'It's been coming our way': Wisconsin tribes dig in to keep COVID-19 off reservations

On the Oneida reservation last week near Green Bay, the casinos remained closed, traffic at its medical clinic was slow and on a warm, sunny day, only a handful of people were walking on the trails along Highway 172.

Though much of Wisconsin eagerly reopened following the state Supreme Court's decision to strike down the governor's stay-at-home order, many Native Americans living on reservations have continued to hunker down.

"Just because the Supreme Court smashed safer-at-home doesn't mean the virus has gone away," said Tehassi Hill, chairman of the Oneida tribe, whose clinic reports 39 COVID-19 cases and two deaths.  

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Statewide, there have been 186 COVID-19 cases and eight deaths among Wisconsin's roughly 70,000 Native Americans, according to the Great Lakes Inter-Tribal Council. 

Oneida leaders said portions of the tribe's stay-at-home order would remain in effect until June 11. 

"We're really focused on prevention," said Debbie Danforth, Oneida's comprehensive health division director. "One outbreak could take out our whole community."

Although Oneida's and some other tribes' casinos started reopening this week, they will bring in a fraction of their normal revenue. The tribes will offer only slots — no table games or bingo in their gambling halls. And, officials say, there will be far fewer gambling machines since they will be spaced apart to follow social distancing guidelines.

The 26 casinos are the economic lifeblood for Wisconsin's Indian governments, generating nearly $1.3 billion gaming revenue for the tribes last year. The sudden revenue loss caused individual tribes to lay off 25% to 90% of their tribal employees and slash or close numerous social service programs.

As sovereign governments, tribes are permitted to issue and enforce stay-at-home orders to handle COVID-19 on their land. Each of Wisconsin's 11 tribes instituted such orders in March, and those orders were not affected by the state Supreme Court's action.

Tribal orders are beginning to expire this week, though it is up to the individual tribes to determine when they should be lifted. Some tribal leaders worry about letting their guard down too quickly in Indian country.

"It's been coming our way," said Joan Delabreau, chair of the Menominee tribe, which has two reported cases on its reservation near Keshena. "It's just taking its time to get here."

So far, only two tribes, the Oneida and Ho-Chunk, report a double-digit number of COVID-19 cases.

Of the 39 cases reported by the Oneida reservation clinic, about a dozen patients were hospitalized and 11 remain quarantined. Danforth said she thinks the tribe's proximity to Green Bay and the number of tribal members who travel to surrounding communities for work each day are contributing to Oneida's caseload. But she said there has been no direct link between cases on the reservation and those at Brown County meatpacking plants, which have been hit hard by the virus.

The Ho-Chunk, based in Black River Falls, has had 13 cases and two deaths, according to a posting by its department of health. Officials of the tribe, which has about 1,400 people on tribal land, did not respond to requests for comment.

The other nine tribes have had no cases or are in single digits, according to tribal leaders.

Some leaders credit their stay-at-home orders — all of which are modeled after Gov. Tony Evers' orders, though some are stricter — at keeping their numbers down.

"Tribes, in general, have been very persnickety about the safer-at-the-home" rules, Evers said in an interview last week. He said he meets with tribal leaders weekly. "They're fearful."

Restrictions issued by some tribes include:

• Limiting access to some reservations. For example, barricades are placed at the main roads leading to the Bad River Chippewa reservation and tribal police stop outsiders seen driving on tribal roads, said Mike Wiggins Jr., the tribe's chairman.
• Setting curfews from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. Exceptions are made for emergencies or people traveling for essential jobs.
• Urging or requiring residents to stay on tribal land and quarantining themselves for 14 days if they leave and return to the reservation.  

On the Oneida reservation last week, numerous tribal buildings were closed. Only a handful of rooms at the tribe's Radisson Hotel, next to its flagship casino, were occupied, a desk clerk told reporters. At the Oneida Community Health Center, the parking lot sat largely empty. 

Native Americans "are very supportive of safer-at-home," Evers said.

Political signs urging tribal voters to cast ballots for a variety of offices, including the chairman and spots on the tribe's business council, dot the reservation.

But Hill, who is running for re-election, said door-to-door visits and meetings with groups of voters are out. "It's a different type of campaign," Hill said. "But we do have Facebook."

The virus caused the tribe to cancel its spring primary. Tribal leaders also took note of the miscues during the Wisconsin spring election, which resulted in citizens waiting in long lines for hours to vote. The tribe is taking steps to keep lines short and voters safe through social distancing when its general election is held in July, officials said.

The Oneida health clinic, which used to see about 1,000 patients a day, now treats only 1,500 a week, Danforth said. 

The clinic primarily treats members of the Oneida and other tribes and their families. About 4,400 people live on the reservation, according to Wisconsin First Nations.

