Greeting / Natola
As many of you know we have been working with the federal government to receive recognition for a long time. Today, I’m writing to inform you that former members, Mr. Fretty, Mrs. Rena and Chief Amos, are hurting our efforts in receiving our Identity within petition # 309. If you all do not know, this is one of the reasons why we have an inactive petition. The said former members went behind my back to have people sign consent forms and had them sent them into Washington. This is not the way to go about handling this business. The forms should have come to Chief Chretien. I have the petition #309 and am working to address concerns on getting the petition active again. We have addressed 5 of the 6 concerns that the Dept. of Interior requested us to rectify. The sixth concern is these forms, which are holding us back in achieving an active petition. The Ishak would not be enduring this undue stress and having to work so hard for recognition had former leadership done their jobs correctly. Our past leader Chief Amos was criticized for his poor leadership and former council member Mr. Fretty kept up discord within the group because he continued to betray the council with false statements. We are kindly asking that Mr. Amos and his followers back down and let us do our job. He had his opportunity to reign as chief and when he did, there was money not accounted for, splitter groups, and noncompliance of the bylaws. When I took office as chief, there was only $170.00 in the account, and there was not a complete governing body. It was “the Amos Show” not the Atakap-Ishak’s. He wanted me, Chief Chretien, to continue these practices but I refused to follow his leadership and organized the Ishak correctly. Mrs. Rena was put on Amos’ council to shut her people up about the misallocation of funds.
She was removed from my Council with official documents stating she had broken several bylaws of the constitution. She has not been honest to all these people that she falsified documents for signatures. What these three people are doing is destroying any chance we have of getting our recognition, and most importantly, what Mr. Huber Singleton wanted for our people. I honor Mr. Singleton’s wishes some of these people do not. Our Council members are intelligent and give of themselves, time and even money out of their own pockets, just as I do.
They are ones that support this cause because they see the bigger picture and also recognize what we have done under this new leadership. We are also working hard for those as well as the 500 signatures that is mentioned in this attachment, so it really bothers me to see all this negativity because of false lies from these three people. I have always had and open door policy to hear your concerns and give you the truth as your Chief. The Federal Government acknowledged, through documentation, that I am the current chief. There is no other chief, if so, have them prove this through documentation. These splitter groups are not nationally recognized.
I want our kids to know who they really are and to teach their kids as well to stand proud of their ancestry. Our family was once ashamed to speak of who they were as Ishak. Some of us do not, I repeat do not know who they are, better yet know how to pronounce our Tribe name. To know who you are is what this cause is about. Some of the people trying to tear us down need to learn about their Ishak blood line and educate themselves before trying to address the concerns of the Ishak people.
These types of letters and communication that are being funneled up to the Dept of Interior are hurting this process, and these people are spewing nothing but lies that will continually mislead our people. It is time for us to wake up, rise up, and move forward, united. Everyone won’t always understand the bigger picture, but this whole effort will die if many of you don’t take a stand to overcome this. We have a challenging road ahead but we are trying to forge a path of recognition even without money or support.
If you know of someone that was a part of this movement from the beginning, please ask them about our past leader. I encourage you to do so, if you choose not to believe me I can back up what I am saying with a letter from those Council members about our previous leaders. I do have documentation that speaks very ill about what shape we were in before I took over. I am not looking for any glory out of this. The only thing I want is just to get my people Identified with the state of Texas and Louisiana an also the United State Government. I know who I am. We need all to know who we are as Ishak and come together. I assure you that the changes that we made from the beginning were not made out of spite. We have a constitution and bylaws to follow, and if you chose not to adhere to that, you will be removed. As for those previous leaders it is ashamed that you would stoop so low, just to call yourself a chief or council member. What you have done is gotten this tribe disgraced with the people in Washington D.C. as well as with your own Ishak people. We are being labeled as not being able to work through this together.
I apologize in advance if I step on anyone’s toes but this is the truth of the matter. I try not to be a person that does things out of spite, but I had to pray on this several times and I feel that this had to be addressed. God Bless the Ishak,
Please see the attachment in this document.
letter from dept of interior/evidence
Sincerely,
Your Chief, the only one the Federal Government acknowledges,
Edward Chretien Jr. Chief Crying Eagle