MARK THE DATE: Mike Black from the BIA to hold a meeting in person and online on September 9, 2015 at 11:00 a.m., CSDT to bring the Headright owners up to date on what is going on with the OME: See http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/08/25/bia-director-discuss-issues-involving-mineral-estate-sept-9/
Why is the Chief inviting the enemy into our camp? The Chief didn't join us in our litigation and he shouldn't be interfering now. What is it that Mr. Black will be discussing with us if he won't be able to speak about the matters involved in litigation? The Chief should not be meeting with our adversary while litigation is ongoing. The Chief has not invited the Osage County Oil and Gas producers to attend. Why do we have to learn about these matters from the Tulsa World as I did? No communication with the Shareholders or producers as usual.
Where is the outrage? Really? The Chief is in the middle of our litigation without a dog in the fight! He may be exposing himself to liability by this interference. The OMC and the producers are in very serious and expensive litigation against this enemy which will have lasting affects on the Shareholders; and the Chief jumps in to possibly sabotage our efforts? Why do the Shareholders put up with this obstruction? Too lazy? Too scarred? Too trusting? I guess most of the Shareholders have given up and rolled over; accepting their fate which is going to be the total destruction of the ME.
The Shareholders are waiting for Tinkerbelle I guess. They have not assisted the producers and failed to support them in their litigation after numerous please to contribute to their legal fund. Shame on the Shareholders. As a Shareholder I couldn't be more embarrassed. We Shareholders appears as cheap ass, dumb ass, blanket ass Indians. An truth be known, we just recently proved it.
We'll get what we deserve soon. No production royalty checks, a Chief with an agenda not in our best interest and thousand of unplugged wells left by the oil producers we forced out of business. Get ready, it's starting to happen.
Our OMC is planning an oil and gas summit. What a joke! Idiots!
Both of you could not be more wrong. First and foremost there are shareholder's who understand exactly what is going on and have supported the Producers. Second, you have to realize only 1% of Osages live in and around Osage County. Ok maybe 10% of Osages. Then you have no communication with the moral majority of Osages who are not aware or even Subscribe to the Osage News. And this newspaper is impartial and or biased. In addition this is why you only see a few who post here it is because they, most shareholder's are not aware of this site. The question is you can complain about what another person is not doing, what is it you are doing. Most people are in a predicament between a rock and hard place financially. Most Osages are still working people or possibly older and cannot afford to take the time off to picket for their benefit. I retired early in 2006. I did not know we had a Newspaper. I did not get my Vote to become a Government. This is no accident how we became a de facto government. It was planned with one phone call right Mr.Redcorn. And I can assure you that their are alot of other shareholder's who did not get their vote.
Why don't you contact the remaining 99% of the Shareholders and let them know what's going on? Be sure to ask them to contribute to the Osage Producers' defense fund while you're at it. The OMC's sorry attorneys road the coattails of the OPA's lead in the August 10th hearing. At the hearing, I felt embarrassed for the OMC's legal counsel. Really pathetic performance. Tom Frederick's law firm should give their fees to Lee Levinson's firm for saving the day.
What is Mike Black's reason for accepting the Chief's invitation to Osage County? What is he planning to discuss outside of the most important issue at hand, being the federal government's attack on the Osage Tribe of Indians? He can't discuss the oil and gas issue during pending litigation so is he coming to talk about third-rate bingo casinos or to assist in increasing tobacco sales? Maybe he is coming to give Robyn Phillips an award for successfully destroying the oil and gas industry in Osage County.
This is a continuing Shareholder discussion past the courtesy notification of the Mike Black meeting so please take any further comments to the Shareholder web page on the Osage Blog at http://osageblog.blogspot.com/2015/08/osage-shareholder-matters-august-2015-ii.html Thank you.
About the Healthcare ON Compact if we are hurt or misdiagnosed or given incorrect medication or otherwise harmed, will this apply too?
On compacting the OME by the Osage Nation, Under the Osage Nation Constitution, Article IV, Section 4. Remedies: No person shall be entitled to an award of monetary damages, as a form of relief, in the Osage Nation Trial Court for ANY VIOLATION OF THESE RIGHTS; unless the Osage Nation Congress may by law provide for monetary damages as a form of relief for such violations, when relief would best serve the interest of THE OSAGE NATION (the entity not an Osage member or Osage shareholder) or that of justice (for whom? Justice for the Osage Nation as an entity or a member of the Osage Nation or an Osage shareholder?) See also Article IV, Section 3. Inalienable Rights of Osage Citizens, E. and H. THIS IS IMPORTANT THAT YOU UNDERSTAND FULLY AND COMPLETELY that if the Osage Nation fouls up your minerals income due from them in any way whatsoever with a multitude of ways for things to be mishandled and for a multitude of reasons, YOU WILL HAVE NO RECOURSE IN THE OSAGE NATION TRIAL COURT TO MONETARY DAMAGES AT ALL FOR YOUR LOSS OR LOSSES. Think about this carefully. No matter how bad it gets, you can sue but can expect NO monetary compensation in the Osage Nation Courts to restore your loss of income no matter what the Osage Nation does or how badly this compact is mismanaged for whatever the reason. THIS IS IN THE OSAGE NATION CONSTITUTION AND IT IS THE HIGHEST LAW OF THE LAND that cannot be changed without a CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT APPROVED by a vote of the Osage membership. Without recourse of any kind like this in the court system, would you want to have any entity managing the OME if such were the case including the Osage Nation? If you do, then you are either ignorant or in need of guardianship yourself. This is as crazy as it gets and don't ever be foolish enough to let them talk you into going there.
Chief addresses concerns over new clinic: https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/news-events/news/chief-addresses-concerns-over-new-clinic This is disturbing. No...me and my doctor are the ones in the best positionto understand my health care needs and priorities. No...this is not a joke. This is a very seriouse matter. Change for the sake of change simply take over so that the ONG can eventually take over the Health Dept. is not a good idea. By the way, does this concern the elders only? This matter concerns of of us. And there you have it folks. Another ONG Board with the power of bureaucracy to control our health concerns. Yeah, the ONG is really all about telling the truth. That's a good one, Mr. Redcorn.BTW Congressman Redcorn truly believes that the ONG owns the Mnerals Estate and wanted to tax the ME a few years ago. Perhaps Congressman Otto Hamilton should support the idea the people dont need ONG interference into the lives and health needs of the ...."elders". Look folks, this is just another power grab by the ONG and to make certain politicians look good in the eyes of the people because "they care so much" about the...elders so when election time come around again they can say "Vote for me because I'm looking out for thr elders and the young!" It's the same political game over and over again to play on the sympathy that a politician will lovingly and tenderly care for the old and young. politicians always focus on a certain demographic to pull on the heartstrings of the the people. After all, only a monster will deny health to the elderly and the young children, right? Thus, if someone opposses this medical takeover that hat person is certainly a monster! Rwraaaa! As I said time and time again, the Osage Nation "Government" wants to take over everything Osage and control all things Osage...including the thoughts and welfare of the common Osage person. I get the sinking feeling that Indian Health is going to take a turn fo the worst. How many of the ONG politicians family membes are going to fill the postions of those ever so critical positions at the clinic? Will nepotism and fraud once again rule the day? Just as millions and millions of dollars have mysteriously disapeared since the inception of the ONG, I fear to imagine the fraud waste, and abuse that will take place in the new system. If certain relatives of certain politicians can get away with stealing money, how many Lortabs are going to go missing from the dispensery? We're all gonna die, folks! Well, at least someday.
Does anyone know how many kids are attending the Learning Centers, since they had to pay to attend? Over at Fairfax there are only 3 kids who attend now. I think it is sad. The kids who can't afford to attend the LC, are the ones who need it the most.
Another one bites the dust due to Standing Bear --->>> http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/08/26/education-department-director-involuntarily-terminated/ Will this job go to someone else he's related to?
I thought the ONG was going to employ millions of Osages to better the the lives of our people. What about Jim Gray's 25 year plan? Weren't we promised great things like a per cap and an endless supply of meat pies? Wasn't the whole idea of the new ONG to promote self governance of "We the People"? The reason the ONG is out sourcing the education dept. is to save money. Yeah, save money. Money that can be spent on the government instead of the people or better yet dissapear into the same black hole that Jim Gray put the million dollars he took out of the S-10 account so he could bribe certain Osage congress members and party in France. Im sure someday the ONG will outsource all of its programs and employees to temp agencies. The casinos will employ temp workers in order avoid paying any benefits and retirement plans. The ONG needs to save money so it can spend money on itself - not the Osage people. This beast of a government is getting bigger and hungrier and more bloated every day. But then again, that was the plan all along.
Well said poster @ 7:42am. I said that a year a go or so. What happened to the 25year plan Chief, are we going in a different direction? And or where is our PER-CAP CHIEF? Do something right for your people sir.
So they're going spent $3,000,000 on three children and 46 Seniors in Fairfax as well? Fairfax grocery store and senior and child care center funding considered --->>> http://www.osagenews.org/en/article/2014/11/17/fairfax-grocery-store-and-senior-and-child-care-center-funding-considered/ Sponsired by our favorite Chief. Hahahahahaha!
More spending folly? It looks that way. http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/08/28/osage-casino-officials-announce-preliminary-plans-tulsa-casino-and-hotel/
$90 million for two casinos, $30 million for new offices on the hill and I'm sure the list goes on. Then this idiocy last I heard the budget was between $240 and $280 million dollars. The problem at least last winter/ spring was that no bank was willing to loan them that amount do to the high amounts they already owe and the fact that compact renegotiation is coming up in 2017, or there about) and who knows what that's going to look like. I can't imagine what has changed or how they are managing to mortgage away our future on a north Tulsa hotel that I can't imagine anyone wanting to stay at.
For a Chief and group so damn concerned about sovereignty they are sure as hell willing to sign it away when it comes to a bank loan. Of course look at them. What else can you expect from that bunch in Pawhuska ...except big feeling attitude.
Who the hell is Carol Woods and why do we need to be paying her outfit to be the owner's representative? More money in Osage pockets to the detriment of the membership? http://www.stonebridgegroup.net/index.cfm?id=3
2015 Congressional Tzi-Zho Session begins September 8, 2015. See https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/news-events/news/2015-tzi-zho-session-begins-september-8th
Won't this be fun to see how quickly they all go back on what they've written in this article about out of control spending? What are the goals of the other five who never bothered to comment? Let's see how fast they adjust and drop direct costs to the membership in favor of their pet spending projects. http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/04/congress-members-share-thoughts-goals-2015-tzi-zho-session/
This is what comes when certain members of the First Osage Nation Congress did not listen to their constituents and didn't do their due diligence and didn't share that information with the other members of the Osage Nation Congress when asked to do so after having been warned about Carol Leese and his relationship to the PBDC of the Forest County Potawatomi before he ever came to the Osage Nation to work for the Osage, LLC. What is their responsibility and liability in all of this for continuing to approve funding for the Osage, LLC up to the $19-20 million? They still are losing money with that thing over some government designation they will never probably use to get government contracts anyway or bungle up all to hell if they ever even do. So irresponsible it's beyond belief! The whole Osage Nation operation should be taken into some kind of protective receivership just to keep the Osage people's money from being lost or spent like this due to gross incompetence. They are wholly incompetent because they won't listen to you as constituents or to anything on the order of sound advice where the Osage Nation's finances are concerned and another wholesale slaughter of our money is about to take place with the Congress on the 6th of September when the Fall session for appropriation comes up in the next few days. The say they never hear from us but when we do contact them for representation, they rarely ever listen to what we want them to do or do what we want them to anyway. If there hadn't been such a large outcry about the losses from Osage, LLC, they would have tried to sneak past it and wouldn't have funded this legal inquiry if they could have gotten away with it because I believe they knew the Osage people were appalled at the milliions and millions of dollars they continued to appropriate for the Osage, LLC., despite good sense and our wishes and afraid of what this inquiry would bring out. That managing board is being shielded too and they should be jailed because they were charged with the mission to run what has become this horror from a management standpoint but because there are Osages on that board they don't want them held responsible like this is some kind of board game and the money lost isn't real. They should be brought before this tribunal just like Leese and especially that Harvard boy, Jonathan Taylor, who was on the board through much if not all of the funding, who worked hand in glove with Leese to pull off this scam on the Osage Nation and the membership.
The Board is responsible for the Hreat Loss at OLLc. All of them from the Executive to the Budget Committee to Congress. Are all responsible to no end.
What was the policy to verify the due diligence was done? I want to know how the Board of directors verified Leese commitments. Was it just one phone call?
Pursuant to the Operating Agreement, it is the Enterprise Board which is the Manager of Osage LLC. Giving Leese the title of CEO did not give him the powers that typically go with such a position. Every major decision required a majority vote of the Enterprise Board. The lawsuits have failed to include the responsible parties - namely, the members of the Enterprise Board.
This is HUGE! Congratulations Tocabe! Zagat chooses Native American restaurant as Denver's hottest chain http://www.bizjournals.com/denver/news/2015/09/03/zagat-chooses-native-american-restaurant-as.html
Hotels are a deadly cancer on the Casino business. See this report: http://skift.com/2013/04/03/oklahoma-tourism-booms-as-tribal-casinos-plan-million-dollar-expansions/
FY2015-2016 TZI-ZHO SESSION begins tomorrow at 10:00 A.M. CSDT! Follow along at http://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/who-we-are/congress-legislative-branch/sessions
Good opening of the Hun-Kah Session. Interesting discussion right away in a Committee of the Whole open discussion of the ON Congress about this $6.5 million additional gaming distribution if' and only if, the Congress uses most of it to pay down the Campus Plan loan. During the Chief's address to the Congress, he made mention of the fact that the Permanent Fund could not be accessed until the campus plan loan is retired.
