs urging Walker to reconsider his decision, tribal drums and a spirit staff adorned with eagle feathers from seven tribal families.
Walker told The Associated Press in January that approving the casino would put Wisconsin at risk of losing hundreds of millions of dollars due to terms of a compact with the Forest County Potawatomi Tribe that prohibits a new casino within 30 to 50 miles of the Potawatomi’s lucrative Milwaukee casino, the state’s largest.
The Potawatomi oppose the Kenosha project, saying it would cut into their profits, and last year withheld a $25 million payment to the state when it appeared the Kenosha casino may be approved.
The Menominee Nation offered to put up a $275 million bond to protect the state from any losses.
After Walker rejected the Kenosha plan, the Menominee Nation offered to pay the state’s contribution, estimated at $220 million, for a new arena for the Milwaukee Bucks if Walker reversed his decision on the casino. Walker said the arena is needed to keep the Bucks from leaving the state.
Menominee leaders say the casino revenue is needed to provide health care, education, housing, justice and infrastructure to more than 9,000 of its tribal members.
At a rally held before Friday’s march, Joey Awonohopay, director of Menominee Language and Culture, said that the journey to Madison was a historic event similar to the tribe’s fight for sovereignty. Walker’s rejection of the Kenosha casino is a threat to the tribe’s sovereignty, he said.
“Over four decades ago, our grandfathers, our grandmothers, our uncles, our aunties, our moms and our dads marched to Madison, and they fought for our self-determination and our right to be re-established as a sovereign nation of this state,” Awonohopay said. “Back then, it was a senator from a different state that put the roadblocks up in front of our people. Today, it is the governor of our own state.”
It is not the Menominee way to hate those who have wronged them, Awonohopay said, and tribal members are hoping the march will be seen as a sign of friendship with the state.
Gary Besaw, Menominee tribal chairman, said the march is not meant to be a protest but rather a sign of tribal members’ determination to move into the future.
“This is a march to call attention to the misinformed and misguided decision handed to our people,” Besaw said. “It’s a march to Madison to remind Governor Walker that we are a sovereign nation, the longest continual residents of Wisconsin, and deserve to be treated on a nation-to-nation basis.”
The tribe is expecting to pump $1.2 billion into the state’s revenues if a casino is accepted, and a new casino managed by Hard Rock Cafe, based in Florida, is expected to provide more than 10,000 jobs, Besaw said. The jobs would benefit Menominee County, which has the highest unemployment rate in Wisconsin, as well as the counties in southeast Wisconsin, he said.
Besaw said that much of the path tribal members will travel over the next several days will be ancestral Menominee land. He pointed out that the tribe is resolute to lobby for reconsideration right up until the Feb. 19 deadline Walker has for a final decision.
“When things go wrong, when things go bad, we know that we stand up for each other and that we are one,” Besaw said.
Prior to the tribe’s decision to march to Madison, officials with the Walker administration had indicated a change of heart from Walker was unlikely.
“The governor made a decision, and we’ve moved on,” state Department of Administration Secretary Mike Huebsch told The Associated Press.