Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians - Organization and Location

Organization and Location

The tribe has 4,804 enrolled Siletz tribal members, 70% of whom live in Oregon and only 8% of whom live near on the 3,900-acre (16 km2) reservation. An additional 6% live in the town of Siletz and 22.6% live in Lincoln County. There are 445 households in the city of Siletz and 143 households on the Siletz reservation.

The tribe owns and manages a 3,666-acre (14.84 km2) reservation located along the Siletz River in the Central Oregon Coast Range of central Lincoln County, Oregon, approximately 15 mi (24 km) northeast of Newport. It owns a checkerboard of approximately 15,000 acres (61 km2) in and around the small city of Siletz.

The tribe owns and operates the Chinook Winds Casino and Convention Center, the Chinook Winds Golf Resort in Lincoln City (including the Chinook Winds Resort hotel purchased from Mark Hemstreet of Shilo Inn hotels for $26 million in 2004), the $9.5 million undeveloped oceanfront Lot 57 north of Chinook Winds Casino, a dredging and salvage company known as Northwest Maritime LLC, Hee Hee Illahee RV park in Salem, the Logan Road RV Park, the Salem Flex Building where the Salem Area Offices currently exist, the $1.6 million Portland Stark Building which was purchased in August 2007, which will eventually be the site of the tribe's Portland Area Office, the Eugene Elks building which houses the Eugene Area Office, the Siletz Gas & Mini Mart, the old Toledo Mill site, and the building in which the Depoe Bay Seafood Company is currently doing business.

In late 2005 the Siletz Tribe partnered with a bankrupt aerospace parts manufacturing company in Dayton, Ohio called U.S. Aeroteam. The original plan included expanding that partnership to create a tribally owned business called Siletz Aeroteam to manufacture jet engine parts in the Siletz area. Siletz Aeroteam never began operation and is now defunct, but the Tribe still owns 20% of U.S. Aeroteam, the Ohio company.

The Tribe also owns and runs the Siletz Community Health Clinic. A $7.5 million plan is underway to expand the clinic. $2 million of the funding will come from the Federal government's IHS Small Ambulatory Grant funding. The clinic is currently 15,000 square feet (1,400 m2) but will grow to 45,000 square feet (4,200 m2) between 2006-2016.

The Siletz Tribal Police have disbanded, but the Tribe now contracts with the nearby Toledo Police Department to provide law enforcement services to the Siletz area.

The Tribe is gradually accumulating additional property into the reservation, as part of a 2005-2015 Comprehensive Plan. These include 3,851 acres (15.58 km2) entrusted to the tribe in 2007 by the State and Federal governments as part of the New Carissa oil spill settlement, on the condition that the Siletz Tribe will manage it solely as a marbled murrelet habitat.

The tribal government is attempting to get old treaties recognized by referencomg them in the Tribe's Constitution, and also by mentioning the treaties in a work by Charles Wilkinson, who has been hired by the Tribal Council to write a history of the Siletz. There have also been attempts to retrieve the remains of tribal ancestors from the Smithsonian Institution, and to retrieve various other tribal artefacts distributed throughout the United States of America.

The current Tribal Council includes Chairman Delores Pigsley; Vice Chairman Bud Lane; Secretary Tina Retasket; Treasurer Jessie Davis; Loraine Butler; Lillie Butler; Reggie Butler; Robert Kentta; and Sharon Edenfield, who was appointed to take elected member Lisa Brown's place. Lisa Brown was elected in 2009 with one of the highest vote counts in tribal history, but was removed from office by a 6 to 2 vote of the Tribal Council soon after taking office. The tribal government's Public Information Office publishes the monthly Siletz News. Information about tribal current events can also be found at the member sponsored website Siletz Net.