You can read about the expansion of the Tulsa casino at http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/08/proposed-osage-casinos-tulsa-renovation-will-have-132-room-hotel/ and hear the audio of the additional gaming distribution discussion of the Tzi-zho Session today at http://mixlr.com/osage-nation/4c_tzs_day-1_9-8-15_pt1
I heard on this recording that they are going to add more damn board members. This time for that damn Talgrass LLC at $18,000 EACH and more of them for the gaming commission as well at $18,000 EACH TOO!!!!!!!!!!! Pirate treasure of the Osage Treasury is being shoveled out by the boatload again to these Osage government for the government people. I also heard on there that the Chief said the Tulsa casino expansion is going to cost down from the original proposal of $406,000,000???????? How much would that be? FIFTEEN BUCKS? What the unholy hell are these people even thinking about here and suspending sovereignty to do it? The whole of Osage County is still on the brink of going over a cliff economically if that Federal injunction against the new BIA CFRs doesn't hold and these Osage government people are even thinking about getting a huge loan for this expansion. I can speculate right now why they want that campus plan loan paid off and it's because they can't get the loan on the expansion until the pemanent fund is no longer encumbered with the loan for the Campus plan. Then I heard Kuuggee talking about accessing the whole $6 plus million to spend in ways that benefit the greatest number of Osages?????? Earlier Speaker said people in the Executive Branch were already screaming about not having enough money to finish out the year at the end of next Sepember with the budget cuts if these budgets are approved?????????? With FORTY MILLION DOLLARS AND THEY CAN'T LIVE WITHIN THE BUDGET PARAMETERS OF THIS MUCH MONEY??????????? How outrageous is this???????? These people are so well paid and eating their way through their paychecks to the level that it is frightening and is going to kill them of diabetes and heart disease if we don't take this money away from them. Just because they aren't drinking liquor, clearly they have transferred this addictive behavior to what they eat. Shocking the size of that Speaker and Kuuggee and Edwards and Buffalohead and that reed thin Pratt who is nearly unrecognizable today who made the remark that they are already in chaos going in. She's right about that. Maybe some of those people need to return some promised constituent phone calls and fill their mouths with words INSTEAD OF FOOD. Just finished Congressional Affairs Committee Meeting early so Speaker Whitehorn can get a bit of lunch... Hahahahahahah! She should forget about that if you ask me. When are health concerns going to start impacting what THEY put in thier mouths? Leadership means the young can see what they are doing by how they look on the basis of how they behave and if they want healthy children who aren't overweight and are so Constitutionally concerned about the young, they should set a proper example for them by not letting themselves get so grotesquely morbidly obese.
We can understand your frustration but we think this is grey area here of a personal nature. If they are using our money to benefit themselves in harmful ways then this is truely a concern and it's true that some of these members of the Osage Congress look like they've nearly doubled in girth size since they were elected and it does set a terrible example for the Nation's youth but we feel that this venting could be less caustic in nature. Please refrain from such outbursts in the future as it isn't helpful. If you want to make note of it, that's one thing but going this far is another matter altogether.
more of our Gal Darn money spent on some undoubtedly Osage owned company to do another study this time a minimum wage study for the casinos. These government people are sick and obsessed with spending. they NeeD an intervention. where's the study for that? http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/08/osage-gaming-officials-moving-forward-casino-employee-minimum-wage-study/
After now many years an annual report from these casino honchos? I hear the new hotels are eating up profits on Ponca and Skiatook but this report won't say anything that now will it? http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/08/osage-gaming-officials-report-fy-2014-information-osage-casinos/
One motion to confirm all of the board members? How strange is that? What is this? A blanket rubber stamp on the Chief's choices right across the Board? More negligence from the Osage Congress where their due diligence vetting of these appointees are concerned? This discussion is happening in the Commerce and Econ Committee? BUH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WHAT ARE WE PAYING THESE PEOPLE FOR IF THEY ARE CONSTANTLY SEEKING WAYS TO SIDE STEP THEIR BASIC RESPONSIBILITES UNDER THE OSAGE CONSTITUTION?
Courtesy notification: The Mike Black meeting was a lollapalooza today with it almost coming to blows at one point. More on this --->>> http://osageblog.blogspot.com/2015/08/osage-shareholder-matters-september-2015.html
Did I hear that salaries are up 23-50% and that the budget for osage nation government operations is nearly $20 million in ONCA 15-84 in the government OPs committee today? Are you kidding? Peoples feelings figure into this? I'll bet they do. These departments ran on $250,000 in total less than 10 years ago? 80 times higher than what it used to be? This is TOTALLY SICK AND DISGUSTING!!!!!!!!!!!!!
As a member, are your benefits and services from the Osage Nation government 80 times better? My answer to that is without question NO! These Executive Branch government people under Chief Geoffrey Standing Bear are completely out of control with spending.
Good. The committee tabled this bill for further review later.
A direct services to the Osage students reduction in Vocational Tech from $300,000 to $100,000 for some reason and some funds may have been sent to another budget. You can listen in again at http://mixlr.com/osage-nation/showreel/?page=1 when this meeting is up on today's roster.
Here's the roster for 19,000 Osage Nation members not including the 3 Branches, the Boards an Commissions or the Study groups --->>> https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/resource-directory 41 of them and I'm not even certain that this is all of them like IT that does perform well for the membership and is of great benefit. How many of them actually provide services to the great majority of Osages and are even really needed?
Reworked the numbers on this and it comes out to 54 total departments, divisions, offices, boards, commissions and this list does not include the Office of the Chiefs, the Osage Congress and the OFPR or the Judicial Branch. It does not include study groups who produce no studies that I am aware have ever been publicly published to the membership or any of the Casinos and those business organizations that may be unaccounted for in this roster.
Here is but one budget example of one division and those INDIVIDUAL CATEGORIES for funding involving Land, Commerce and Public Safety: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/dktjyxLuLPdVqG6nhf7sc52kMg9BwFqoWgHexl87yLA7RLhMAKDv6qZHAwwlYyxa?dl=1 These Osage Nation government people are spending money like this for budget after budget after budget: https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/who-we-are/congress-legislative-branch/legislation If you think this won't happen if they get their hands on minerals, you better think again. This new Osage government isn't even 10 years old and look what has happened here. They need to prove to us that they provide benefits for the majority of the Osage Nation members and they can't even hope to make that case.
Review this resolution bill for the Boards and Commissions and this is just the compensation and reimbursement for 11 of 12 of them not including the budget appropriation for the entity they act as a board or commission member for; https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/DEwESoLWHPeaZQsOwoo4Fz3ir1igNhqOD5eyOBhtg3BCN43LmqTUL25w3aj9fGEt?dl=1 Note that it doesn't include the number of board or commission members for each entity listed. This may involve as many as 50 to 75 people in total, attending no more than one meeting a month, if that. In some instances, where the business boards are involved, this compensation is equal to the full salary of an entry level full time employee outside of the Osage Nation sphere as an employer or in other words, in the surrounding local area in the real world.
Session is due to begin with no agenda and no legislation tracking document posted as of yet at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/who-we-are/congress-legislative-branch/sessions
Single separate audit report and findings with summary of findings. Clean opinion for a modified opinion with a restatement for the Villages now in the financial statement for the Nation. One deficientcy on the construction of the new buildings and a clean opinion on Osage, LLC. Still room for improvement but largely very good for this year. Shannon Edwards asking about all of the LLCs. How many of them are there?
Discussion on changing the Congressional Rules to fast-track legislation. And the high cost of the health care self insured cost to the Nation. Committee of the whole open discussion on partial self-insured costs.
Change being reviewed as to using the Affordable Care Act for the employees. SO NOW YOU'RE CATCHING ON? With a savings of a MILLION DOLLARS on health cost savings for the Executive Branch if they had been doing it this way this year? Comment on million savings this year from AP Chief.
Is this crazy or what? For TWO solid years these Osage Nation government goofs have been paying for insurance for the employees when they could have gotten their tax credit, high quality insurance, paid only a small premium above the amount of the individual tax credit, no deductible and no further out of pocket cost whatsoever which is subsidized by the Federal government under Native American plans. Keep in mind that these less than pro-active decision makers who should have looked into the benefits of the Affordable HC Act at the very beginning of 2013 want to run our minerals. Enough said.
According to the audit, $3,889,000 was paid by the Nation in health care costs in 2014 for the self-insured health insurance. In view of the option for self insurance under the AHCA, this cost could have been maybe $20.00 per employee if the Nation picked up that premium amount for say 550 employees that would have amounted to $11,000.
I heard that in the first year of the Act, one Osage paid a grand total of $1.49 per month and that was it period. Nothing else was paid or required throughout the year and it included no cost for medications either. The plan offered and chosen was far better than the one being paid for at $330.00 a month and included a mental health care provision which the previous plan did not.
If the total is 3.9 million dollars paid for self-insured health care and only $132,000 could have been the maximum paid, that would have been a savings of $3,757,000 for 2014 fy. So that's 3 and 3/4s of a MILLION DOLLARS that could have gone to pay for approximately 20,000 members or $187.50 in benefits for every single registered member of the Osage Nation.
How is it possible that they haven't looked into this option from the Congress side if the Executive wasn't on the ball? I see this as money lost to the Nation of approximately $6,700,000 up to and including September of this year! This amount would have paid nearly the whole amount of direct cost to the Nation of the health programs including the Osage health card and the participation in Medicare Plan F for all of the Seniors for fy 2016.
In response to the post at 9:17 AM: The "clean opinion on Osage, LLC" could not have been issued if the auditors had a working knowledge of the Small Business Act. Osage, LLC and its subsidiaries are in violation of multiple clauses at 15 USC 645 and violation of the implementing regulations for the 8(a) Business Development program at 13 CFR 124. The violations stem from misrepresenting subcontractors to OPDG and OIS as these entities, claiming both the past experience of the subcontractors and the employees as their own. All contracts awarded with a small business preference, including 8(a) set-aside and sole source contracts, require the contractor company to perform at least 50% of the effort with its own employees. The proposals submitted to the government falsely identify the subcontractors' employees as those of the OLLC subsidiaries. The OLLC subsidiaries have absolutely no capabilities to perform architect/engineer/construct (AEC) contracts without Pinnacle Design Group (a company located in Norman, OK) or a similarly qualified company, and would never receive an award without committing fraud against the U.S. government. A review of the submitted proposals, the contract and subcontracts, and records of employee labor can easily be conducted to verify the facts. These contracts were executed under the current board, which is the manager of OLLC per the operating agreement, and the OLLC board was appointed to the Tallgrass, LLC board. Ethics? Let the facts speak for the record.
Gov. Ops Committee is meeting now and being broadcast. Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/qAPzRhkuo6XUINFRlkpsNrD6ewc0s8w3fg724lZqDVfMnRcZiCg7UNKHQ3H86huc?dl=1
IMPORTANT: "Pending an approved contract, Hart Intercivic will work with the Election Office and board on the June 2016 (Congress) election and primary election, if necessary." See http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/14/on-election-board-selects-texas-company-for-election-services-equipment/ What is significant is Congressman Norris initially submitted a bill, ONCA 15-76, in August that called for a Primary Election for the Congressional Candidates that would make it that much harder for the members of the Osage Nation to run for office. Apparently he had the wise judgment and good sense to chance this legislation in early September to state that there will be no Primary Election for the Osage Congress. This kind of stuff in legislation is what we have to watch for and monitor closely. Today the membership person who spoke in the Committee Meeting said that there are still Osages out there who receive a headright check who have no idea that they lost their Tribal membership when the Constitutional government came in and the Osage Nation Congress voted on new membership regulations in the Fall of 2006.
Comm and Econ Committee is live and members are having confusion with how one of the budgets has been organized however the Agenda for today does not specify what legislation is being reviewed. I believe Kugee is the Chair of this Committee as to why this agenda does not have specific information on the legislation being gone over. It's always a good thing and a courtesy to the constituents following along to know what is being reviewed as they move through the meeting.
Some of the discussion was centered around the administrative cost not exceeding 20% in Federal budgets. From what was discussed, they are moving salaries for this program budget to another line item area. If the Federal requirement is there at 20%, shouldn't that be observed and because that cap is there for a reason, are we to infer that the Nation is hiring more people than this federal program is meant to have employed to manage and oversee? It looks like another area of Osage employee pile on or salaries too high for those who work with this program to stay within those Federal guideliines?
$3 million for about 150 Osages: http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/11/construction-underway-nations-fairfax-child-care-and-senior-center-building/
Session today was fairly straight forward. No surprises today. Listen now at http://mixlr.com/osage-nation/showreel/ and the Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/JnsikP0xZWjYXN4cM64TAesqQeHNSzel6oeo4scYCgeRiKt87KcqS4entT2YhOx9?dl=1 Due to Minerals Meeting tomorrow, the ON Congress will meet on Thursday morning at 10 a.m.
Education Committee live at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media Agenda at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/K4nXfAKZVpWmEO6VDWFcTiQwnl5pplImCfwFLkSV9tOn2v2wxfbT167O7t3Hvraj?dl=1 $9.7 million for 3 children in Hominy? Boys and Girls Club had 700 plus a few years ago and now to 49? Did I hear that correctly? Now they have to pay and no one wants to do that. Youth Academys are listed on the Agenda.
OSAGE CHILDREN ALL OVER THIS COUNTRY NEED THIS MONEY AND YOU HAVE THE NERVE TO ASK US TO PAY $44,000 PER EACH CHILD YOU HAVE IN THIS PROGRAM. SEND THIS BUDGET BACK TO THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH RIGHT THIS MINUTE. HOW DARE YOU PEOPLE?
AND THESE CHILDREN HAVE TO PAY $5 A DAY TO BE IN THIS PROGRAM ON TOP OF ALL THIS MONEY YOU WANT FOR THE PROGRAM AS WELL? GET OUT OF HERE, GROW A BRAIN AND STOP FEEDING YOUR UNADULTERATED UNFETTERED GREED WITH OUR MONEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THIS IS A GROTESQUE OUTRAGE TO THE OSAGE MEMBERSHIP ALL OVER THE UNITED STATES.
THANK YOU LADIES? FOR WHAT? INSULTING EVER OSAGE FAMILY THAT LIVES OUTSIDE OF FAIRFAX, PAWHUSKA AND HOMINY? OF COURSE DEB ATTERBURY IS INVOLVED IN A FUNDING DEBACLE LIKE THIS. NOW THIS IS BEGINNING TO MAKE SOME KIND OF SENSE.
This insanity tracks right back to Chief Standing Bear and his principal mission to make the children his priority. Spending for this is scandalous and we need to get rid of this man in office before he finishes us off with such unjustified spending on 3 year old children. He has lost his mind if he thinks that we will stand for this!
Ever since this man has gotten in office CSB has used his talent to spend insert himself in a mural, insult the M.C.the Shareholders, the list can go on. No he's for big Government. Time to send this Man Packing..
Health and Social Services Committee Meeting is live now at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/u3dyRrXZFMciYt1CLiiJWombEL2scwpKmDS6Vqoy7LJnQ5PsyT0HgRIbG5Vauyhq?dl=1
Compensation analyst? Wage Survey. HR duties divided among three employees and give them salary bumps for additional duties. Then for housing, education, health and job descriptions were changed and get higher salaries plus culture and language. Police dept. Substantial increases in indirect cost. No increases in salaries and yet budgets are higher. IDC pool funds will revert back to the Treasury if not spent. Negotiated rate. Could over-recover in one year ($5 million?) and then the rate could be less the next year? Will meet again to come with a final clarification. Meeting was adjourned.
