LAC DU FLAMBEAU TRIBAL MEMBER
ON RESERVATION SPEARING UPDATE-
the same guidelines for off reservation spearing will be applied to on reservation harvesting.
Reminder per Tribal Resolution #104(20) New Rule- White Sand and Little Sand Lakes are closed to no spearing until July 1, 2020 along with all the other listed lakes and channels effective April 1, 2020 see notice attached. Closures are also posted at landing areas.
AS OF 4/11/2020
NEW GUIDELINES HAVE BEEN DEVELOPED BY LDF VOIGHT REPRESENTATIVES AND APPROVED BY THE TRIBAL COUNCIL PER RESOLUTION NO. 118 (20) ON 4/10/2020.
IN CONSIDERATION OF THE PUBLIC HEALTH COVID-19 PANDAMIC THE GUIDELINES WERE DEVELOPED INCONJUNCTION WITH GLIFWC VOIGHT INTERTRIBAL TASK FORCE and will be followed for on reservation spearing for LDF Tribal Members.
This pandemic has threatened our traditional ways of harvesting and the safety of our membership, their families and our community so therefore these guidelines were developed and approved.
Please have patience through this unprecedented time. We hope for a safe harvest of giigoo for our families and community!
Please contact Elliot Rising Sun, LDF Chief Conservation Law Officer at: cell#715-892-5009 work phone# 715-588-4171 or email: elliot@ldftribe.com, if you have questions or need more information.
COVID-19 UPDATES & RESOURCES AVAILABLE AT
LDFTRIBE.COM
LDF Spring Spearing Season & Turkey Permit COVID-19 GUIDELINES
as of 04/10/2020
Pages 4-5 list of sites considered to issue permits
4. Pages 5 - 8 proposed guidelines for 2020 Spring Spearing Season
5. Pages 8 - 9 proposed Turkey Permits issuance.
The LDF Voight reps goal while developing these guidelines were to keep the best Interests of the tribal membership in mind for public safety, health, and wellbeing for ail Tribal members. Due to the novel virus — coronavirus/COVlD-19 — the spring spearing season will have to be altered, changed, and new measures to follow to keep Tribal and non-tribal alike from contracting and spreading the virus. Will have to come up with new ideas, procedures, protocol and measures to ensure a safer spring spearing season for spear harvesters this year.
Introduce new ideas and measures, look at them objectively to use in this year's spring spearing and perhaps following spearing seasons. Go through some options and discuss them reasonably, and pick an option that will work with the least amount of interaction among people as possible this year. Streamline and tweak an option until most of the flaws are taken out of the option chosen. Meaning some steps and measures won't work this year so add some new ones or make some steps better and take steps out that won't work. It has also been brought to the Natural Resources Spring Spearing team the bingo ball system may be out dated and a newer streamlined version of the lottery system be put in place. Maybe we can incorporate new ideas and procedures from this spring spearing season to be utilized in future spearing seasons.
Train more Natural Resources employees to operate Spring Spearing Season operations — checking lakes and taking water temperature readings, naming lakes, filling out permits, issuing permits. Train Natural Resources employees of all the processes it takes to conduct a spring spearing season in case an employee for whatever reason cannot make it to work for a day or period of time.
Placing the safety and well-being of all Tribal members on the Lac du Flambeau Reservation to contract and spread coronavirus for a spring spearing season is a realistic threat to our people. Spearing fish could offset the need for extra food during this short period of time but concerns are there to contract and spread the coronavirus. People are going to go do whatever they need to do to take care of their families. Going to get natural medicines in nature is one thing because the person gathering natural medicines is usually going by themselves or small number of people. Off-reservation spearing on the other hand involves using a man-made structure boat landing, coming into contact of many more people and traveling out of the community into other communities,
Realistically, we are not the only ones using off-reservation boat landings. People from different communities are using the boat fandings too. Who knows how far they travel and where they come from. They could come from a community or county that has a high amount of coronavirus cases and unknowingly be spreading the disease by coughing or spitting on surfaces the spearing teams come into contact with. Spring spearing can put the entire Tribe's membership safety and well-being at risk to contract and spread the coronavirus placing the Reservation into an unsafe hazardous environment should a Tribal harvester contract and spread the coronavirus back to the Reservation. Spreading this disease not only to the spearing harvesters but putting employees and other Tribal members at risk to contract and spread this novel virus home to their young, elderly and to the mainstream population of Tribal and non-tribal communities.
Have to protect Tribal members from themselves sometimes and this is one of those times. The position should be to delay or postpone spring spearing to protect our Tribal community from possibly contracting and spreading a novel virus connected to getting people sick and possible death in this pandemic period.
Tribal members of all age groups have medical conditions such as asthma, diabetes, respiratory problems, heart problems, high blood pressure, weakened immune systems from whatever medical problems they may have. People with underlying health conditions and elderly are having more severe symptoms and reactions to the coronavirus and are dying more so then healthy people. The percentage of recovery is high with healthy people, tower with the elderly and people that have underlying health issues. Spear harvesters should take into consideration to go off-reservation to spear harvest this year should any family members have health issues.
