[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 76 (Thursday, June 3, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6389-S6390]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
EDUCATION OF INDIAN CHILDREN
Mr. DASCHLE. I will use my leader time this morning.
This is the cover of a recent Parade magazine. The man in this
photograph is the great-great-great-grandson of Sitting Bull, one of
the most extraordinary leaders America has ever produced.
His name is Ron. His horse is Thunder. He is part of the new
generation of American Indian leaders. He is a lawyer by training, but
education is his life's work. He is president of the Sitting Bull
College in Fort Yates, ND, on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, and
chairman of the President's Board of Advisors on Tribal Colleges and
Universities.
The subtitle of this article expresses a fundamental truth that
Sitting Bull taught and that people I talk with throughout Indian
Country still believe today: Education is the key to a better future
for the American Indian people. Education, more than anything else,
gives a person the power to determine his or her own destiny. It is the
most effective tool there is to relieve the grinding poverty that
exists today in too many tribal communities throughout America.
When Native Americans surrendered their lands more than a century and
a quarter ago, the United States Government promised to provide the
descendants of Sitting Bull and all Native Americans, free education,
health care and other basic necessities of life, forever. That is one
reason I am disturbed by the results of two new audits by the Interior
Department's inspector general.
The first audit reveals that, over a 3-year period, the BIA's Office
of Indian Education Programs used at least $5 million from a
contingency fund for non-emergency purposes, including staff retreats,
bean bag chairs, televisions and puppets. This misuse of contingency
funds shortchanged Indian schools of money they need for emergencies.
The second audit, which concerns the BIA school construction program,
also documents numerous examples of poor management and lack of
accountability. It found that Indian children are being forced to try
to learn, and their teachers are trying to teach, in schools that put
them at undue risk of injury because ``no one in BIA ensures that
school buildings are not occupied'' until hazards are corrected. That
is shameful.
This second report also found that 30 percent of the school
construction and repair projects it reviewed failed to meet the BIA's
own goal of completing design and construction within 3 years.
The IG made nine recommendations that it said could strengthen the
BIA school construction program and increase the program's benefits for
Native Americans. Those nine recommendations were included in a draft
copy of the report the IG gave to BIA officials for comment.
Incredibly, despite being given an extended deadline, Bureau
officials failed to respond to the draft. As a result, when the report
was released publicly, it noted that ``all nine recommendations are
considered unresolved.''
I do not know why the BIA failed to even acknowledge those nine
recommendations for improving the Indian school construction program; I
do not know if it was arrogance, indifference, incompetence or simply a
result of being overwhelmed. But I know that it is unacceptable.
The BIA operates or funds 187 schools in 23 States, including South
Dakota. Most of these schools were built in the 1940s or 1950s. Many
are decades older than that. Few are equipped to support computer labs
or other sorts of modern equipment that are now considered essential in
most school districts.
I have visited BIA schools where children had to place trash cans
beneath the holes in the roofs to catch the rain. I have been to BIA
schools in which cold winds whipped through broken windows. I visited a
school, which has since been replaced, in which neither the furnace nor
the bathroom plumbing worked. That is not keeping our promise to
educate Indian children. That is a disgrace.
The Cheyenne Eagle Butte School and dormitories on the Cheyenne River
Sioux Reservation in South Dakota were built by the BIA around 1960.
The floor tiles in both the school and the dormitory contain asbestos,
a known cause of lung cancer and emphysema.
To date, the BIA's remediation efforts consist of recommending that
the school ``keep the boiler room door shut'' and keep the floors waxed
so the tiles will not chip and flake.
Three years ago, the Cheyenne Eagle Butte School was first on the
BIA's priority list for school replacement. Then the BIA changed its
criteria, and the school dropped down on the list. Today, the tribe has
no idea when the school will be replaced.
Several weeks ago, I spoke on this floor about the Crow Creek Tribal
Schools in Stephan, SD.
Two years ago, Crow Creek's middle school was condemned and replaced
with modular trailers. The elementary school and high school still need
to be replaced. Throughout the high school, crumbling walls are
supported by steel braces; one can see exposed electrical wires.