GovOps is live at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/DSefwGfmctrhBEjs32BKGx4QmeU12XeDjWr0gnmLtkEoUWME5ClcGn1cXogNRVom?dl=1
Hey Turkey Voucher guy! You just don't rank as a third class no count constituent but these Osage government for the government employees sure as $#*T do. They get employee hams handed out to them on a silver platter and it's right here on this budget.
Hey Buddy here I am the Turkey Guy...lol. My point is,there is no reason we can't get a Gift certificate out to all Osages. Long over due unreal really? A Ham. I shouldn't have to call the executive to sponsor such a moral thing to do...or call a Congressman to support such a good thing. And this is why we have a bloated over inflated Government. A 150,000 is not much compared to what our Government is spending, wasting or that A Per-Cap shpiuld go out to all Osages..
Compensation analyst? Wage Survey. HR duties divided among three employees and give them salary bumps for additional duties. Then for housing, education, health and job descriptions were changed and get higher salaries plus culture and language. Police dept. Substantial increases in indirect cost. No increases in salaries and yet budgets are higher. IDC pool funds will revert back to the Treasury if not spent. Negotiated rate. Could over-recover in one year ($5 million?) and then the rate could be less the next year? Will meet again to come with a final clarification. Meeting was adjourned.
Turkey voucher Guy! Glad you're back, and I agree with this much money spent on every insane thing they can think of or spent in insane ways, you're right. Get that Turkey voucher out and that per cap hard on its heels! We need that money too.
To poster @ 4:36 pm, I've been here all along just mostly on the other side of this Blog focused on our current situation regarding the M.E. This out of control spending is out of site. And we Osages for fiscal responsibility have the right to say how we want our Government to spend our money that is not working for the Majority but the Minority. That mentality will not last long. Coming this 2016 Several Congressional seats will be up for election. We need to pay attention. We must replace those seats with Canidates who are for smaller Government. Who are for the Constituency their People...The Osage and their Communities as promised and get that Turkey Voucher out to all Osages. A symbol, you are not forgot...The Money is there. I keep on hereing this Money is Yours and How is it working for you? Where is that Per-Cap Chief? This was not the Government the People expected or wanted. Change will come and it will be the will of the People, The Osage.
What do we need this old building for which the Osage Nation just bought? spend spend spend! Nonsense all the time. http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/11/osage-nation-buys-first-national-bank-building-pawhuska/
Congressional Education Meeting is live and the Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/Sd1ni3P8JvJX1zehK6kzsPyobg0n0cfpb0cVU9pBn2kHIT7Zr7L68o6eqpYUs1ji?dl=1
To see the Congressional Calendar for scheduled Committee Meetings, see https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/who-we-are/congress-legislative-branch/calendar
Session is due to begin and the agenda for today is located at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/sites/default/files/event-brochures/DAY9A_9-17-15_TZS.pdf
Comments from Congress on spending in this Session. Trying to put together a spending road map. Spend everthing to borrow more money? All voted yes. Now let's see what they do. Congressional comments: Committee of the Whole and employee raises they are seeing in these budgets. New positions and new raises in many if not all of the budget. Some departments were told no and added the raises to the budget anyway? Supernaw met with HR and no rhyme or reason to the raises. If the money's there, they would give the raises if they got signatures for those raises. Freeze the salaries across the board to be fair. Cuts in every division. A good job in early childhood education. (???) $390,000 surplus from Asst Chief's comments. If this is so, why is the Congress talking about spending to the maximum. Some should not get a raise unless all get a raise. $2 million spent on salaries on fair market value last year on for profit businesses? (What market is that? RAISES, MERIT, PLUS COST OF LIVING). Admitted that the budgets in total are over the projected income figure as it is. Cuts were made but not enough to come under the projected revenue figure so lose that argument right now. Boots on the ground in HR and this justifies this continued spending nonsense well over the bottom line figure? That won't fly and don't make the same stupid argument over and over year after year. Live within your allowance within projected revenue. Do the work Executive and quit whining. That's what you're paid to do so do it!
Assistant Chief, you do your own work at the granular level. You have the figure, now take it and adjust the budget figures within what you are given as a total spending figure by the Congress. If your work isn't right, correct it yourself and bring it back. Just do it and quit trying to bully and manipulate the Congress. Nine years of this and the constituents are FED UP WITH IT!!!!!!!!!!!! Get your branch of government in line and stop this nonsense YEAR IN AND YEAR OUT.
BTW, why are we getting these total budget figures and not budgets for each different office division department etc. so we can see what is going on and what money is being spent on what individual budget? This is totally bogus. Send these back to the Executive Branch and get us budgets with breadowns and real numbers. What do we have to do? File a complaint with the AGs office to get you people to properly disclose to the Osage people how you are spending our money, where and how much?
Commerce and Econ Meeting is live and the Agenda is located at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/sites/default/files/event-brochures/CE-9-17-15_NoticeRevised.pdf
I just read ONCR 15-23, a resolution to transfer its assets, wind up its affairs, and dissolve the company. The third paragraph of the resolutions gives consent to the transfer of residual property after "winding up its assets and liabilities". This language would typically indicate the subsidiaries would also be shut down and dissolved, but this seems to contradict the opening paragraph of the resolution. Perhaps the intent will become clear during the session with OLLC management.
Not only did the Nation by a bank building they also bought the old Hernandez building and may have to tear that building down. Isn't that something you find out before you purchase a property? Sounds to much like the old Fairfax Nursing home they bought paid to re-roof and then promptly tore down.
If they really feel the need to buy something, buy land not buildings. We aren't going to make money being landlords in Pawhuska. If we hadn't pissed it all away we could have enough money to own a good chunk if not most of Osage county now. That's an ownership that would mean something. Instead we have a bunch of structure we are going to have to pay to insure and upkeep. This tedious stupidity wears a person out.
Congressional Session was held today and the Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/uRln5HSadErlBGkASC7ZdIcN5gEXNTUWSePkM0ZS7sEcvkBOU7UYxssvYymQgjkr?dl=1 Of particular interest is the fact that with only one exception, the Tallgrass Economic Development Board nominees were not asked a singled vetting question on behalf of or for the Osage people in a matter as serious as confirming this Board member transfer from the Osage , LLC. Tallchief did say that they would need two years to clean up the problems from the Osage,LLC but no one asked him for a clarification of that statement or why it was taking so long. Congressman Shaw did ask nominee Phillip Morrow if he anticipated difficulty in the meetings or future meetings of the TED LLC. When he said no, Shaw let it stand without any further in depth followup question as to why he would ask such a question in the first place and when it came time to vote for confirmation, Pratt, Shaw and Supernaw voted against confirmation. We want to know why these members have been nominated by the Chief, what business background they have which qualifies them to be nominated and what experience they have in business, in addition to what plans they have for the direction of TED LLC in the future. For this reason this was the poorest vetting on the part of the Osage Congress I have ever seen. Deplorable and if the TED LLC runs afoul in the future just like the Osage LLC has in the past, the Osage Congress will be on the hook for such a poor if not negligent job of vetting these new managing Board members in Congress when they had the chance to do so.
Another $90K shot in paying these guys to run this board and shot if they fail to make us money. When are the members of the Osage Congress going to start acting like they accept the full responsibility for why they are there and for what they are supposed to be doing?
You are 100% correct about the process for confirmation. It was little more than a sit down where each member of the board had the opportunity to tell a sad story about the challenges they faced, pat himself on the back for turning things around, and then say they'll do great things in the future. However, their business model is to take contracts which are performed entirely by subcontractors. They have no employees with experience in the areas of architecture, engineering or construction, and are entirely reliant upon Don Frick and Jeff Maack of Pinnacle Design Group. You should not confuse this company with Osage Pinnacle Design Group, though they rely on the Federal government being confused for participation in the 8(a) Business Development program and for contract awards. These board members are either ignorant of the laws being violated in defrauding the Federal government, or fully aware but willing to do anything in order to get contracts.
Even so, they are not covering the costs of the board, their single employee, or the personnel performing management functions under contract. The "profit" reported in the OLLC annual report is the markup over the subcontracts without accounting for costs of management salaries and other expenses necessary to run the company.
In addition to confirming these board members, of which two have been OLLC board members for three years, they changed the resolution related to the transfer of assets from OLLC to TED LLC. The revised version does not yet match either the Committee Report or the recorded session. The AG has requested that OLLC not be dissolved while the lawsuits are active, and the committee discussion and recommendations for revision shows clear intent to adhere to this request. However, this raises questions.
If OLLC is not dissolved, who will be sitting on its board?
Will the Nation be paying for two sets of board members, one set for OLLC and the other for TED LLC?
FYI - There will be an identity of interest problem if the same board directs both companies. This will be made worse if the board is only compensated for TED LLC. The transfer of assets is a shady practice at best, and possibly criminal. It certainly doesn't protect any of the transferred assets.
Double the compensation for these board members? Is this what you are suggesting? What a sweet deal. Hahahahahaha! Why am I not surprised? You are aware that there is legislation in this session to terminate the OLLC and they could move forward with voting for this legislation by the end of this session of the Osage Congress.
I'm not recommending doubling the board and paying them twice. In my opinion, Shannon Edwards has the right of it. She is not in favor of the OLLC to TED LLC transition. It won't protect the assets and the fraudulent business practices and lack of federal government business experience among this board will just ruin another name.
GovOps is meeting live at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media Agenda for this meeting is located at: https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/sites/default/files/event-brochures/GO-9-18-15_NoticeRevised2.pdf
AG looking into things left and right? What things Congresswoman Bufflohead? Since we get no information from the AG's web site, perhaps you can enlighten us.
As a courtesy to the listening audience, will the Congressional Committee Chair announce how much the total budget is for each category that we no longer have the privilege of seeing in these budget abbreviation Bills that you are reviewing one by one? Today we have: Law Enforcement - Federal Law Enforcement - Tribal Osage News There is a total figure for each one of these separate budgets in ONCA 15-85 that we are no longer able to see as a result of such consolidated opaque bills that you are putting out there on behalf of the Osage people.
Osage News Editor Duty is reporting that the Osage Nation has its own PR facebook page. This is true and she claims that it is a source of news and information that is favorable toward the Osage Nation and not unbiased like the Osage News is in content orientation. https://www.facebook.com/osagenation
Now now. Duty is asking for an increase in salary because raises are going through in this Session of the Osage Nation? Other raises have been justified with support documents. Still here she comes begging for more money because it isn't fair and because she has seen other budgets gone through before hers today and wants more because they are getting more. Imagine if she doesn't get what she wants. She will probably go whining about it in the Osage News. Federal requirements are in play here on other budgets on increases. She's paid with Tribal funds with no such requirements.
Of course, Buffalohead says go ahead and resubmit your budget. You little A** kisser! Disgusting !!!!!!!!!!!!!! Substantially, RJ Walker says to take any new budget back to the Chief with changes signed by the Chief and he will look at it at a later time in this committee.
I see everyone has thier hand out for their raise..Tell me what our Congress has done for the People oh thats right the People the few the proud the privilege, the Government employees and Shannon Duty and she is not apart of the Government. thats right we forgot the economy is in the sh****r.Really is a shame the same people get passed onto the next LLC who are responsible for the huge fail of the Osage LLC. What a bowl of Conflict of interest. How could the Congressional Body not recognize the ethical consequences not just that, doing the same thing over again is asking for trouble all over again mark my word...Mrs.Duty your paper is bias. The truth hurts.
VERY IMPORTANT MEETING OF THE COMMERCE AND ECONOMIC COMMITTEE MEETING TODAY THAT INCLUDES A REPORT FROM THE OSAGE, LLC AT 3:00 P.M. CSDT. To listen in to the meeting see https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-mediahttps://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media The Agenda is located at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/sites/default/files/event-brochures/CE-9-18-15_Notice.pdf
Tallgrass transition and excited about the future. Where are we and whats going on today with joint venture with an Osage. Hit a back log with an $11 million contract TOCA contract with $19 million contract with Corps of Engineers. 21,000 gone through Winding down with Osage Manhatttan bldrs. with money back $200,000? $1.1 plus $1.5 millions and have bond for $15 million. Are they borrowing money? Questions by the SBA on transition running silent and deep? Are they hiding things from the SBA? Move to Tallgrass after approval has been obtained under the OLLC. Capture income and assets of the OLLC for TED LLC.
Need past experience with 8a that in the past wasn't executed very well? The new team will be more diligent and a new company you have to partner with on this. Focus to get companies we can partner with in the future to get the SBA to work with but need acquisitions to get partners and increase revenue quickly. Don't have the money to buy these companies and WILL HAVE TO COME BACK TO CONGRESS FOR MORE MONEY??????????????? HERE WE GO AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Osage Innovative is a tech firm and have found a data management company as in initiative with a partnership. One of the companies they work with is the Osage Nation. 2016 and beyond -- strategic thoughts to generate revenue. Rebranding this company. Difficulties in hiring people in the past. REALLY? Focussed to get into construction and need more money to do it. Plus another 8a to work with. Tech is very thin business with a better margin. In 2017 with an accounting department staff and more hires with the need for a new 8a. How can we cross sell and payback on these companies and continue to diversify with a Super Board?
So, in short they have to be entirely refunded. They have a million dollars and can't hire people or a CEO or move forward? A lot of companies to be successful they don't have that much money to start up and get going. Is this joker kidding? This is stupid going in right from the get go. WTH? They are already going in a bad direction. You don't have to buy companies. You can start companies in your own right with $1,000,000 in the bank right now. They have this much money in the TED LLC and they are saying the same damn things as the Osage LLC Board was saying all along. No capital infusion PERIOD. NOW THEY WANT $5 TO $10 MILLION MORE ISN'T A LOT OF MONEY? TO WHOM ISN'T IT A LOT OF MONEY? WANT $2 MILLION MORE? GET THE HELL OUT OF THE ROOM YOU IDIOT. NO MORE MONEY FOR THIS NONSENSE. YOU HIRE LOCALLY AND PUT OSAGES TO WORK HERE IN THE COUNTY OR PACK UP AND GET OUT!!!!
