Victor Rocha wrote: > Commissioner: Closing liquor stores in Whiteclay won't help > BY MARK THIESSEN / The Associated Press Yanking the beer licenses from > four stores in Whiteclay would do little to address the problem of > alcohol abuse on the nearby Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, a member of > the Nebraska Liquor Control Commission said. > > It would be like ``putting a Band-Aid on a compound fracture,'' Rhonda > Flower of Gering said Friday, a day after commission members visited the > small community near the South Dakota border and reservation. The visit > was made at the request of Nebraskans for Peace, an advocacy group > seeking to curtail the liquor sales in Whiteclay. > > ``Nebraska officials like Rhonda Flower are part of the problem,'' said > Tim Rinne, the advocacy group's state coordinator. > > Commissioners Flower, Richard Coyne and Robert Logsdon were joined on the > tour by the commission's executive director, Frosty Chapman, and Sen. Ray > Janssen, chairman of the Legislature's General Affairs Committee. The > committee oversees legislation dealing with alcohol sales. > > Nebraskans for Peace and others have complained for years the four stores > in the tiny town sell millions of cans of beer annually to residents from > the nearby Native reservation. > > Alcohol is banned on the 5,000-square-mile reservation, which is home to > 15,000 Oglala Sioux and has one of the nation's highest > alcoholism-related mortality rates. > > While there is no easy solution to the problem, Flower said, Nebraskans > for Peace could help find one by addressing what she called the root > problem. > > ``Quit blaming the commission and go to the core of the problem, and that > is the truly impoverished lifestyles these people lead on the > reservation,'' she told Scottsbluff radio station KNEB. > > ``I'm appalled, horrified that she would have the chutzpah to say such > things,'' said Rinne, a native of Gering. > > He said the state has profited by about $250,000 a year in sales taxes > from the sale of beer in Whiteclay, and didn't give a dime to the Oglala > Sioux tribal government to address the problem of alcohol abuse. > > ``The state of Nebraska needs to get out of the business of profiting > from Indian misery,'' he said. > > ``This is blatant racism on the part of the state of Nebraska as they are > targeting this minority population and if Rhonda Flower refuses to > acknowledge the reality of this and the Liquor Control's responsibility > in it, we need to have a new commission,'' he said. > > Flower said closing Whiteclay businesses would not keep those with > alcohol problems from finding another source for the product. > > The commission has in the past disciplined Whiteclay stores that have > violated the law, just like it would any other liquor dealer in the > state, she said. > > An attorney general's opinion last year said the state has little > authority to block the sale of beer to the Oglala Sioux in Whiteclay. > > Gov. Mike Johanns and other state officials have said they can do nothing > to stop licensed establishments from selling alcohol unless laws are > violated. > > Critics, however, say those laws, such as consuming alcohol on public > property, are consistently violated in the village. > > Nine Natives, including activist Russell Means, were arrested in July > 1999 as hundreds of Oglala Sioux marched from the reservation to > Whiteclay to protest the beer sales and the unsolved murders of two > Indians whose bodies were found just across the South Dakota border. > > > http://www.journalstar.com/nebraska?story_id=6551&past=
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