When spring spearing starts off-reservation it will be at the beginning of the peak of the pandemic period. The risk of contracting and spreading the disease will be greater, there are other means of contracting the coronavirus and spreading the disease like going to the store, getting gas, out of necessity going out of your community to get essentials and necessities to live, making it more possible to contract and spread this coronavirus by community spread — spread unknown or accidental. Ideally staying at home in isolation would be the safest thing to do. Spring spearing this year is risky and putting Tribal members at risk because we are purposely sending out spring spearing harvesters off the Reservation into other communities that may have the coronavirus. The spearing harvesters will have a greater chance of contracting the coronavirus by traveling into other communities that have the coronavirus, coming into contact with other people, then coming back home possibly spreading the disease. Staying on the Reservation and at home would be the wisest choice.
Is it essential to the Tribe to have a spring spearing season? Some may considerate it a tradition to spear but it is also a tradition to protect families and the Tribal membership safety and well-being from harm. It would be wise to delay the spring spearing season until after the pandemic period or cancel the spring spearing season. Look at all the cancelations of recent events — College conferences tournaments for basketball teams to become eligible for the NCCA tournament, March Madness NCCA basketball tournament, NCCA wrestling tournament, NBA basketball season, the start of Major League Baseball on hold, the Masters Golf tournament postponed to a later date, Olympics postponed 1 year, Wimbledon tennis tournament canceled in England. Closer to home, large gatherings • cancelations or closures of concerts, pow-wows, weddings, going to restaurants, taverns, casinos, things that people in our community attend. This is probably costing millions or billions of dollars to the economy from these canceled events. There Is a reason for it — Contracting and spreading a novel disease — the coronavirus.
Might be over-reacting but right now the data and science don't lie about this new/novel coronavirus pandemic. Look at the updates from the Tribe, State, and Nation. Coronavirus is starting to infect more and more of the population in the United States. Here's different national updates of confirmed cases since starting this draft:
March 24, 2020 - 42,321 sick, 541 deaths
March 26, 2020 - 85,000 sick, 1354 deaths
March 28, 2020 -121,000 sick, 2043 deaths
March 30, 2020 -142,796 sick, 2490 deaths
April 1, 2020 -190,509 sick, 4,118 deaths
April 03, 2020 - 245,974 sick, 6,126 deaths
April 07, 2020 -379,224 sick, 11,835 deaths
In Wisconsin, April 7, 2020, 2,440 confirmed cases, 77 deaths. Wisconsin’s low number of cases maybe due to State of Wisconsin and Tribes going into isolation earlier than other states. Wisconsin and the other states that went into isolation early are having less cases of the coronavirus.
People may think that we might not get the coronavirus here but it's starting to show up in counties surrounding the Lac du Flambeau Reservation and in the county the Reservation is located. Starting to show up in rural areas more and more. Tribal membership should take this pandemic seriously, become informed and understand what this coronavirus can do. It is projected in the United States to have deaths up to 100,000 to 240,000 people before the end of the pandemic, since starting this draft the model used for the projection of deaths of 100,000 to 240,000 could be wrong up to one-third stated on CNN news April 06, 2020, state death is connected to this novel coronavirus disease. So, we have to take precautions and follow the guidelines - Isolation, social distancing, direct contact with other people and travelling tong distances into other communities that may or may not have the coronavirus.
At the same time people have to live and provide for their families. Spring spearing can provide extra food to families and the community, it also can be broken down into being under SD in a gathering and under 10 to in a room. This year spring spearing wilt have to lessen the amount of people in direct contact with each other, make it as small as possible to sign up for spearing teams and to issue permits. New steps and procedures put in place to protect people from contracting and spreading the coronavirus disease. it may be an inconvenience to keep spring spearing within the guidelines and protocol of Tribal, State, and National governments so Tribal members have to understand there will be new measures to follow for this year and maybe beyond this year.
Have to protect Spring Spearing employees and Tribal members that are placed in this unsafe hazardous environment connected to spring spearing this year. For this year maybe, all employees connected to spring spearing get hazard pay for putting them and their family’s well-being at risk for working in unsafe hazardous conditions. Employees and spear harvesters will have to travel out of their communities through 2 -S maybe more communities to get to a boat landing. Another drawback because one of those communities might have the coronavirus putting employees and spear harvesters at risk.
Strict rules, procedures, and protocol must be followed and these will be put in place before this year's spearing season. The purpose is to protect all Tribal and non-tribal people from contracting and spreading the coronavirus. It would be best to stay home in isolation and not travel. Tribal members should understand this.