Do not give these jerks a dime of the Osage peoples money. This won't work either. Get out now and if any of you Congress vote to give this loser more money we will see to it that you won't be reelected. You have plenty of money to hire a CEO if you don't pay him $250,000 to $300,000 a year. YOU ARE SMALL SO STOP THINKING YOU NEED SOMEONE FROM A FORTUNE 500 COMPANY AND THAT YOU HAVE TO HIRE SOMEONE ON THAT BASIS! Once again, these people are looking for a big paycheck and to run through our money again. This is stupid and I don't like Stewart's tone toward the members of the Committee. He sounds just like that Jonathan Taylor. PUT OSAGES TO WORK OR GO HOME. YOU ARE WASTING YOUR TIME AND OURS AND YOU ARE GETTING PAID OUR MONEY TO WASTE IT. GO HOME AND SHUT IT DOWN TODAY. IS THIS FOR REAL???????????? CONGRESS DON'T YOU DARE GO THERE TO GIVE THEM ANY OF OUR MONEY. DON'T LET THEM BORROW MONEY EITHER. GET RID OF THIS TED LLC NOW. THE RIGHT SITUATION COMING ALONG? FORGET IT GOING IN.
They were paying the last one like a Fortune 500 CEO and it failed. business model is a success and don't even have a firm opportunity to put forward yet? they have been makingg these prromises for a year now and itts the same damn thing again. kill it now beffore it eats more of our money. we don't deserve this.
You are full of it. If you can't make a good start with a million bucks tell them to go home and forget it. Kugee says three months till we have more money? Don't you even think about funding this dumb thing with three Osages on the Board. Well doesn't that say a lot right there?
Don't know how much money they need and don't know what for? But we're a really great Board? Where would that be? Nevernever land? This is crazy from the get go. Get rid of these people. Want $5 million to $10 million to build competency in the future and that's the way to do it. Kugee says a target date to give them money by December 15, 2015. Has he gotten stupid all of a sudden? Ranges of capital infusion? OH YOU BET PAL! HIT THE ROAD BEFORE YOU EMBARRASS YOURSELF ANY FURTHER. THAT WILL BE $30 MILLION TOTAL TOWARD THIS LOSER BUSINESS CONCEPT IN TOTAL BY THE END DECEMBER IF THEY GIVE THEM $10 MILLION. FORM A COMPANY AND THEN ASK FOR BUSINESS. GLOBAL INITIATIVE TO FORM A COMPANY AFTER YOU GET A CONTRACT? Most people open for business and THEN solicit business NOT HAVE A CONTRACT FOR BUSINESS AND THEN OPEN A BUSINESS TO SATISFY THE CONTRACT. IS THIS JOKER FOR REAL????????? DON'T YOU DARE GIVE THIS PIKER A DIME OF OUR MONEY. NOT ONE THIN DIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WTH? Global initiative? We're talking Osage County here not Venice, Italy! Throw your corporate jargon around elsewhere buddy. If you can't roll up your sleeves and get something done with ONE MILLION BUCKS in your Corrporate coffers right now, you can shove your GLOBAL INITIATIVE WHERE THE SUN DON'T SHINE. How could the Congress have even considering confirming such people as this today when they are saying the same damn things Carol Leese and Jonathan Taylor said exactly in the past. How dare these jerks show up and ask for another $2 million or more or even FIFTY CENTS MORE from the Osage people? Show these bstrds the door and lock it behind them!
What core competency? They have no competency without a plan for business expansion and without any businesses in mind, how will they know how much money they will need? Obviously they are incompetent and if they can't form at least one small business with a million bucks in the local area, something is very wrong. Are they planning to hide in the TALLGRASS this time and try and fool us with the same Harvard business concept that failed the last time? We can see you coming globally, tallgrass or not. How could the Osage Nation be doing the same thing again with our money? Because Kugee supports it? He needs to retire on an immediate basis if he is backing another plan like this one. Don't go there again. I am warning you...
Kugee's not this stupid. Nobody with a lick of sense wants to build a hotel in the Tulsa location because it's in the worst part of town. They have $5 million but it's being used as collateral for the campus plan loan and until it's paid off it won't become available. Kugee likely wants to divert the $6.5 million more from gaming, if they pay off the campus plan loan, to the Tallgrass LLC that is his baby. Kugee is notorious for working to destroy ideas and people who don't or won't allow him to take the controlling role and that's pretty much what happened with the Osage, LLC. It's the same governing documents as the Osage LLC but by the name of Tallgrass. He's either the "God controlling things behind the scenes" or he won't play ball. Since Tallgrass is coming from him he'll advocate for giving it money and try and justify its losses in future. It's in our best interest to keep the money in the bank and not spend it because with the Osages, spending is always losing on business opportunities that never seem to succeed other than gaming which they are already bleeding dry as we speak. This get rich quick model is wrong from the beginning and it has no where to go but down and out.
Came back and have no real plans till the get money from the Nation and are looking for partnerships and are shifting furnature and cash over from OLLC to TED LCC. All up in the air? Bright future? The lights are off here and there is nothing bright about it. Dullards all around and losses will continue till the Nation gives more money. GTHO! Advantages you have developed? You have no advantages to lay out or develop at this point. The guy is either lying about a bright future or he's an idiot. He's got a million bucks left of our money and if he can't make a go of that then he needs to shove off. My God! I can't believe that they are trying to pull off a stunt like this again. This is exactly how we started out the last time. BOGUS!
Just look around in Indian Country..hotels do not make money and the damage that goes along with it..unless you have the economy to support such a venture, will only fail....right where is the future forethought...what a concept..
You are dealing with a mind set here and even if they were losing their shirts on the hotels we put up in Poko and Skiatoot, they would do whatever they can to keep it hidden. It's insane to build a hotel in the Tulsa location. It will be a magnet for drugs and prostitution in nothing flat. If that's what they want going on there they should admit it.
I don't give a rip if the head guy doing the talking today is from the Cherokee Tribe business end of things, they ought to show them all the door. This is nuts all over again.
Parris isn't telling the Commerce and Economic Development Committee all of the facts about Performance Oriented Construction Activities (POCA) contracts. These are Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract vehicles, and the award amount is the ceiling. There are numerous IDIQ awardees at Tinker AFB and with the US Army Corps of Engineers, and each company awarded a contract has the same total dollar ceiling amount. Having an IDIQ contract doesn't mean you'll win task orders, and there is no way to estimate how many you'll win or what the total value will end up being. OPDG had a previous IDIQ contract at Tinker AFB and didn't win a single task order. They were paid the $200 minimum when the contract was closed out.
Osage Innovative Solutions is only a shell of a company without any "tech company" experience or capabilities. Anyone can set up a business and claim all of the North American Industrial Classification System (NAICS) codes it wants in whatever areas it wants to pursue business, but without past experience and employees with actual capabilities it is just an empty shell with no ability to get work. The government awards contracts to companies based on qualifications to get the job done. The way that OPDG is getting contracts isn't by "teaming" but by fraud. They are representing Pinnacle Design Group as if its past performance, experience, capabilities, and employees are those of OPDG. If they claimed the actual capabilities of OPDG they couldn't win a construction contract shoveling sand with a toddler's shovel and bucket set.
To the poster at 11:24 PM. The head guy you're referring to is Dave Stewart. Cherokee Nation Businesses tossed him out on his ear. He sued them for firing him and ended up quite well off, not on merit but because the employment contract was so poorly written. They fired him for a reason, but won't discuss it. Several of the staff that worked with Stewart also got the boot around that time.
Here's the link to the article on Stewart's termination and compensation. Another case where a business board made a bad deal and a tribe had to make good on it. http://www.cherokeephoenix.org/Article/index/6211
Great! I'm beginning to think no one of quality will work with us. Just like that Leese character, we should try and get the back story on this Dave Stewart before it runs to nothing but losses all over again. He's already on board and with the way the Osages conduct business, the contract the Nation has with him will be even worse than the one with the Cherokees. The whole diversification idea was to start up businesses in the local area and then this global concept with Harvard started up and the diversification concept has put a whole lot of white people to work using our money but nothing of value to us here at home. It's so stupid and fundamentally wrong. They act like there is nothing that will make money in our area in Osage County which just isn't true.
They are continuing to pursue government contracts as the main line of business revenue. This type of contract doesn't have much potential to put people to work locally. During the presentation the board also claimed to have up to millions in contracts. If that is true, then why don't they do like other government contractors and grow their business using the profits. Few successful contractor companies even have a line of credit when they start, much less more than $1 million dollars in the bank and more for bonding. It really doesn't sound like the have a plan for developing a business, but only one involving buying an existing business.
Another rank and rude executive type trying to run through our money in a predatory way. We've been saying sink or swim from the very beginning and no one in this government for the government is willing to listen. If they've got a milliion let them show us they've got the chops to make money with that amount. If all they plan to do is sit and wait till December for additional funding. Shut it down now. One wisdom the Osages have never apparently seemed to have encountered is a penny saved is a penny earned. How many pennies are in $19 million to $20 million that they have collaborated in losing despite our best efforts to warn and advise them?
Session is due to start at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/RdxqEVJVN6Y3RbNQdqyhgdkWStiUBya6db8Vfm7gCdVaSdP9j6LKypMyelRSbb6y?dl=1
https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media Tourism with Eddy Red Eagle speaking. It would be nice to know how much money is being appropriated by the Osage Nation Congress by making this individual budget amount available. $98,000 in total nested in this budget bill ONCA 15-86? Thank you Eddy for asking so we have some clue as to how much we are talking about. Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/ruElyjcqYl4mBUNbsxG6mtbtS7cTJAS00MDa01rrAGlkIJsLIktw2shNPqGKHkMI?dl=1
If they can publish the individual budget being reviewed they can at least publish the total figure for each budget listed on the agenda. These people are contitutionally mandated to represent us and I want some representation in asking the Osage Nation Congress to represent us with full disclosure with the total amount of the money being appropriated on every separate budget on each and every committee agenda they put forward for committtee review. To ignore a request like this is unethical IMO.
MARK THE DATE:
ReplyDeleteMike Black from the BIA to hold a meeting in person and online on September 9, 2015 at 11:00 a.m., CSDT to bring the Headright owners up to date on what is going on with the OME:
See http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/08/25/bia-director-discuss-issues-involving-mineral-estate-sept-9/
Why is the Chief inviting the enemy into our camp? The Chief didn't join us in our litigation and he shouldn't be interfering now. What is it that Mr. Black will be discussing with us if he won't be able to speak about the matters involved in litigation? The Chief should not be meeting with our adversary while litigation is ongoing. The Chief has not invited the Osage County Oil and Gas producers to attend. Why do we have to learn about these matters from the Tulsa World as I did? No communication with the Shareholders or producers as usual.
Deletehttp://www.tulsaworld.com/news/local/amid-lawsuits-bia-director-to-visit-osage-nation-in-september/article_f27809ae-6b22-59c2-9ca7-c068593dac9f.html
DeleteWhere is the outrage? Really? The Chief is in the middle of our litigation without a dog in the fight! He may be exposing himself to liability by this interference. The OMC and the producers are in very serious and expensive litigation against this enemy which will have lasting affects on the Shareholders; and the Chief jumps in to possibly sabotage our efforts? Why do the Shareholders put up with this obstruction? Too lazy? Too scarred? Too trusting? I guess most of the Shareholders have given up and rolled over; accepting their fate which is going to be the total destruction of the ME.
DeleteThe Shareholders are waiting for Tinkerbelle I guess. They have not assisted the producers and failed to support them in their litigation after numerous please to contribute to their legal fund. Shame on the Shareholders. As a Shareholder I couldn't be more embarrassed. We Shareholders appears as cheap ass, dumb ass, blanket ass Indians. An truth be known, we just recently proved it.
DeleteWe'll get what we deserve soon. No production royalty checks, a Chief with an agenda not in our best interest and thousand of unplugged wells left by the oil producers we forced out of business. Get ready, it's starting to happen.
Our OMC is planning an oil and gas summit. What a joke! Idiots!
Both of you could not be more wrong. First and foremost there are shareholder's who understand exactly what is going on and have supported the Producers. Second, you have to realize only 1% of Osages live in and around Osage County. Ok maybe 10% of Osages. Then you have no communication with the moral majority of Osages who are not aware or even Subscribe to the Osage News. And this newspaper is impartial and or biased. In addition this is why you only see a few who post here it is because they, most shareholder's are not aware of this site. The question is you can complain about what another person is not doing, what is it you are doing. Most people are in a predicament between a rock and hard place financially. Most Osages are still working people or possibly older and cannot afford to take the time off to picket for their benefit. I retired early in 2006. I did not know we had a Newspaper. I did not get my Vote to become a Government. This is no accident how we became a de facto government. It was planned with one phone call right Mr.Redcorn. And I can assure you that their are alot of other shareholder's who did not get their vote.
DeleteWhy don't you contact the remaining 99% of the Shareholders and let them know what's going on? Be sure to ask them to contribute to the Osage Producers' defense fund while you're at it. The OMC's sorry attorneys road the coattails of the OPA's lead in the August 10th hearing. At the hearing, I felt embarrassed for the OMC's legal counsel. Really pathetic performance. Tom Frederick's law firm should give their fees to Lee Levinson's firm for saving the day.
DeleteWhat is Mike Black's reason for accepting the Chief's invitation to Osage County? What is he planning to discuss outside of the most important issue at hand, being the federal government's attack on the Osage Tribe of Indians? He can't discuss the oil and gas issue during pending litigation so is he coming to talk about third-rate bingo casinos or to assist in increasing tobacco sales? Maybe he is coming to give Robyn Phillips an award for successfully destroying the oil and gas industry in Osage County.
This is a continuing Shareholder discussion past the courtesy notification of the Mike Black meeting so please take any further comments to the Shareholder web page on the Osage Blog at http://osageblog.blogspot.com/2015/08/osage-shareholder-matters-august-2015-ii.html Thank you.
DeleteFor September at http://osageblog.blogspot.com/2015/08/osage-shareholder-matters-september-2015.html
DeleteWind Farm meeting in Greyhorse:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1615078728775611&set=a.1615078762108941.1073741828.100008204974654&type=1&theater
No. Cal. Osage meeting:
ReplyDeletehttp://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/08/26/northern-california-osage-meeting-set-sept-26-petaluma/
Chief addresses concerns over new clinic:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/news-events/news/chief-addresses-concerns-over-new-clinic
About the Healthcare ON Compact if we are hurt or misdiagnosed or given incorrect medication or otherwise harmed, will this apply too?
