Well, it happened again. This month Leadership OK (LOK) was in McAlester instead of in Muskogee, but there was something familiar about what we heard and how the class reacted.

Last month, after a presentation by Neal McCaleb, President of “Transportation Revenues Used Strictly for Transportation” (TRUST) Coalition,  several members of my Leadership OK class expressed outrage at how poorly funded our transportation system is in Oklahoma. They were enthusiastic that we have designated money to this problem. It caused me to start thinking about the larger implications of this reaction. Read the rest of this entry »

Most people in this country today agree that indigenous tribes, who lived in the Americas before Europeans arrived, were treated less than fairly by their new neighbors. Unfortunately, the inequitable and inconsistent policies with regard to Native tribes are not strictly a thing of colonial or even early American history. Even into the second half of the 20^th century, the federal government implemented new versions of its on-again/off-again assimilation policies. These policies, often implemented without a full understanding of the differences between the tribes’ cultures and ways of self governance, proved to be hugely detrimental to the various tribal ways of life. Luckily, there has been a tremendous amount of resiliency shown in response.

Last week, as representatives from every Oklahoma tribe gathered in Washington DC for a Native American Summit, I gathered with the rest of my Leadership Oklahoma class in Tahlequah to learn more about Native American issues in Oklahoma. Read the rest of this entry »