Morning, good morning, good morning, and welcome, welcome, welcome.
It is time now for our community connection, and we have Chief Chuck Hoskin,
Junior Principal Chief Cherokee Nation, and we also have a Counselor, Dora
Patskowski here with us too. Welcome. And there's a word I'm supposed to
be saying, and it starts with an oh. Well, it's Olco Tom
and I'm glad to be with my dear friend, counsel Lady Dora Smith Patskowski.
We've got a lot going on in Cherokee Nation. It never stops,
it just keeps going and going and going, and that's great. I understand
we have a counselor a very special announcement. Yes we do. Let's start
off with the big news. Huh. The big news is a donation that
is being made on behalf of Cherokee Nation to the Washington County Fair Building.
Yes, I understand. He took a little tour of there. I did
you know that day. I just kind of happened by there because I know
the work was going on, and I learned from Jason Mantooth that the project
was not going to be able to be totally completed. Because of funding.
And so I stood there and I looked, and I spoke with Chief and
I just decided, you know, this would be a great generational type donation
and we agreed on that, and it's going to be fifty seven thousand dollars
to complete the ceiling part of the project there at the Fair building. Thank
you very much. For a lot of us who use that building, it
was like it's almost done, yeah, and we kind of would look at
it and go, well, it'll be nice. Thank you for helping everybody
getting that, taking care of who needs to be be a part of that.
That's wonderful. That's just a sample of what good things partnerships we have
here with Cherokee Nation. It really is. And that's to a well used
space. And if you go across the reservation, Tom you see the Cherity
Co Nation's impact in ways big, small, and in the middle. But
it's always, you know, working towards building up communities. And so for
every one of these types of projects, we could take it to a lot
of other places see and see similar ones. But this is such a huge
investment and you know, we're here to celebrate it, and we just had
a great visit at the site. I'm just proud of to work with the
Council Lady. We're making huge investments across the cherry connation. I can remember
years ago, Council Lady was fairly new on the council. I was new
in the office of Principal Chief. We're hit with the pandemic, but then
we also had the opportunity to recover from the pandemic, respond to the pandemic
with a lot of federal dollars. We turned all that into huge investments across
the reservation. This is one of those investments, and I just think it's
good to remind folks that we took a crisis turned it into an opportunity to
heal and also build towards the future. It says generational impact. And speaking
of building, you've got a historic one point one seven billion dollar capital infrastructure
project under construction. Now that's with the beat. I can't count that high.
I run out of ingers and toast you, but this just seems like
this is just awesome. It's it's huge. It's the largest period of capital
investment in the history of the Cherygon nation. That says something. Given the
things that we've already built. I mean, you can look at the outpatient
facility in Tahlequa, the biggest in Indian country. We're recently celebrating OSU med
students walking across the stage for the first time. That's the result of the
OSU Medical School. You could go across the reservation and see millions and million,
tens of millions of dollars really, I think two hundred million dollars in
healthcare infrastructure. This is one point one seven billion. And the list is
so long we don't have time here. But let's get it closer to home.
In Dewey, the council lady found this amazing property, a former church.
We've turned that in to a community building and we're actually bringing services closer
to Cherokees in Washington County. That's where some of those dollars are going.
And then you can go up and down the highways and through the communities.
You can see community centers, you can see this big hospital we're building,
you can see wellness centers. We're trying our best to marshal one point seven
one point one seven billion dollars into things that will really make as a Councilate
says, a generational impact. But you don't have to drive far from this
station to see it. Tom, That's true. Back to Dora, we
were up there about a year ago. I think it was. I think
it was weather was nice, it's all I remember, and it was even
nicer inside. And the chief you were there too once we got that building
opened up and everybody got to take a look at the fresh coat of paint
and everything else that had gone on in there too. And you've been getting
a lot of use out of that building. Yes, yes, we have.
We have monthly meetings there. The Cherokee Cultural Community Organization meets there once
a month, and we also it's open to the general public for rental.
And we now currently have career services operating there Monday through Friday from eight to
five, and soon to join them will be human services. And a lot
of the Cherokee citizens are saying thank you because that's a long drive, it
is, and this is right in our backyard, and as opposed to going
down to Tallifuaha anyplace else, they really appreciate that. You know it,
it was found, it was discovered, it was taken care of, it
was renovated, it was turned into what it is today and what it's going
to be tomorrow too, absolutely, and that's all thanks to the leadership of
Chief Hoskin. Well there you go. Yes, Well, I appreciate that.
It's a big team, and we've got a good team. So you're
doing just a ton of different things here too. But another one of the
things we want to talk about is the OSU Medical School graduation. This is
a big one. This is the inaugural, this is the numeral owners it's
the first one, and I mentioned it before, but it really it's hard
to overstate the importance of this time. I mean, think about this.