DeleteOn compacting the OME by the Osage Nation, Under the Osage Nation Constitution, Article IV, Section 4. Remedies: No person shall be entitled to an award of monetary damages, as a form of relief, in the Osage Nation Trial Court for ANY VIOLATION OF THESE RIGHTS; unless the Osage Nation Congress may by law provide for monetary damages as a form of relief for such violations, when relief would best serve the interest of THE OSAGE NATION (the entity not an Osage member or Osage shareholder) or that of justice (for whom? Justice for the Osage Nation as an entity or a member of the Osage Nation or an Osage shareholder?) See also Article IV, Section 3. Inalienable Rights of Osage Citizens, E. and H. THIS IS IMPORTANT THAT YOU UNDERSTAND FULLY AND COMPLETELY that if the Osage Nation fouls up your minerals income due from them in any way whatsoever with a multitude of ways for things to be mishandled and for a multitude of reasons, YOU WILL HAVE NO RECOURSE IN THE OSAGE NATION TRIAL COURT TO MONETARY DAMAGES AT ALL FOR YOUR LOSS OR LOSSES. Think about this carefully. No matter how bad it gets, you can sue but can expect NO monetary compensation in the Osage Nation Courts to restore your loss of income no matter what the Osage Nation does or how badly this compact is mismanaged for whatever the reason. THIS IS IN THE OSAGE NATION CONSTITUTION AND IT IS THE HIGHEST LAW OF THE LAND that cannot be changed without a CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT APPROVED by a vote of the Osage membership. Without recourse of any kind like this in the court system, would you want to have any entity managing the OME if such were the case including the Osage Nation? If you do, then you are either ignorant or in need of guardianship yourself. This is as crazy as it gets and don't ever be foolish enough to let them talk you into going there.
Chief addresses concerns over new clinic: https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/news-events/news/chief-addresses-concerns-over-new-clinic This is disturbing. No...me and my doctor are the ones in the best positionto understand my health care needs and priorities. No...this is not a joke. This is a very seriouse matter. Change for the sake of change simply take over so that the ONG can eventually take over the Health Dept. is not a good idea. By the way, does this concern the elders only? This matter concerns of of us. And there you have it folks. Another ONG Board with the power of bureaucracy to control our health concerns. Yeah, the ONG is really all about telling the truth. That's a good one, Mr. Redcorn.BTW Congressman Redcorn truly believes that the ONG owns the Mnerals Estate and wanted to tax the ME a few years ago. Perhaps Congressman Otto Hamilton should support the idea the people dont need ONG interference into the lives and health needs of the ...."elders". Look folks, this is just another power grab by the ONG and to make certain politicians look good in the eyes of the people because "they care so much" about the...elders so when election time come around again they can say "Vote for me because I'm looking out for thr elders and the young!" It's the same political game over and over again to play on the sympathy that a politician will lovingly and tenderly care for the old and young. politicians always focus on a certain demographic to pull on the heartstrings of the the people. After all, only a monster will deny health to the elderly and the young children, right? Thus, if someone opposses this medical takeover that hat person is certainly a monster! Rwraaaa! As I said time and time again, the Osage Nation "Government" wants to take over everything Osage
Deleteand control all things Osage...including the thoughts and welfare of the common Osage person. I get the sinking feeling that Indian Health is going to take a turn fo the worst. How many of the ONG politicians family membes are going to fill the postions of those ever so critical positions at the clinic? Will nepotism and fraud once again rule the day? Just as millions and millions of dollars have mysteriously disapeared since the inception of the ONG, I fear to imagine the fraud waste, and abuse that will take place in the new system. If certain relatives of certain politicians can get away with stealing money, how many Lortabs are going to go missing from the dispensery? We're all gonna die, folks! Well, at least someday.
Any time you got folks ta think ethiks is a disease of the foot / youse are in truuble.
DeleteDoes anyone know how many kids are attending the Learning Centers, since they had to pay to attend? Over at Fairfax there are only 3 kids who attend now. I think it is sad. The kids who can't afford to attend the LC, are the ones who need it the most.
ReplyDelete3? Another great example of the Chief mixing it up again.
DeleteAnother one bites the dust due to Standing Bear --->>> http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/08/26/education-department-director-involuntarily-terminated/
DeleteWill this job go to someone else he's related to?
I thought the ONG was going to employ millions of Osages to better the the lives of our people. What about Jim Gray's 25 year plan? Weren't we promised great things like a per cap and an endless supply of meat pies? Wasn't the whole idea of the new ONG to promote self governance of "We the People"? The reason the ONG is out sourcing the education dept. is to save money. Yeah, save money. Money that can be spent on the government instead of the people or better yet dissapear into the same black hole that Jim Gray put the million dollars he took out of the S-10 account so he could bribe certain Osage congress members and party in France.
DeleteIm sure someday the ONG will outsource all of its programs and employees to temp agencies. The casinos will employ temp workers in order avoid paying any benefits and retirement plans. The ONG needs to save money so it can spend money on itself - not the Osage people. This beast of a government is getting bigger and hungrier and more bloated every day. But then again, that was the plan all along.
Well said poster @ 7:42am. I said that a year a go or so. What happened to the 25year plan Chief, are we going in a different direction? And or where is our PER-CAP CHIEF? Do something right for your people sir.
DeleteSo they're going spent $3,000,000 on three children and 46 Seniors in Fairfax as well?
DeleteFairfax grocery store and senior and child care center funding considered --->>>
http://www.osagenews.org/en/article/2014/11/17/fairfax-grocery-store-and-senior-and-child-care-center-funding-considered/
Sponsired by our favorite Chief. Hahahahahaha!
Shame on them for lettibf fairfax go to the way side. This was not apart of the plan.
DeleteMore spending folly? It looks that way.
ReplyDeletehttp://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/08/28/osage-casino-officials-announce-preliminary-plans-tulsa-casino-and-hotel/
$90 million for two casinos, $30 million for new offices on the hill and I'm sure the list goes on. Then this idiocy last I heard the budget was between $240 and $280 million dollars. The problem at least last winter/ spring was that no bank was willing to loan them that amount do to the high amounts they already owe and the fact that compact renegotiation is coming up in 2017, or there about) and who knows what that's going to look like. I can't imagine what has changed or how they are managing to mortgage away our future on a north Tulsa hotel that I can't imagine anyone wanting to stay at.
DeleteFor a Chief and group so damn concerned about sovereignty they are sure as hell willing to sign it away when it comes to a bank loan. Of course look at them. What else can you expect from that bunch in Pawhuska ...except big feeling attitude.
They must personally loathe themselves and all other Osages because they're so hell bent on self-destruction that it's unquestionable.
DeleteOmg.
DeleteWho the hell is Carol Woods and why do we need to be paying her outfit to be the owner's representative? More money in Osage pockets to the detriment of the membership?
Deletehttp://www.stonebridgegroup.net/index.cfm?id=3
How soon will it be before this is happening to us?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.marketwatch.com/story/unlucky-lottery-winner-gets-iou-instead-of-prize-2015-08-31?link=MW_popular
Web services discussion with ON Internet Technology at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/audio/2894
ReplyDelete2015 Congressional Tzi-Zho Session begins September 8, 2015. See
ReplyDeletehttps://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/news-events/news/2015-tzi-zho-session-begins-september-8th
Won't this be fun to see how quickly they all go back on what they've written in this article about out of control spending? What are the goals of the other five who never bothered to comment? Let's see how fast they adjust and drop direct costs to the membership in favor of their pet spending projects.
Deletehttp://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/04/congress-members-share-thoughts-goals-2015-tzi-zho-session/
This is what comes when certain members of the First Osage Nation Congress did not listen to their constituents and didn't do their due diligence and didn't share that information with the other members of the Osage Nation Congress when asked to do so after having been warned about Carol Leese and his relationship to the PBDC of the Forest County Potawatomi before he ever came to the Osage Nation to work for the Osage, LLC. What is their responsibility and liability in all of this for continuing to approve funding for the Osage, LLC up to the $19-20 million? They still are losing money with that thing over some government designation they will never probably use to get government contracts anyway or bungle up all to hell if they ever even do. So irresponsible it's beyond belief! The whole Osage Nation operation should be taken into some kind of protective receivership just to keep the Osage people's money from being lost or spent like this due to gross incompetence. They are wholly incompetent because they won't listen to you as constituents or to anything on the order of sound advice where the Osage Nation's finances are concerned and another wholesale slaughter of our money is about to take place with the Congress on the 6th of September when the Fall session for appropriation comes up in the next few days. The say they never hear from us but when we do contact them for representation, they rarely ever listen to what we want them to do or do what we want them to anyway. If there hadn't been such a large outcry about the losses from Osage, LLC, they would have tried to sneak past it and wouldn't have funded this legal inquiry if they could have gotten away with it because I believe they knew the Osage people were appalled at the milliions and millions of dollars they continued to appropriate for the Osage, LLC., despite good sense and our wishes and afraid of what this inquiry would bring out. That managing board is being shielded too and they should be jailed because they were charged with the mission to run what has become this horror from a management standpoint but because there are Osages on that board they don't want them held responsible like this is some kind of board game and the money lost isn't real. They should be brought before this tribunal just like Leese and especially that Harvard boy, Jonathan Taylor, who was on the board through much if not all of the funding, who worked hand in glove with Leese to pull off this scam on the Osage Nation and the membership.
ReplyDeleteRead it and weep!
Deletehttp://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/01/second-lawsuit-filed-against-former-osage-llc-management/
The Board is responsible for the Hreat Loss at OLLc. All of them from the Executive to the Budget Committee to Congress. Are all responsible to no end.
DeleteWhat was the policy to verify the due diligence was done? I want to know how the Board of directors verified Leese commitments. Was it just one phone call?
DeletePursuant to the Operating Agreement, it is the Enterprise Board which is the Manager of Osage LLC. Giving Leese the title of CEO did not give him the powers that typically go with such a position. Every major decision required a majority vote of the Enterprise Board. The lawsuits have failed to include the responsible parties - namely, the members of the Enterprise Board.
DeleteWhy are they only wanting these little piddly amounts like $75,000 back from Leese and his cohorts? I thought they lost millions, didn't they?
DeleteThis is HUGE! Congratulations Tocabe!
ReplyDeleteZagat chooses Native American restaurant as Denver's hottest chain
http://www.bizjournals.com/denver/news/2015/09/03/zagat-chooses-native-american-restaurant-as.html
Hotels are a deadly cancer on the Casino business.
ReplyDeleteSee this report:
http://skift.com/2013/04/03/oklahoma-tourism-booms-as-tribal-casinos-plan-million-dollar-expansions/
FY2015-2016 TZI-ZHO SESSION begins tomorrow at 10:00 A.M. CSDT! Follow along at http://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/who-we-are/congress-legislative-branch/sessions
ReplyDeleteLive broadcast is located at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
DeleteGood opening of the Hun-Kah Session. Interesting discussion right away in a Committee of the Whole open discussion of the ON Congress about this $6.5 million additional gaming distribution if' and only if, the Congress uses most of it to pay down the Campus Plan loan. During the Chief's address to the Congress, he made mention of the fact that the Permanent Fund could not be accessed until the campus plan loan is retired.
DeleteYou can read about the expansion of the Tulsa casino at http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/08/proposed-osage-casinos-tulsa-renovation-will-have-132-room-hotel/ and hear the audio of the additional gaming distribution discussion of the Tzi-zho Session today at
Deletehttp://mixlr.com/osage-nation/4c_tzs_day-1_9-8-15_pt1
I heard on this recording that they are going to add more damn board members. This time for that damn Talgrass LLC at $18,000 EACH and more of them for the gaming commission as well at $18,000 EACH TOO!!!!!!!!!!! Pirate treasure of the Osage Treasury is being shoveled out by the boatload again to these Osage government for the government people.
DeleteI also heard on there that the Chief said the Tulsa casino expansion is going to cost down from the original proposal of $406,000,000???????? How much would that be? FIFTEEN BUCKS? What the unholy hell are these people even thinking about here and suspending sovereignty to do it? The whole of Osage County is still on the brink of going over a cliff economically if that Federal injunction against the new BIA CFRs doesn't hold and these Osage government people are even thinking about getting a huge loan for this expansion. I can speculate right now why they want that campus plan loan paid off and it's because they can't get the loan on the expansion until the pemanent fund is no longer encumbered with the loan for the Campus plan. Then I heard Kuuggee talking about accessing the whole $6 plus million to spend in ways that benefit the greatest number of Osages?????? Earlier Speaker said people in the Executive Branch were already screaming about not having enough money to finish out the year at the end of next Sepember with the budget cuts if these budgets are approved?????????? With FORTY MILLION DOLLARS AND THEY CAN'T LIVE WITHIN THE BUDGET PARAMETERS OF THIS MUCH MONEY??????????? How outrageous is this???????? These people are so well paid and eating their way through their paychecks to the level that it is frightening and is going to kill them of diabetes and heart disease if we don't take this money away from them. Just because they aren't drinking liquor, clearly they have transferred this addictive behavior to what they eat. Shocking the size of that Speaker and Kuuggee and Edwards and Buffalohead and that reed thin Pratt who is nearly unrecognizable today who made the remark that they are already in chaos going in. She's right about that. Maybe some of those people need to return some promised constituent phone calls and fill their mouths with words INSTEAD OF FOOD. Just finished Congressional Affairs Committee Meeting early so Speaker Whitehorn can get a bit of lunch... Hahahahahahah! She should forget about that if you ask me. When are health concerns going to start impacting what THEY put in thier mouths? Leadership means the young can see what they are doing by how they look on the basis of how they behave and if they want healthy children who aren't overweight and are so Constitutionally concerned about the young, they should set a proper example for them by not letting themselves get so grotesquely morbidly obese.
We can understand your frustration but we think this is grey area here of a personal nature. If they are using our money to benefit themselves in harmful ways then this is truely a concern and it's true that some of these members of the Osage Congress look like they've nearly doubled in girth size since they were elected and it does set a terrible example for the Nation's youth but we feel that this venting could be less caustic in nature. Please refrain from such outbursts in the future as it isn't helpful. If you want to make note of it, that's one thing but going this far is another matter altogether.
Deletemore of our Gal Darn money spent on some undoubtedly Osage owned company to do another study this time a minimum wage study for the casinos. These government people are sick and obsessed with spending. they NeeD an intervention. where's the study for that?
Deletehttp://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/08/osage-gaming-officials-moving-forward-casino-employee-minimum-wage-study/
After now many years an annual report from these casino honchos? I hear the new hotels are eating up profits on Ponca and Skiatook but this report won't say anything that now will it?
Deletehttp://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/08/osage-gaming-officials-report-fy-2014-information-osage-casinos/
Summary of Day 1 is located at http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/09/2015-tzi-zho-session-underway/
DeleteHotels a boondoggle, wage increase in an area that is already economicly depressed no to the hail no...Guys do your homework.