The Crow Creek Council has been lobbying for money to fix the schools
on the reservation for 25 years. Recently, the Crow Creek school
superintendent received this letter from the South Dakota state fire
marshal. I have had it reprinted and enlarged here. I will quote:
[T]he buildings are dangerous and represent a threat to
life.
The State fire marshal ``strongly recommends discontinued use of
both'' the elementary and high schools.
Two weekends ago was graduation weekend at Crow Creek Tribal Schools.
The school had originally planned to hold the graduation ceremony
outside because the gym has been condemned--but it rained on graduation
day. So 1,500 people--the graduates, their families and friends--
crowded into a condemned gymnasium that threatened to fall down around
them.
I ask you, what other group of children would we allow to be treated
this way?
The BIA has committed to replace the Crow Creek gym--but it is
unclear when. Tribal officials had thought students would be playing
basketball in the new gym this fall, but the construction funds have
once again been delayed.
In the last several months, Crow Creek schools have experienced a
crisis of suicides among students. Mental health experts call such
episodes ``cluster suicides.'' Six young people on the Crow Creek
Reservation have killed themselves in the last 6 months--and many more
have tried. In April, there were 21 suicide attempts; the month before,
28. Last month, a 14-year-old girl tried to hang herself behind the
elementary school. She was discovered and cut down just in time. The
most recent suicide was a 19-year-old young man who had dropped out of
school. Had he stayed, he would have graduated last month.
Clearly, the suicide crisis at Crow Creek schools is not caused only
by crumbling schools. This is a complex crisis with very deep roots. It
involves public health issues and myriad other issues.
But what message does it send to young people when they are forced to
try to learn in a condemned building?
There are school buildings like the Crow Creek Tribal Schools
throughout the BIA system. All told, the BIA school construction
backlog is estimated at $1 billion. At the current funding levels, it
would take decades to get through that backlog.
In 2000, when he was running for President, then-Governor Bush met
with tribal leaders in New Mexico and promised to invest $1 billion to
fix crumbling BIA schools. Yet, the President's proposed budget for
next year cuts funding for Indian school replacement for the second
year in a row. That is wrong.
America's commitment to build new schools for children in Iraq and
Afghanistan is admirable, but it does not erase our treaty obligations
to provide good schools for Indian children in this country.
The JOBS bill the Senate just passed last month includes a promising
program that was first suggested by tribal educators in my State. The
program would allow tribal governments to issue school construction
bonds; the Federal Government would pay the interest and the principal
on the bonds.
[[Page S6390]]
The BIA school construction bond program would increase by about half
the number of BIA schools that are currently being replaced or repaired
each year.
Yesterday evening, I met with two officials from the Porcupine school
board on the Pine Ridge Sioux Reservation. Those two gentlemen are with
us this morning.
The grade school in Porcupine is 40 years old and overcrowded. The
foundation is unstable. The boiler is unreliable. There is no
cafeteria; the children eat their meals in the hallways.
The Porcupine elementary school is number two on the BIA's school
construction replacement list. School board officials say they have
been told that construction on a new school could start in July--not
this year, not next year, not the year after that, but in 2008--more
than 4 years from now.
The new Indian school bonding program would enable us to replace and
renovate more schools faster.
For the sake of the children at the Porcupine elementary school, and
all the children in crumbling and inadequate BIA schools throughout
America, Congress needs to get the JOBS bill--with the BIA school
construction plan--to the President and get this important program up
and running as soon as possible.
Once the law is signed, we are going to insist that the BIA report
regularly to Congress on how the BIA school construction program is
being implemented and managed. We expect progress and results. We will
not tolerate the lack of accountability that is documented in the two
recent audits of the BIA's Office of Indian Education Programs.
This chart says it so poetically and prophetically. More than a
century ago it was said the first time. Sitting Bull implored
representatives of the Federal Government:
Let us put our minds together and see what life we can make
for our children.
In that same spirit, we must now put our minds together and hold our
Government accountable to keep the promises it made in trusts and
treaties and laws to Native Americans.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
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