In rural America, you don't find a medical school. You don't find a
medical school in a town the size of Tallequah, you don't find one in
Indian country. And yet that is what exists in our capital of Tallequa.
Chief Baker, my predecessor, had this vision of bringing medical education to the
reservation because we have this problem. We're building big buildings. I think we're
doing great things in healthcare. It's the pipeline of talent. And I'm talking
now about doctors, but it's the whole array of healthcare professions that's our biggest
challenge. And so building a medical school in a rural area on a reservation
in our capital. Means that we're flipping the script on those stats that worked
against us, the stats that worked against us. Is a met student,
she's going to practice within driving distance of where she goes to school. They
all go to school in urban areas, but not here in Oklahoma, not
with Oklahoma State University. So we've got all these graduates crossing the stage.
Native three y are Cherokee. Now that number may strike some people as small,
but look, that is twenty percent of the graduating class across the country.
It's less than one percent. We're blowing the roof off the stats.
And this is just the first class. So this is generational changing, not
just for the Cherokee people, which is our first and foremost concern, but
all the people in rural northeast Oklahoma. And it's a template of what we
can do across the country. And we need to because it's one of the
great challenges of this century to have enough healthcare workforce to take care of all
of us. Tom, you and I aren't getting any younger, oh no,
but the whole country's facing this and we need to have doctors. This
is a great story a great impact. Counsel Lady's been part of it because
when she and I took office, the thing wasn't even out of the ground
yet, and we had to make sure it got built during a pandemic and
to make sure we were there to support OSU and the students. And I
think as a team we all did. We absolutely did. You know what
you must have quite the team. As you talk about getting things done and
making things happen, it's always moving forward and that doesn't always happen in elective
office. There are a lot of different voices in a lot of different ideas
and everything. But the ability to take each voice melded the best ideas and
then move forward, really that's really something about your leadership, Jeep. Well,
look, Cherokee people are certainly people that have different views. If we
agreed on everything, you would recognize us. We wouldn't be Cherokee. But
one of the things I like about our government is that we are very much
into collaboration getting to a good result. We're not mired in what we see
in a lot of state legislatures, certainly in the federal government, where they
can sometimes they can't even keep the lights on. They can't even keep the
government moving. We do and it allows us to look deep into the future
together. So our s U or other state university had a great example.
We recently committed formingllion dollars to build a STEM building and science technology education on
a campus where a lot of Cherokees go and a lot of other people go.
The council unanimously backed that. They did it because they know higher education
is a great investment. It's what our ancestors believed in. But we leverage
that gift to turn it into also ten scholarships a year for the next decade
for Cherokees to become nurses. So we talked about medical school, now we're
talking about nursing school. We didn't get bogged down into who gets credit,
whether the next election really is gonna affect somebody. We just wanted to get
things done. And I think people in this country, in this region,
in the state, in every community want to see that out of government.
We're not perfect at the Cherokey Nation, but there's an example of seeing a
problem, finding a solution, and just getting it done. And Dora,
I want to get back to what you do as counselor. You represent our
area and people in Bartlesville and do we know you. But those aren't the
only two talents you represent. You got a whole lot of Oklahoma around here
that you represent. Tell everybody where about your location is so yes, I
do represent all of Washington County and about the southern half of No Water County,
so that's Delaware, no Wata Talala Wan. And then I go,
I have a small portion of Tulsa County and Rogers County, so I serve
part of Skiatook as well as Collinsville. You're stretched out, yeah, but
you know what, you know what everybody says, you're accessible, Well,
thank you. I sure try to be. I see you every now and
then on Facebook answer questions there. And I know that people call you.
You know, boy, do I know people call you and and you know,
you do your work, you listen and you respond. It might not
always be the answer that what that's right? Yeah, that is that's human,
you know. But the thing is that so many times in government there
are times people don't feel like to be in hurt that didn't happen here.
And when we talk about other things that are going on with Cheroke, of
course, with graduation, with the infrastructure and everything else like that. How
do people connect with Cherokee Nation government. You've got that communication thing, you
got a real good infrastructure there going to we do and it's kind of all
the above. So we're very prominent on social media. People can go to
our Cheroke Nation Facebook page. I have a Facebook page. Principal Chief Chuck
cost Con Junior, the Council Lady has a Facebook page. Many of us
are on other platforms on social media. You can find us there. The
Godoogi Portal, which revolutionize how we interact directly with our citizens, means that
we can not only get emails out on vital information, but increasingly citizens can
go there and apply for programs and services. And so that's where we're moving.