DeleteLive audio broadcast of the Day 2 Regular Session is located at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
ReplyDeleteMeeting is adjourned. Housekeeping on legislation and introduction of bills and resolutions.
DeleteIf you missed it live, see http://mixlr.com/osage-nation/showreel/
DeleteOther YouTube Videos are located at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/video
DeleteOne motion to confirm all of the board members? How strange is that? What is this? A blanket rubber stamp on the Chief's choices right across the Board? More negligence from the Osage Congress where their due diligence vetting of these appointees are concerned? This discussion is happening in the Commerce and Econ Committee? BUH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WHAT ARE WE PAYING THESE PEOPLE FOR IF THEY ARE CONSTANTLY SEEKING WAYS TO SIDE STEP THEIR BASIC RESPONSIBILITES UNDER THE OSAGE CONSTITUTION?
ReplyDeleteWill someone please ask Supernaw to quit mumbling so we can hear what he's saying?
DeleteCourtesy notification:
ReplyDeleteThe Mike Black meeting was a lollapalooza today with it almost coming to blows at one point. More on this --->>>
http://osageblog.blogspot.com/2015/08/osage-shareholder-matters-september-2015.html
More good information:
Deletehttps://www.facebook.com/OsageNews?fref=nfhttps://www.facebook.com/OsageNews?fref=nf
You can see today's video of the Congressional session at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
ReplyDeleteDid I hear that salaries are up 23-50% and that the budget for osage nation government operations is nearly $20 million in ONCA 15-84 in the government OPs committee today? Are you kidding? Peoples feelings figure into this? I'll bet they do. These departments ran on $250,000 in total less than 10 years ago? 80 times higher than what it used to be? This is TOTALLY SICK AND DISGUSTING!!!!!!!!!!!!!
DeleteAs a member, are your benefits and services from the Osage Nation government 80 times better? My answer to that is without question NO! These Executive Branch government people under Chief Geoffrey Standing Bear are completely out of control with spending.
DeleteGood. The committee tabled this bill for further review later.
Education Committee is up next:
Deletehttps://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/gmAGTa0AFrVJyHZLoAvepkWqRZTdvZroadFcrwGjOqIfdYFVMndCHoLCV0MFaNXp?dl=1
A direct services to the Osage students reduction in Vocational Tech from $300,000 to $100,000 for some reason and some funds may have been sent to another budget. You can listen in again at http://mixlr.com/osage-nation/showreel/?page=1 when this meeting is up on today's roster.
DeleteCongressman Mason is always so polite to the listening audience in explaining things to us which is greatly appreciated.
DeleteActivities at the Cultural Center:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.facebook.com/preservingourculture?fref=nf
Here's the roster for 19,000 Osage Nation members not including the 3 Branches, the Boards an Commissions or the Study groups --->>>
ReplyDeletehttps://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/resource-directory
41 of them and I'm not even certain that this is all of them like IT that does perform well for the membership and is of great benefit. How many of them actually provide services to the great majority of Osages and are even really needed?
Reworked the numbers on this and it comes out to 54 total departments, divisions, offices, boards, commissions and this list does not include the Office of the Chiefs, the Osage Congress and the OFPR or the Judicial Branch. It does not include study groups who produce no studies that I am aware have ever been publicly published to the membership or any of the Casinos and those business organizations that may be unaccounted for in this roster.
DeleteHere is but one budget example of one division and those INDIVIDUAL CATEGORIES for funding involving Land, Commerce and Public Safety:
Deletehttps://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/dktjyxLuLPdVqG6nhf7sc52kMg9BwFqoWgHexl87yLA7RLhMAKDv6qZHAwwlYyxa?dl=1
These Osage Nation government people are spending money like this for budget after budget after budget:
https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/who-we-are/congress-legislative-branch/legislation
If you think this won't happen if they get their hands on minerals, you better think again. This new Osage government isn't even 10 years old and look what has happened here. They need to prove to us that they provide benefits for the majority of the Osage Nation members and they can't even hope to make that case.
This does not include Task Forces of the Osage Nation either.
DeleteReview this resolution bill for the Boards and Commissions and this is just the compensation and reimbursement for 11 of 12 of them not including the budget appropriation for the entity they act as a board or commission member for;
Deletehttps://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/DEwESoLWHPeaZQsOwoo4Fz3ir1igNhqOD5eyOBhtg3BCN43LmqTUL25w3aj9fGEt?dl=1
Note that it doesn't include the number of board or commission members for each entity listed. This may involve as many as 50 to 75 people in total, attending no more than one meeting a month, if that. In some instances, where the business boards are involved, this compensation is equal to the full salary of an entry level full time employee outside of the Osage Nation sphere as an employer or in other words, in the surrounding local area in the real world.
What's this new dustup with the building of the new Ram's stadium in St. Louis?
ReplyDeleteSession is due to begin with no agenda and no legislation tracking document posted as of yet at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/who-we-are/congress-legislative-branch/sessions
ReplyDeleteLive now with audio but no video available.
Delete...at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
DeleteTreasurer's report on the audit for 2014 with the auditor from BKD.
DeleteFor the Nation and the Osage, LLC.
DeleteAudit report on financial statements.
DeleteSingle separate audit report and findings with summary of findings. Clean opinion for a modified opinion with a restatement for the Villages now in the financial statement for the Nation. One deficientcy on the construction of the new buildings and a clean opinion on Osage, LLC. Still room for improvement but largely very good for this year. Shannon Edwards asking about all of the LLCs. How many of them are there?
DeleteONES, LLC, Home Health and the Osage Foundation don't have to have a separate audit at this point and are reported with the Nation.
DeleteGaming enterprise is included in overall audit but also has to have another audit separate as per NIGC and a financial audit in the audit report.
DeleteTalking about the contents of the report.
DeleteDiscussion on changing the Congressional Rules to fast-track legislation. And the high cost of the health care self insured cost to the Nation. Committee of the whole open discussion on partial self-insured costs.
DeleteOn claims to increase employees who pay $20.00 and $680.00 a month is paid by the Nation per employee?
DeleteChange being reviewed as to using the Affordable Care Act for the employees. SO NOW YOU'RE CATCHING ON? With a savings of a MILLION DOLLARS on health cost savings for the Executive Branch if they had been doing it this way this year? Comment on million savings this year from AP Chief.
DeleteIs this crazy or what? For TWO solid years these Osage Nation government goofs have been paying for insurance for the employees when they could have gotten their tax credit, high quality insurance, paid only a small premium above the amount of the individual tax credit, no deductible and no further out of pocket cost whatsoever which is subsidized by the Federal government under Native American plans. Keep in mind that these less than pro-active decision makers who should have looked into the benefits of the Affordable HC Act at the very beginning of 2013 want to run our minerals. Enough said.
DeleteAccording to the audit, $3,889,000 was paid by the Nation in health care costs in 2014 for the self-insured health insurance. In view of the option for self insurance under the AHCA, this cost could have been maybe $20.00 per employee if the Nation picked up that premium amount for say 550 employees that would have amounted to $11,000.
DeleteThat would be a yearly total of $132,000.
DeleteI heard that in the first year of the Act, one Osage paid a grand total of $1.49 per month and that was it period. Nothing else was paid or required throughout the year and it included no cost for medications either. The plan offered and chosen was far better than the one being paid for at $330.00 a month and included a mental health care provision which the previous plan did not.
DeleteIf the total is 3.9 million dollars paid for self-insured health care and only $132,000 could have been the maximum paid, that would have been a savings of $3,757,000 for 2014 fy. So that's 3 and 3/4s of a MILLION DOLLARS that could have gone to pay for approximately 20,000 members or $187.50 in benefits for every single registered member of the Osage Nation.
DeleteHow is it possible that they haven't looked into this option from the Congress side if the Executive wasn't on the ball? I see this as money lost to the Nation of approximately $6,700,000 up to and including September of this year! This amount would have paid nearly the whole amount of direct cost to the Nation of the health programs including the Osage health card and the participation in Medicare Plan F for all of the Seniors for fy 2016.
DeleteIn response to the post at 9:17 AM: The "clean opinion on Osage, LLC" could not have been issued if the auditors had a working knowledge of the Small Business Act. Osage, LLC and its subsidiaries are in violation of multiple clauses at 15 USC 645 and violation of the implementing regulations for the 8(a) Business Development program at 13 CFR 124. The violations stem from misrepresenting subcontractors to OPDG and OIS as these entities, claiming both the past experience of the subcontractors and the employees as their own. All contracts awarded with a small business preference, including 8(a) set-aside and sole source contracts, require the contractor company to perform at least 50% of the effort with its own employees. The proposals submitted to the government falsely identify the subcontractors' employees as those of the OLLC subsidiaries. The OLLC subsidiaries have absolutely no capabilities to perform architect/engineer/construct (AEC) contracts without Pinnacle Design Group (a company located in Norman, OK) or a similarly qualified company, and would never receive an award without committing fraud against the U.S. government. A review of the submitted proposals, the contract and subcontracts, and records of employee labor can easily be conducted to verify the facts. These contracts were executed under the current board, which is the manager of OLLC per the operating agreement, and the OLLC board was appointed to the Tallgrass, LLC board. Ethics? Let the facts speak for the record.
DeleteGov. Ops Committee is meeting now and being broadcast. Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/qAPzRhkuo6XUINFRlkpsNrD6ewc0s8w3fg724lZqDVfMnRcZiCg7UNKHQ3H86huc?dl=1
ReplyDeleteIMPORTANT:
ReplyDelete"Pending an approved contract, Hart Intercivic will work with the Election Office and board on the June 2016 (Congress) election and primary election, if necessary." See http://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/14/on-election-board-selects-texas-company-for-election-services-equipment/
What is significant is Congressman Norris initially submitted a bill, ONCA 15-76, in August that called for a Primary Election for the Congressional Candidates that would make it that much harder for the members of the Osage Nation to run for office. Apparently he had the wise judgment and good sense to chance this legislation in early September to state that there will be no Primary Election for the Osage Congress. This kind of stuff in legislation is what we have to watch for and monitor closely. Today the membership person who spoke in the Committee Meeting said that there are still Osages out there who receive a headright check who have no idea that they lost their Tribal membership when the Constitutional government came in and the Osage Nation Congress voted on new membership regulations in the Fall of 2006.
Waste of time and money and not just that would be an intrusion on and a violation against the the 1906ACT and I would sue...in the Courts.
ReplyDeleteWhat comment are you responding to? Please clarify.
DeleteComm and Econ Committee is live and members are having confusion with how one of the budgets has been organized however the Agenda for today does not specify what legislation is being reviewed. I believe Kugee is the Chair of this Committee as to why this agenda does not have specific information on the legislation being gone over. It's always a good thing and a courtesy to the constituents following along to know what is being reviewed as they move through the meeting.
ReplyDeletehttps://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/x3DQnKQF2xdfgy2bzvl9fb0fsdCYLJQChjxbRHhGMZsqUPivy880or4TTjShLboS?dl=1
DeleteWhat is that background noise? The AC or the rain? Wow. It's loud!
DeleteSome of the discussion was centered around the administrative cost not exceeding 20% in Federal budgets. From what was discussed, they are moving salaries for this program budget to another line item area. If the Federal requirement is there at 20%, shouldn't that be observed and because that cap is there for a reason, are we to infer that the Nation is hiring more people than this federal program is meant to have employed to manage and oversee? It looks like another area of Osage employee pile on or salaries too high for those who work with this program to stay within those Federal guideliines?
DeleteComing event --->>>
ReplyDeletehttp://osagenews.org/en/categories/events/
$3 million for about 150 Osages:
ReplyDeletehttp://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/11/construction-underway-nations-fairfax-child-care-and-senior-center-building/
Session today was fairly straight forward. No surprises today. Listen now at http://mixlr.com/osage-nation/showreel/ and the Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/JnsikP0xZWjYXN4cM64TAesqQeHNSzel6oeo4scYCgeRiKt87KcqS4entT2YhOx9?dl=1
ReplyDeleteDue to Minerals Meeting tomorrow, the ON Congress will meet on Thursday morning at 10 a.m.
Attorney General moves into the new campus plan building --->>>
ReplyDeletehttps://www.flickr.com/photos/osagenews/sets/72157657068911301
Education Committee live at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
ReplyDeleteAgenda at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/K4nXfAKZVpWmEO6VDWFcTiQwnl5pplImCfwFLkSV9tOn2v2wxfbT167O7t3Hvraj?dl=1
$9.7 million for 3 children in Hominy? Boys and Girls Club had 700 plus a few years ago and now to 49? Did I hear that correctly? Now they have to pay and no one wants to do that. Youth Academys are listed on the Agenda.
A new Stem program? Summer educational activities with Certified teachers with an educational curriculum throughout the year.
DeleteOMG! $1,336,000 for 30 children in total for the three Youth Academys? $44K per child? WHAT THE HELL? YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!!!!!!!!!!!
DeleteOSAGE CHILDREN ALL OVER THIS COUNTRY NEED THIS MONEY AND YOU HAVE THE NERVE TO ASK US TO PAY $44,000 PER EACH CHILD YOU HAVE IN THIS PROGRAM.
DeleteSEND THIS BUDGET BACK TO THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH RIGHT THIS MINUTE. HOW DARE YOU PEOPLE?
AND THESE CHILDREN HAVE TO PAY $5 A DAY TO BE IN THIS PROGRAM ON TOP OF ALL THIS MONEY YOU WANT FOR THE PROGRAM AS WELL? GET OUT OF HERE, GROW A BRAIN AND STOP FEEDING YOUR UNADULTERATED UNFETTERED GREED WITH OUR MONEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THIS IS A GROTESQUE OUTRAGE TO THE OSAGE MEMBERSHIP ALL OVER THE UNITED STATES.
DeleteAFTER SCHOOL PROGRAM OF $485,000 TOO? GIVE US A BREAK! ARE YOU PEOPLE INSANE?
DeleteTHANK YOU LADIES? FOR WHAT? INSULTING EVER OSAGE FAMILY THAT LIVES OUTSIDE OF FAIRFAX, PAWHUSKA AND HOMINY? OF COURSE DEB ATTERBURY IS INVOLVED IN A FUNDING DEBACLE LIKE THIS. NOW THIS IS BEGINNING TO MAKE SOME KIND OF SENSE.
DeleteI can't believe what is written here. Is this real? I am livid if this is true and so should everyone be who finds out about it.
