Copyright © 2000 NLThomas
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ROSEBUD, SD (SST) - If Rosebud Sioux President Willie Kindle had any inkling how the day would turn out Monday, October 23, he might have skipped work.

But he didn't. And he got both barrels --- from council members and community elders alike. And most of the Rosebud Reservation got to hear it live on KINI-FM Radio.

What produced this scathing tongue-lashing?

Well, it began coming to a head last week.

After two days in executive session (ostensibly to handle a police matter), members of the Rosebud Sioux Tribal Council last week began looking inward at the leadership provided by the Kindle administration --- and not for the first time.

Kindle took office for the third time last November. Over the intervening months the Council has given the Kindle administration a number of tasks to perform, including taking care of some firing and getting casino information, which Kindle hadn't done.

According to sources on the council, the rhetoric in the council chambers last week during executive session began to get intense. In past months, Kindle kept promising to follow council directives, but failed to complete anything.

Last Thursday, Kindle got up, shook hands with surprised council members, and said he would turn in his resignation to the Secretary's Office. He didn't call the council out of executive session and adjourn. He left the building.

Word immediately spread around the reservation. A meeting of community leaders was hastily called for Friday morning in the council chambers, inviting the local media, including KINI.

Kindle made a short appearance, saying yesterday had all been a joke and that he was back to work. He then left to attend a Health Board meeting.

But that didn't stop the meeting, led by Ralph Walking Bull and Ned Metcalf, who tried his best to put the administration¹s spin on the matter and urged community members to let it go.

Rumors of Kindle's resignation even brought in a tearful Miss Rosebud Sheré Wright, who was given the administration¹s spin that Kindle had never resigned and that he was at work.

But community members were not buying the spin. They wanted to know what had really gone down in executive session --- did Kindle say he resigned or didn't he?

The problem was that the incident had occurred in executive session and whatever goes on in such instances is supposed to be secret.

The question festered on the reservation all weekend, and some council members finally broke under pressure from their communities and told what they heard: Kindle said he resigned.

But did he actually say it?

Did you say it? thundered Charley "Pop" Arcoren, 78, of St. Francis, in a loud, accusatory voice on Monday when the issue broke out again during council session.

"Did you resign?" demanded Arcoren before a silent council.

"I did not resign", replied Kindle, after skirting the question several times.

"Liar", said Rep. Lionel Bordeaux, Antelope. Bordeaux said he had 12 witnesses who could say otherwise, meaning the other council members who had been in with Kindle during executive session.

"You pouted like a baby", thundered Arcoren. "There's no respect (from the oyate) for what you did. It was too much pressure, and you walked out."

"I said, I'm leaving the building", Kindle said.

Although Kindle apologized profusely Monday for deserting his post, he refused to say that he had uttered the words, "I resign", even though a number of council members backed up Bordeaux's description of events.

"As long as you deny it, it'll keep coming up", predicted Rep. Bordeaux.

The last Rosebud president to resign was Robert Burnette in the 1950s in order to accept a position in federal government.

While Kindle endured a lot of verbal abuse Monday for allegedly "deserting the people" last Thursday, he still managed Monday to keep the council moving through its agenda, with some help.

Rep. Betty Red Owl, Parmelee, tried to get council members to back off expressing their anger and dismay at Kindle¹s actions last week and to get on with the agenda, helped move the council along.

Among other things, the council ordered Kindle to fire Treasurer Charles Whitepipe for absenteeism and to stop stalling in the firing of Housing Director George Keller, who was appointed to his post by the previous administration. Kindle said he had been trying to find Keller another job in tribal government, which he gave as the reason he hadn¹t fired him yet.

"It's not easy to be headman, and I tell you that", said Willard Fool Bull, a respected elder from He Dog, at the close of the day¹s business in council chambers.

"I'm going to pray for each and every one of you ... You're all Lakotas, remember that ... Don¹t think about that blood quantum [as a divider]. I hope you understand what I'm telling you", he said.