Calif. casino tribes kick out some members

SAN FRANCISCO — Two casino-owning tribes in California have thinned their membership ranks over the last several months, cutting off scores of people from a share of casino profits and other benefits of tribal membership.

Officials with The Picayune Rancheria of the Chukchansi Indians and the Pala Band of Mission Indians say the former members' ancestral blood lines disqualified them.

Critics, however, have a different explanation: greed.

They accuse tribal officials of trying to increase their share of profits from their casinos, a charge that tribal officials vehemently deny.

Many expulsions have occurred around the country, but they are particularly numerous in California, where many tribes reconstituted over the last several decades then entered the casino business, advocates say.

Exact expulsion figures are hard to come by, but Laura Wass, Central California director for the American Indian Movement, estimates that about 2,500 tribal members have been purged since 1997, most in California.

The Chukchansi, owners of the Chukchansi Gold Resort and Casino in the Sierra foothills near Yosemite National Park, have expelled dozens of members since around November. The Pala Band of Mission Indians in northern San Diego County — owners of the Pala Resort and Casino — expelled more than 150 people on Wednesday.

Still other tribal members have had their benefits suspended through banishment — the fate recently of several members of the United Auburn Indian Community, operator of the Thunder Valley Casino Resort outside Sacramento.

Expelled and banished tribal members can be cut off from thousands of dollars in monthly stipends and other benefits. With the tribes claiming sovereign status, experts say these people have little recourse to challenge tribes' enrollment decisions in courts.

"Native people to this day have no voice," Wass said. "We can't go anywhere with this to get human rights or civil rights upheld."

Nancy Dondero, 58, said she lost a $1,000-a-month stipend and her daughter, Nikah, stopped receiving college funding and had to drop out of California State University, Fresno when she and her family were removed from the Chukchansi tribe in November.

"I know who I am," Dondero said. "I know who my dad is. I will always be Chukchansi."

Dondero traces her heritage back to her great grandfather, Jack Roan. Tribal officials say a 1929 application with the state and Roan's own will list him as Pohoneechee, a Miwok band.