DeleteThis insanity tracks right back to Chief Standing Bear and his principal mission to make the children his priority. Spending for this is scandalous and we need to get rid of this man in office before he finishes us off with such unjustified spending on 3 year old children. He has lost his mind if he thinks that we will stand for this!
DeleteYou have to hear this to believe it! Listen to Congresswoman Bufffalohead's remarks
Deletehttp://mixlr.com/osage-nation/showreel/
Ever since this man has gotten in office CSB has used his talent to spend insert himself in a mural, insult the M.C.the Shareholders, the list can go on. No he's for big Government. Time to send this Man Packing..
DeleteHealth and Social Services Committee Meeting is live now at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
ReplyDeleteAgenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/u3dyRrXZFMciYt1CLiiJWombEL2scwpKmDS6Vqoy7LJnQ5PsyT0HgRIbG5Vauyhq?dl=1
Compensation analyst? Wage Survey. HR duties divided among three employees and give them salary bumps for additional duties. Then for housing, education, health and job descriptions were changed and get higher salaries plus culture and language. Police dept. Substantial increases in indirect cost. No increases in salaries and yet budgets are higher. IDC pool funds will revert back to the Treasury if not spent. Negotiated rate. Could over-recover in one year ($5 million?) and then the rate could be less the next year? Will meet again to come with a final clarification. Meeting was adjourned.
DeleteComment above is in the wrong place. It's for the Government Operations Committee. Sorry.
DeleteGovOps is live at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
ReplyDeleteAgenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/DSefwGfmctrhBEjs32BKGx4QmeU12XeDjWr0gnmLtkEoUWME5ClcGn1cXogNRVom?dl=1
Hey Turkey Voucher guy! You just don't rank as a third class no count constituent but these Osage government for the government employees sure as $#*T do. They get employee hams handed out to them on a silver platter and it's right here on this budget.
DeleteHow much do we pay for candy and soda pop? Where is that on these budgets?
DeleteHey Buddy here I am the Turkey Guy...lol. My point is,there is no reason we can't get a Gift certificate out to all Osages. Long over due unreal really? A Ham. I shouldn't have to call the executive to sponsor such a moral thing to do...or call a Congressman to support such a good thing. And this is why we have a bloated over inflated Government. A 150,000 is not much compared to what our Government is spending, wasting or that A Per-Cap shpiuld go out to all Osages..
DeleteCompensation analyst? Wage Survey. HR duties divided among three employees and give them salary bumps for additional duties. Then for housing, education, health and job descriptions were changed and get higher salaries plus culture and language. Police dept. Substantial increases in indirect cost. No increases in salaries and yet budgets are higher. IDC pool funds will revert back to the Treasury if not spent. Negotiated rate. Could over-recover in one year ($5 million?) and then the rate could be less the next year? Will meet again to come with a final clarification. Meeting was adjourned.
DeleteTurkey voucher Guy! Glad you're back, and I agree with this much money spent on every insane thing they can think of or spent in insane ways, you're right. Get that Turkey voucher out and that per cap hard on its heels! We need that money too.
DeleteTo poster @ 4:36 pm, I've been here all along just mostly on the other side of this Blog focused on our current situation regarding the M.E. This out of control spending is out of site. And we Osages for fiscal responsibility have the right to say how we want our Government to spend our money that is not working for the Majority but the Minority. That mentality will not last long. Coming this 2016 Several Congressional seats will be up for election. We need to pay attention. We must replace those seats with Canidates who are for smaller Government. Who are for the Constituency their People...The Osage and their Communities as promised and get that Turkey Voucher out to all Osages. A symbol, you are not forgot...The Money is there. I keep on hereing this Money is Yours and How is it working for you? Where is that Per-Cap Chief? This was not the Government the People expected or wanted. Change will come and it will be the will of the People, The Osage.
DeleteWhat do we need this old building for which the Osage Nation just bought? spend spend spend! Nonsense all the time.
ReplyDeletehttp://osagenews.org/en/article/2015/09/11/osage-nation-buys-first-national-bank-building-pawhuska/
Congressional Education Meeting is live and the Agenda is located at
ReplyDeletehttps://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/Sd1ni3P8JvJX1zehK6kzsPyobg0n0cfpb0cVU9pBn2kHIT7Zr7L68o6eqpYUs1ji?dl=1
Health & SS Committee is live at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
ReplyDeleteAgenda is located at
Deletehttps://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/4Cp6kSUZMo1Asx4719CMNJm0dt5FAG94C861iHIZRVbyxxKzB4Yq8Yg3Kaluq9Q2?dl=1
To see the Congressional Calendar for scheduled Committee Meetings, see https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/who-we-are/congress-legislative-branch/calendar
ReplyDeleteSession is due to begin and the agenda for today is located at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/sites/default/files/event-brochures/DAY9A_9-17-15_TZS.pdf
ReplyDeleteOn live now.
DeleteSpending to be held to $43,775,000 of Tribal Funding (casino and other income to the Nation, I presume).
DeleteComments from Congress on spending in this Session. Trying to put together a spending road map. Spend everthing to borrow more money? All voted yes. Now let's see what they do.
DeleteCongressional comments:
Committee of the Whole and employee raises they are seeing in these budgets. New positions and new raises in many if not all of the budget. Some departments were told no and added the raises to the budget anyway? Supernaw met with HR and no rhyme or reason to the raises. If the money's there, they would give the raises if they got signatures for those raises. Freeze the salaries across the board to be fair. Cuts in every division. A good job in early childhood education. (???) $390,000 surplus from Asst Chief's comments. If this is so, why is the Congress talking about spending to the maximum. Some should not get a raise unless all get a raise. $2 million spent on salaries on fair market value last year on for profit businesses? (What market is that? RAISES, MERIT, PLUS COST OF LIVING). Admitted that the budgets in total are over the projected income figure as it is. Cuts were made but not enough to come under the projected revenue figure so lose that argument right now. Boots on the ground in HR and this justifies this continued spending nonsense well over the bottom line figure? That won't fly and don't make the same stupid argument over and over year after year. Live within your allowance within projected revenue. Do the work Executive and quit whining. That's what you're paid to do so do it!
Assistant Chief, you do your own work at the granular level. You have the figure, now take it and adjust the budget figures within what you are given as a total spending figure by the Congress. If your work isn't right, correct it yourself and bring it back. Just do it and quit trying to bully and manipulate the Congress. Nine years of this and the constituents are FED UP WITH IT!!!!!!!!!!!! Get your branch of government in line and stop this nonsense YEAR IN AND YEAR OUT.
DeleteBTW, why are we getting these total budget figures and not budgets for each different office division department etc. so we can see what is going on and what money is being spent on what individual budget? This is totally bogus. Send these back to the Executive Branch and get us budgets with breadowns and real numbers. What do we have to do? File a complaint with the AGs office to get you people to properly disclose to the Osage people how you are spending our money, where and how much?
DeleteCommerce and Econ Meeting is live and the Agenda is located at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/sites/default/files/event-brochures/CE-9-17-15_NoticeRevised.pdf
ReplyDeletePaying for outside employees who actually know what they are doing and have job skills for the job? Did I hear that right? On break until after lunch.
DeleteI just read ONCR 15-23, a resolution to transfer its assets, wind up its affairs, and dissolve the company. The third paragraph of the resolutions gives consent to the transfer of residual property after "winding up its assets and liabilities". This language would typically indicate the subsidiaries would also be shut down and dissolved, but this seems to contradict the opening paragraph of the resolution. Perhaps the intent will become clear during the session with OLLC management.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.dropbox.com/s/blf6uxisj87p2ee/ONCR%2015-23%20REVISED.pdf?dl=0
Not only did the Nation by a bank building they also bought the old Hernandez building and may have to tear that building down. Isn't that something you find out before you purchase a property? Sounds to much like the old Fairfax Nursing home they bought paid to re-roof and then promptly tore down.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.newson6.com/story/30045531/osage-nation-buys-pawhuskas-first-national-bank-building
If they really feel the need to buy something, buy land not buildings. We aren't going to make money being landlords in Pawhuska. If we hadn't pissed it all away we could have enough money to own a good chunk if not most of Osage county now. That's an ownership that would mean something. Instead we have a bunch of structure we are going to have to pay to insure and upkeep. This tedious stupidity wears a person out.
Relentless, isn't it?
DeleteCongressional Session was held today and the Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/uRln5HSadErlBGkASC7ZdIcN5gEXNTUWSePkM0ZS7sEcvkBOU7UYxssvYymQgjkr?dl=1
ReplyDeleteOf particular interest is the fact that with only one exception, the Tallgrass Economic Development Board nominees were not asked a singled vetting question on behalf of or for the Osage people in a matter as serious as confirming this Board member transfer from the Osage , LLC. Tallchief did say that they would need two years to clean up the problems from the Osage,LLC but no one asked him for a clarification of that statement or why it was taking so long. Congressman Shaw did ask nominee Phillip Morrow if he anticipated difficulty in the meetings or future meetings of the TED LLC. When he said no, Shaw let it stand without any further in depth followup question as to why he would ask such a question in the first place and when it came time to vote for confirmation, Pratt, Shaw and Supernaw voted against confirmation. We want to know why these members have been nominated by the Chief, what business background they have which qualifies them to be nominated and what experience they have in business, in addition to what plans they have for the direction of TED LLC in the future. For this reason this was the poorest vetting on the part of the Osage Congress I have ever seen. Deplorable and if the TED LLC runs afoul in the future just like the Osage LLC has in the past, the Osage Congress will be on the hook for such a poor if not negligent job of vetting these new managing Board members in Congress when they had the chance to do so.
All of the Board members were confirmed by the Congress some of them have been on the OLLC for years. What is going on with this situation?
DeleteAnother $90K shot in paying these guys to run this board and shot if they fail to make us money. When are the members of the Osage Congress going to start acting like they accept the full responsibility for why they are there and for what they are supposed to be doing?
DeleteYou are 100% correct about the process for confirmation. It was little more than a sit down where each member of the board had the opportunity to tell a sad story about the challenges they faced, pat himself on the back for turning things around, and then say they'll do great things in the future. However, their business model is to take contracts which are performed entirely by subcontractors. They have no employees with experience in the areas of architecture, engineering or construction, and are entirely reliant upon Don Frick and Jeff Maack of Pinnacle Design Group. You should not confuse this company with Osage Pinnacle Design Group, though they rely on the Federal government being confused for participation in the 8(a) Business Development program and for contract awards. These board members are either ignorant of the laws being violated in defrauding the Federal government, or fully aware but willing to do anything in order to get contracts.
DeleteEven so, they are not covering the costs of the board, their single employee, or the personnel performing management functions under contract. The "profit" reported in the OLLC annual report is the markup over the subcontracts without accounting for costs of management salaries and other expenses necessary to run the company.
In addition to confirming these board members, of which two have been OLLC board members for three years, they changed the resolution related to the transfer of assets from OLLC to TED LLC. The revised version does not yet match either the Committee Report or the recorded session. The AG has requested that OLLC not be dissolved while the lawsuits are active, and the committee discussion and recommendations for revision shows clear intent to adhere to this request. However, this raises questions.
If OLLC is not dissolved, who will be sitting on its board?
Will the Nation be paying for two sets of board members, one set for OLLC and the other for TED LLC?
FYI - There will be an identity of interest problem if the same board directs both companies. This will be made worse if the board is only compensated for TED LLC. The transfer of assets is a shady practice at best, and possibly criminal. It certainly doesn't protect any of the transferred assets.
Double the compensation for these board members? Is this what you are suggesting? What a sweet deal. Hahahahahaha! Why am I not surprised? You are aware that there is legislation in this session to terminate the OLLC and they could move forward with voting for this legislation by the end of this session of the Osage Congress.
DeleteI'm not recommending doubling the board and paying them twice. In my opinion, Shannon Edwards has the right of it. She is not in favor of the OLLC to TED LLC transition. It won't protect the assets and the fraudulent business practices and lack of federal government business experience among this board will just ruin another name.
DeleteGovOps is meeting live at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
ReplyDeleteAgenda for this meeting is located at:
https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/sites/default/files/event-brochures/GO-9-18-15_NoticeRevised2.pdf
AG looking into things left and right? What things Congresswoman Bufflohead? Since we get no information from the AG's web site, perhaps you can enlighten us.
DeleteAs a courtesy to the listening audience, will the Congressional Committee Chair announce how much the total budget is for each category that we no longer have the privilege of seeing in these budget abbreviation Bills that you are reviewing one by one? Today we have:
DeleteLaw Enforcement - Federal
Law Enforcement - Tribal
Osage News
There is a total figure for each one of these separate budgets in ONCA 15-85 that we are no longer able to see as a result of such consolidated opaque bills that you are putting out there on behalf of the Osage people.
Osage News Editor Duty is reporting that the Osage Nation has its own PR facebook page. This is true and she claims that it is a source of news and information that is favorable toward the Osage Nation and not unbiased like the Osage News is in content orientation.
Deletehttps://www.facebook.com/osagenation
Now now. Duty is asking for an increase in salary because raises are going through in this Session of the Osage Nation? Other raises have been justified with support documents. Still here she comes begging for more money because it isn't fair and because she has seen other budgets gone through before hers today and wants more because they are getting more. Imagine if she doesn't get what she wants. She will probably go whining about it in the Osage News. Federal requirements are in play here on other budgets on increases. She's paid with Tribal funds with no such requirements.
DeleteOf course, Buffalohead says go ahead and resubmit your budget. You little A** kisser! Disgusting !!!!!!!!!!!!!! Substantially, RJ Walker says to take any new budget back to the Chief with changes signed by the Chief and he will look at it at a later time in this committee.
DeleteHear it again when posted at http://mixlr.com/osage-nation/showreel/?page=1
DeleteOn behalf of the Osage people? You have got to be joking. This isn't funny.
DeleteI didn't say it was. Aparently you are incapable of picking up sarcasm.
DeleteI see everyone has thier hand out for their raise..Tell me what our Congress has done for the People oh thats right the People the few the proud the privilege, the Government employees and Shannon Duty and she is not apart of the Government. thats right we forgot the economy is in the sh****r.Really is a shame the same people get passed onto the next LLC who are responsible for the huge fail of the Osage LLC. What a bowl of Conflict of interest. How could the Congressional Body not recognize the ethical consequences not just that, doing the same thing over again is asking for trouble all over again mark my word...Mrs.Duty your paper is bias. The truth hurts.
DeleteHahahahaha!
Deletehttps://www.facebook.com/OsageNews/photos/a.153834188010750.33094.134873493240153/974585772602250/?type=1&theater
Money grub grub grub grub grub grub... ... ... ... ... ...