We're moving and the whole country's moving that way, the whole world's moving
that way, but we're moving in a way that we can interface with our
citizens through the Godoogie Portal. That's going to continue to improve. In fact,
it recently got high accolades in the industry for what it's done, and
I think the Council Lady and I see it work every day. We're both
optimistic though that it's going to continue to expand. One thing I could tell
you is that people are using it. There are folks when that first came
out, they looked at it. I don't know, but and you know,
just like anybody else, change has kind of hard. But now you
know, I'm talking to some of the same people who I would know.
I don't know about this. Well, now that's how they get things done,
and they've made friends with it, and all of a sudden it's now
part of what they do. And it's really simple once you get past that
first, you know, entry into it and get things rocking. You know,
they find out to be a really helpful tool. So that's off.
What else we got you Well, I know, we've got two big dates
coming up. One is a lot of fun. One is very serious.
I'm going to ask the conculated to talk about the really fun one, and
that's SunFest that's coming up. The serious one, though we both care deeply
about, and that's I think an election that's the most important in generations for
Cherokees. June the fifteenth, there'll be a constitutional convention question. Cherokee voters
will decide whether to open the whole constitution up for a convention or whether to
keep what we have. It's important people need to get knowledgeble about the counseling,
and I've been talking about a lot publicly. I never speak for the
council Lady, but we've talked a lot about it. We're opposed to opening
up the Convention. The government's working, we're very stable. There's ways to
change the constitution through the existing constitution, through initiative petition, council approved referendum.
But the most important thing is get knowledgeable. Go vote on June the
fifteenth, and there's lots of information out there about that. So that's a
very serious topic that we could spend a lot of time on. I don't
know if Counselated has any thoughts to share, but she and I talk a
lot about this subject. Well. It's very unique that we get to have
that opportunity to address the Constitution. There are several ways of doing it,
though, and this particular vote, I personally will be voting no because there
is a lot of other safer avenues to addressing the Constitution and I just really
I really encourage those to read to call me, contact me, let's visit
about it. I've been going out to the community organizations here in District twelve
to visit with them about this special election coming up. And I want everybody
to know that I will be voting no for that because what we have at
this time is working, and it's working very well and we just need to
continue with it for what I feel very good. Yeah, that's serious.
Well, what's to date again? June? That's doing the fifteenth, that's
a Saturday. And there's lots of info out there about how to vote,
where to vote. People can go to our website cherokey dot org find out
more, stay connected on Facebook before people go vote though weeks before good times
at SunFest and uh and you can actually you could even go and ask cancer
Pats Caski about the Constitution at SunFest. Oh, yes you can. With
the big smile, you'll be happy to talk to you. Yes. I
encourage all of you all to come to SunFest and I will have a booth
there. I will be. My goal there is to really help people update
your address. The Kaduki Portal is a great avenue for that. It does
not quite and totally reach all of the entities of Cherokee nations. So I
have put a lot of thought into this and I have some strategies on how
to fulfilly full hopefully get people's addresses updated and from the Nowada County area in
particular because they've just started their nine to one one program. We really need
to get focused over there and help those citizens with that. So that's a
goal that I have now for as long as I probably alive. I guess
well, we'll see at sunfast and you'll be very alive. Yes, everyone
just has fun. You know what at sunfasts, they have a lot of
food there, but it's calorie neutral because you have to walk it off in
a play room to walk, so you could be as good. I'll be
in good as shape is cheap right now. My shape is round, but
it's a shape, that's true. What else we got, guys and gal,
You know, there's so much. We surely can come back and talk
about more. But one of the things that's on my mind always is housing.
There's some good things going on in housing in this there's a council lady
said, look, we've got to meet the challenge that we have in this
area for housing. So we looked at Oceanleda. We're doing something innovative there.
We're using something called the worker the Section one a force skilled workers program
so that we can build housing to help with the workforce we need in the
area that includes healthcare workers. And so people are going to see some exciting
housing going on in Ocean Leda Right now, we've got two hundred and fifty
housing units underway across the reservation. Of talking about housing additions, I'm talking
about new home construction. And that doesn't even count helping elders and people with
disabilities with home accessibility fixing their home. We're spending more on housing than we
have in history, but closer to where we are now. People are going
to see something really innovated in Oceanlada. And I know the council lad and
I've visited the site. We'll visit it again because there's some contracts that have
been awarded to start the work there. There's gonna be a lot of excitement
when that happens. Yes, and so all you contractors out there listening,
please check the Cherokee Nation Procurement website. There's a lot of opportunity work opportunity
there. Check them out, put in your bid and see if we can
work together. That sounds great. Yeah, I want to thank you both
for coming in and I'm going to attempt this. What oh fool, You're
nailing a tone in a row.