Vermont Public Continues to Mislead
We share here a direct observation from Atowi Co-Director Melody Walker Mackin, in response to Vermont Public’s latest article is a long-running series that continues to selectively present skewed and inaccurate perspectives. The referenced quote is below and Melody’s commentary follows. The full VP article is here.
The observation made by Melody regarding the selectivity in reporting is (frustratingly) corroborated by Atowi Co-Director Rich Holschuh (author of this post) in that this exact subject was addressed in response to direct questioning on the point from reporter Elodie Reed during her cited visit to the Vermont State House on March 12th. She asked me about the genealogical aspect of the process and I answered in alignment with Melody’s response, since that is, after all, the accurate response. It was not included in her article’s summary, along with any of the other aspects or answers that we exchanged during a very substantial interview that day, except for a broad (and accurate) “Rich…told me people are hurting, and he feels there’s a lack of comprehension about the issue in Vermont.” That about sums it up, and VP is not providing the perspectives that could provide that context.
*****
Mitch Wertlieb: So in the “Recognized,” series, you looked into Odanak and Wôlinak First Nations’ claims about the state recognition process, right?
Elodie Reed: Yes. And one of the things we found was, Vermont’s state recognition process did not require groups to document their descendancy from historical Indigenous peoples.
*****
Melody Walker Mackin: It is very interesting that VPR is perpetuating such total nonsense continuously….
[For the Vt state recognition process, the tribes] had to qualify via this: "A substantial number of the applicant’s members are related to each other by kinship and trace their ancestry to a kinship group through genealogy or other methods. Genealogical documents shall be limited to those that show a descendancy from identified Vermont or regional native people."
We had to submit genealogy and I know this because I submitted mine. This is just blatantly wrong. Wow. Do better.