Shame on you Shannon Duty!
VERY IMPORTANT MEETING OF THE COMMERCE AND ECONOMIC COMMITTEE MEETING TODAY THAT INCLUDES A REPORT FROM THE OSAGE, LLC AT 3:00 P.M. CSDT.
ReplyDeleteTo listen in to the meeting see https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-mediahttps://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
The Agenda is located at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/sites/default/files/event-brochures/CE-9-18-15_Notice.pdf
This ought to be good!
DeleteParris is giving the report.
DeletePresentation is going to be given with slides. Setting up for that.
DeleteWorking with a handout.
DeleteTallgrass transition and excited about the future. Where are we and whats going on today with joint venture with an Osage. Hit a back log with an $11 million contract TOCA contract with $19 million contract with Corps of Engineers.
Delete21,000 gone through
Winding down with Osage Manhatttan bldrs. with money back $200,000?
$1.1 plus $1.5 millions and have bond for $15 million. Are they borrowing money?
Questions by the SBA on transition running silent and deep? Are they hiding things from the SBA? Move to Tallgrass after approval has been obtained under the OLLC.
Capture income and assets of the OLLC for TED LLC.
Need past experience with 8a that in the past wasn't executed very well? The new team will be more diligent and a new company you have to partner with on this. Focus to get companies we can partner with in the future to get the SBA to work with but need acquisitions to get partners and increase revenue quickly. Don't have the money to buy these companies and WILL HAVE TO COME BACK TO CONGRESS FOR MORE MONEY???????????????
DeleteHERE WE GO AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Osage Innovative is a tech firm and have found a data management company as in initiative with a partnership. One of the companies they work with is the Osage Nation.
Delete2016 and beyond -- strategic thoughts to generate revenue. Rebranding this company. Difficulties in hiring people in the past. REALLY?
Focussed to get into construction and need more money to do it. Plus another 8a to work with. Tech is very thin business with a better margin. In 2017 with an accounting department staff and more hires with the need for a new 8a. How can we cross sell and payback on these companies and continue to diversify with a Super Board?
David Steward answering questions about the mentor proteget SBA partnership with Arrowhead? Moving assets that perform to TED LLC and leave the rest.
DeleteSo, in short they have to be entirely refunded. They have a million dollars and can't hire people or a CEO or move forward? A lot of companies to be successful they don't have that much money to start up and get going. Is this joker kidding? This is stupid going in right from the get go. WTH? They are already going in a bad direction. You don't have to buy companies. You can start companies in your own right with $1,000,000 in the bank right now. They have this much money in the TED LLC and they are saying the same damn things as the Osage LLC Board was saying all along. No capital infusion PERIOD. NOW THEY WANT $5 TO $10 MILLION MORE ISN'T A LOT OF MONEY? TO WHOM ISN'T IT A LOT OF MONEY? WANT $2 MILLION MORE? GET THE HELL OUT OF THE ROOM YOU IDIOT. NO MORE MONEY FOR THIS NONSENSE. YOU HIRE LOCALLY AND PUT OSAGES TO WORK HERE IN THE COUNTY OR PACK UP AND GET OUT!!!!
DeleteGET OUR MONEY BACK AND SHUT THIS NEW THING AND THE OLD THING DOWN NOW AND MOVE ON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
DeleteDo not give these jerks a dime of the Osage peoples money. This won't work either. Get out now and if any of you Congress vote to give this loser more money we will see to it that you won't be reelected. You have plenty of money to hire a CEO if you don't pay him $250,000 to $300,000 a year. YOU ARE SMALL SO STOP THINKING YOU NEED SOMEONE FROM A FORTUNE 500 COMPANY AND THAT YOU HAVE TO HIRE SOMEONE ON THAT BASIS! Once again, these people are looking for a big paycheck and to run through our money again. This is stupid and I don't like Stewart's tone toward the members of the Committee. He sounds just like that Jonathan Taylor. PUT OSAGES TO WORK OR GO HOME. YOU ARE WASTING YOUR TIME AND OURS AND YOU ARE GETTING PAID OUR MONEY TO WASTE IT. GO HOME AND SHUT IT DOWN TODAY. IS THIS FOR REAL???????????? CONGRESS DON'T YOU DARE GO THERE TO GIVE THEM ANY OF OUR MONEY. DON'T LET THEM BORROW MONEY EITHER. GET RID OF THIS TED LLC NOW. THE RIGHT SITUATION COMING ALONG? FORGET IT GOING IN.
DeleteThey were paying the last one like a Fortune 500 CEO and it failed. business model is a success and don't even have a firm opportunity to put forward yet? they have been makingg these prromises for a year now and itts the same damn thing again. kill it now beffore it eats more of our money. we don't deserve this.
DeleteYou are full of it. If you can't make a good start with a million bucks tell them to go home and forget it. Kugee says three months till we have more money? Don't you even think about funding this dumb thing with three Osages on the Board. Well doesn't that say a lot right there?
DeleteBet on this? Who is that Board member who said that? We're not betting on any more of this stupidity. This can't be for real but it sure is.
DeleteDon't know how much money they need and don't know what for? But we're a really great Board? Where would that be? Nevernever land? This is crazy from the get go. Get rid of these people. Want $5 million to $10 million to build competency in the future and that's the way to do it. Kugee says a target date to give them money by December 15, 2015. Has he gotten stupid all of a sudden? Ranges of capital infusion? OH YOU BET PAL! HIT THE ROAD BEFORE YOU EMBARRASS YOURSELF ANY FURTHER. THAT WILL BE $30 MILLION TOTAL TOWARD THIS LOSER BUSINESS CONCEPT IN TOTAL BY THE END DECEMBER IF THEY GIVE THEM $10 MILLION. FORM A COMPANY AND THEN ASK FOR BUSINESS. GLOBAL INITIATIVE TO FORM A COMPANY AFTER YOU GET A CONTRACT? Most people open for business and THEN solicit business NOT HAVE A CONTRACT FOR BUSINESS AND THEN OPEN A BUSINESS TO SATISFY THE CONTRACT. IS THIS JOKER FOR REAL????????? DON'T YOU DARE GIVE THIS PIKER A DIME OF OUR MONEY. NOT ONE THIN DIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!
DeleteWTH? Global initiative? We're talking Osage County here not Venice, Italy! Throw your corporate jargon around elsewhere buddy. If you can't roll up your sleeves and get something done with ONE MILLION BUCKS in your Corrporate coffers right now, you can shove your GLOBAL INITIATIVE WHERE THE SUN DON'T SHINE. How could the Congress have even considering confirming such people as this today when they are saying the same damn things Carol Leese and Jonathan Taylor said exactly in the past. How dare these jerks show up and ask for another $2 million or more or even FIFTY CENTS MORE from the Osage people? Show these bstrds the door and lock it behind them!
DeleteIn Executive session.
Deleteomg...not again!
DeleteWhat core competency? They have no competency without a plan for business expansion and without any businesses in mind, how will they know how much money they will need? Obviously they are incompetent and if they can't form at least one small business with a million bucks in the local area, something is very wrong. Are they planning to hide in the TALLGRASS this time and try and fool us with the same Harvard business concept that failed the last time? We can see you coming globally, tallgrass or not. How could the Osage Nation be doing the same thing again with our money? Because Kugee supports it? He needs to retire on an immediate basis if he is backing another plan like this one. Don't go there again. I am warning you...
DeleteKugee's not this stupid. Nobody with a lick of sense wants to build a hotel in the Tulsa location because it's in the worst part of town. They have $5 million but it's being used as collateral for the campus plan loan and until it's paid off it won't become available. Kugee likely wants to divert the $6.5 million more from gaming, if they pay off the campus plan loan, to the Tallgrass LLC that is his baby. Kugee is notorious for working to destroy ideas and people who don't or won't allow him to take the controlling role and that's pretty much what happened with the Osage, LLC. It's the same governing documents as the Osage LLC but by the name of Tallgrass. He's either the "God controlling things behind the scenes" or he won't play ball. Since Tallgrass is coming from him he'll advocate for giving it money and try and justify its losses in future. It's in our best interest to keep the money in the bank and not spend it because with the Osages, spending is always losing on business opportunities that never seem to succeed other than gaming which they are already bleeding dry as we speak. This get rich quick model is wrong from the beginning and it has no where to go but down and out.
DeleteCame back and have no real plans till the get money from the Nation and are looking for partnerships and are shifting furnature and cash over from OLLC to TED LCC. All up in the air? Bright future? The lights are off here and there is nothing bright about it. Dullards all around and losses will continue till the Nation gives more money. GTHO! Advantages you have developed? You have no advantages to lay out or develop at this point. The guy is either lying about a bright future or he's an idiot. He's got a million bucks left of our money and if he can't make a go of that then he needs to shove off. My God! I can't believe that they are trying to pull off a stunt like this again. This is exactly how we started out the last time. BOGUS!
DeleteJust look around in Indian Country..hotels do not make money and the damage that goes along with it..unless you have the economy to support such a venture, will only fail....right where is the future forethought...what a concept..
DeleteYou are dealing with a mind set here and even if they were losing their shirts on the hotels we put up in Poko and Skiatoot, they would do whatever they can to keep it hidden. It's insane to build a hotel in the Tulsa location. It will be a magnet for drugs and prostitution in nothing flat. If that's what they want going on there they should admit it.
DeleteI don't give a rip if the head guy doing the talking today is from the Cherokee Tribe business end of things, they ought to show them all the door. This is nuts all over again.
DeleteHere's the operational phrase to have ready for this bunch as you walk them toward the door, "Please, don't let us keep you."
DeleteParris isn't telling the Commerce and Economic Development Committee all of the facts about Performance Oriented Construction Activities (POCA) contracts. These are Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract vehicles, and the award amount is the ceiling. There are numerous IDIQ awardees at Tinker AFB and with the US Army Corps of Engineers, and each company awarded a contract has the same total dollar ceiling amount. Having an IDIQ contract doesn't mean you'll win task orders, and there is no way to estimate how many you'll win or what the total value will end up being. OPDG had a previous IDIQ contract at Tinker AFB and didn't win a single task order. They were paid the $200 minimum when the contract was closed out.
DeleteOsage Innovative Solutions is only a shell of a company without any "tech company" experience or capabilities. Anyone can set up a business and claim all of the North American Industrial Classification System (NAICS) codes it wants in whatever areas it wants to pursue business, but without past experience and employees with actual capabilities it is just an empty shell with no ability to get work. The government awards contracts to companies based on qualifications to get the job done. The way that OPDG is getting contracts isn't by "teaming" but by fraud. They are representing Pinnacle Design Group as if its past performance, experience, capabilities, and employees are those of OPDG. If they claimed the actual capabilities of OPDG they couldn't win a construction contract shoveling sand with a toddler's shovel and bucket set.
DeleteTo the poster at 11:24 PM. The head guy you're referring to is Dave Stewart. Cherokee Nation Businesses tossed him out on his ear. He sued them for firing him and ended up quite well off, not on merit but because the employment contract was so poorly written. They fired him for a reason, but won't discuss it. Several of the staff that worked with Stewart also got the boot around that time.
DeleteHere's the link to the article on Stewart's termination and compensation. Another case where a business board made a bad deal and a tribe had to make good on it. http://www.cherokeephoenix.org/Article/index/6211
DeleteGreat! I'm beginning to think no one of quality will work with us. Just like that Leese character, we should try and get the back story on this Dave Stewart before it runs to nothing but losses all over again. He's already on board and with the way the Osages conduct business, the contract the Nation has with him will be even worse than the one with the Cherokees. The whole diversification idea was to start up businesses in the local area and then this global concept with Harvard started up and the diversification concept has put a whole lot of white people to work using our money but nothing of value to us here at home. It's so stupid and fundamentally wrong. They act like there is nothing that will make money in our area in Osage County which just isn't true.
DeleteThey are continuing to pursue government contracts as the main line of business revenue. This type of contract doesn't have much potential to put people to work locally. During the presentation the board also claimed to have up to millions in contracts. If that is true, then why don't they do like other government contractors and grow their business using the profits. Few successful contractor companies even have a line of credit when they start, much less more than $1 million dollars in the bank and more for bonding. It really doesn't sound like the have a plan for developing a business, but only one involving buying an existing business.
DeleteAnother rank and rude executive type trying to run through our money in a predatory way. We've been saying sink or swim from the very beginning and no one in this government for the government is willing to listen. If they've got a milliion let them show us they've got the chops to make money with that amount. If all they plan to do is sit and wait till December for additional funding. Shut it down now. One wisdom the Osages have never apparently seemed to have encountered is a penny saved is a penny earned. How many pennies are in $19 million to $20 million that they have collaborated in losing despite our best efforts to warn and advise them?
DeleteSession is due to start at https://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
ReplyDeleteAgenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/RdxqEVJVN6Y3RbNQdqyhgdkWStiUBya6db8Vfm7gCdVaSdP9j6LKypMyelRSbb6y?dl=1
Wonderful honor for Mogri Lookout to be cited by the Osage Nation Congress for his work with the Osage Language.
DeleteCultural committee is meeting now.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.osagenation-nsn.gov/multimedia/live-media
DeleteTourism with Eddy Red Eagle speaking. It would be nice to know how much money is being appropriated by the Osage Nation Congress by making this individual budget amount available. $98,000 in total nested in this budget bill ONCA 15-86? Thank you Eddy for asking so we have some clue as to how much we are talking about.
Agenda is located at https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/ruElyjcqYl4mBUNbsxG6mtbtS7cTJAS00MDa01rrAGlkIJsLIktw2shNPqGKHkMI?dl=1
If they can publish the individual budget being reviewed they can at least publish the total figure for each budget listed on the agenda. These people are contitutionally mandated to represent us and I want some representation in asking the Osage Nation Congress to represent us with full disclosure with the total amount of the money being appropriated on every separate budget on each and every committee agenda they put forward for committtee review. To ignore a request like this is unethical IMO.
DeleteIs that rain? It must be a deluge there. The background sound is deafening. Wow!
DeleteSome guy talking about dishonorable Indians on a budget for American Legion? Who is this guy going on and on and on? John Henry. Mashunkeshey?
DeleteMumble mumble mumble. Maker and Norrris. PLEASE speak up so we can hear what you are saying.
DeleteWanting more information on budgets as to justifications for donations? Discussing a law as to how donations are made by the Nation.
DeleteOsage Blog Conversation continues at http://osageblog.blogspot.com/2015/09/conversation-september-2015.html
ReplyDelete