Some Tribal members will want to take their chances and go spearing. But what about Tribal members that have nothing to do with spearing. Maybe one Tribal spear harvester contracts the coronavirus and the spear harvester recovers to be okay without too many symptoms but passes the virus to some other Tribal member that has nothing to do with spear harvesting who is not as lucky — doesn't do as well, has more severe symptoms, suffers and maybe dies. Tribal spear harvester might think he/she was great for going out to exercise their rights during this pandemic but on the other hand maybe the spear harvester was irresponsible to put someone else at risk to contract this virus.
Hopefully this doesn't happen. As mentioned before the coronavirus might come anyway by some other means but again why take the risk of contracting and spreading the coronavirus by purposely putting Tribal members into an unsafe hazardous environment during this year's spring spearing season. The spear harvesting of fish can be done at some other point and time. Other methods can be used other than spearing harvesting — netting, hook and line, spearing done during summer and fall. Hopefully everyone can still be here safe, well and alive to enjoy harvested fish when this pandemic period is
done.
Spring spearing is a festive, great and fantastic time of year but precautions wilt has to be taken this year to make spring spear harvesting safe as possible for everyone. Voigt Task Force members started with 4 options:
1. — Delay or postpone spearing to a later date.
2, — Keep spring spearing the way it was as much as possible like in previous years.
Drawbacks are in every option mentioned and one option will be addressed streamlined and tweaked until it is the safest option to use for this year's spearing season. Option 2 was considered the best option to use going forward if Spring Spearing Season isn't canceled or postponed. Measures will still have to be in place if spearing season Is delayed or postponed to a later date because of the reinfection factor of the coronavirus.
Option 1 should be seriously considered so we are not putting Tribal membership at risk to contract and spread the coronavirus at its projected peak which is during the spring spearing season. Staying home in isolation, social distancing and not travelling outside our community unless it is absolutely necessary'. if that Is not the case, Option 2 format will be worked on by Voigt Task Force members hopefully putting Tribal membership into the least amount of contact with each other and other people. LDF Voigt Task Force members will work to streamline and tweak Option 2 to take measures out that won't work and add measures that will work. Taking the best measures of not contracting and spreading the coronavirus which is a realistic threat to all Tribal members this year. Spring spear harvesters there can be dire consequences involved this spring spearing season due to contracting and spreading the coronavirus and bringing it home to your families and other tribal members to get sick, we are not the only ones using these boat landings.
Location — Three sites were considered:
All sites considered the Natural Resource building being the number 1 site because It is totally isolated from the public at this time of year but it is a second Emergency Management location.
Fish Hatchery was also considered but was deemed to have less space than the Registration Station Area.
Registration Station area was considered too small of an area and would get congested too fast. But going around Bearskin Circle in single file keeping distance and not getting out of vehicle will solve this problem. Only concerns with Bearskin Circle are residential areas located around Bearskin Circle with pedestrians and children playing on road. Extra precaution will be given to pedestrians and children playing on road who live in this area from Registration employees and spear harvesters.
Location — Deer Registration
Times — All times wilt stay the same for each day of the week Monday thru Sunday. 7:00 am — 8:00 am lottery bingo balls drawn, 9:00 am list of spearing teams and time slot wilt be posted, 12:00 noon named lakes wilt be posted, 5:00pm permits will be issued.
Guidelines to follow for this year’s spring spearing season 2020 to lessen the contraction and spread of the novel new disease - coronavirus:
Registration Station, Natural Resource Building and the Community Center side entrance where the old clinic and dental was located — now Indian Child Welfare
1 — Whatever spearing team
5:00 pm 2
to 3
5:05 pm 4
5
6 — Whatever spearing team
5:05 pm 7 to 8
5:10 pm 9
11 — Whatever spearing team
5:10 pm 12 to 13
5:15 pm 14
So, on and 50 forth until ail teams are done. Get in line in your time slot to keep from getting area congested. If you miss your time slot will go to bottom of list, come back at the end of time slot times. If last time slot is 5:40 — 5:45 pm come back at 5:45 pm.
are spear harvesting that designated lake or to spearing teams that didn't harvest a named lake that night, if spearing team wants to get available permit who speared harvested lake inform the creel team. Creel team will make list of spearing teams that want available permits and inform spearing teams of permits available and start Issuing available permits at 10:00 pm. Any spearing team that didn’t*t harvest a named lake can get any available permits before 10:00 pm.
This will change during clean-up and musky season when there is considerably less amount of spear harvesters, have musky season follow same format as walleye season but allow musky harvesters to go to more than one landing.
With the small number of musky harvesters this will be possible.
Reservations that live/address in the immediate area — 15-mile radius or on the Lac du Flambeau Reservation with immediate family be allowed to spear harvest under Lac du Flambeau harvest quota this year. This will keep Tribal members from different Reservations travelling daily long distances into other communities that may have the coronavirus then contracting the virus and spreading back here to Lac du Flambeau. — Council Approval
14-day isolation period before Spring Spearing due to the high number of Coronavirus cases in Southern Wisconsin or for those Tribal members that live out of the State of Wisconsin. — Council Approval
Outline for Turkey season permits —