The Menominee and Oneida clinics have restricted the kinds of cases they see. For example, the tribes will treat emergencies and several serious medical issues but are not taking in-person behavioral health cases or routine wellness checks. Both clinics are keeping in touch with patients through telehealth checks.

Some tribal members said they wished there were more in-person health services.

"There are a lot people who need help," said Ted Christjohn, an Oneida tribal member and a Vietnam War veteran. He said he has post-traumatic stress disorder. Christjohn said he understands why it is necessary to limit in-person visits, but "I wish somebody would see me."

And, like several other tribes that have had a handful of COVID-19 cases, the Menominee, with a reservation population of more than 3,400, is gearing up for a possible surge.

"This isn’t over. This is coming later to the rural areas," said Amy Slagle, the Menominee clinic's medical director. "We're still anticipating that a worst-case scenario is possible."

The tribe is trying to stockpile personal protective equipment for doctors and other health care providers at Menominee's 80,000-square-foot clinic.

In addition to the Menominee tribe buying medical supplies, tribal members are pitching in by making cloth face masks, and local companies are donating trash bags and medical grade paper, both of which are being used to make gowns.

"It's neat and exciting," Slagle said. "But on the other hand, it's completely pathetic."

Particularly concerning to the tribe is that it has no control over neighboring Shawano County. Sheriff Adam Bieber questioned the governor's order after it was issued, saying in a Facebook post that he would "not enforce rules or laws that infringe on the Constitutional rights of our Citizens." The county had 41 COVID-19 cases as of Tuesday, records show.

Jerry Waukau, the Menominee clinic's administrator, and other sources said several Shawano County businesses remained opened when Evers' order was in effect.

"The bars have been wide open, and people have been behaving as if COVID-19 didn’t exist," Waukau said.. "What happens in Shawano County happens in Menominee."

Wiggins, the Bad River chairman, is keeping an eye on a nearby Lac du Flambeau Chippewa tribe. 

The Bad River, whose reservation is home to about 1,000 and borders Lake Superior, has yet to have a COVID-19 case on its land. Still, Wiggins is worried because the Lac du Flambeau Chippewa in Vilas County said last week it had one tribal member test positive. The two Chippewa bands are a little more than an hour away from each other.

The Bad River tribe initially banned outsiders from its land in March when officials heard a large group on non-Indians were planning to go camping on the reservation. 

"This isn’t a place that is wide open for normal recreation or tourist-based business," Wiggins said. "We're taking the COVID-19 threat seriously."

One need only look at the Navajo Nation to see how serious the threat can be to an Indian community.

Navajo is an impoverished tribe whose reservation is in Utah, New Mexico and Arizona. The Navajo reservation is home to about 173,000 and has become one of the nation's hot spots for COVID-19. It has had 157 deaths as of Tuesday.

"We're watching what is happening at Navajo," said Shannon Holsey, president of Stockbridge-Munsee Mohican tribe and of the Great Lakes Inter-Tribal Council. "It scares the heck out of me."

Living conditions on many reservations expose many Native Americans, especially elders, to the virus, Holsey said, noting the high number of multigenerational families living under one roof. 

In addition, there are "many Native Americans who are susceptible to virus because of preexisting conditions, such as diabetes, heart disease and asthma," Holsey said.

A new study of Indians and Alaska Natives in Wisconsin, Michigan and Minnesota concluded that the groups had higher mortality rates than whites overall as well as for several serious diseases.

The study, conducted by the Great Lakes Inter-Tribal Epidemiology Center, also said that "the poverty rate was over twice as high for American Indian/Alaska Natives in the three-state area as for all races, with nearly 1 out of every 5 older Natives living in poverty." 

In addition to medical issues, each tribe is dealing with the devastating financial impact of closing their casinos for two months.

The Forest County Potawatomi off-reservation casino in Milwaukee generally brings in roughly $400 million in annual revenue, allowing it to pay its members a dividend of about $70,000 annually, according to documents and sources.

That dividend has been suspended. A handful of other tribes pay much smaller dividends, though all of those have been suspended or canceled, tribal sources said.

"Our financial situation is a disaster," said Jeff Crawford, attorney general for the  Potawatomi, which owns the state's most profitable casino.

Crawford said the tribe's revenue has fallen by about $70 million since March, forcing it to furlough about 60% of its workforce. 

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The situation is similar throughout Wisconsin Indian country.

At Oneida, Hill said two-thirds of its workers have been furloughed and popular services, such as a college scholarship program, have been halted or trimmed.

 "Essentially, the tribe doesn’t have a budget right now," he said. "It's shot through with holes."

He predicted it will take two to three years for the tribe to rebuild its finances.

Tribal leaders said their history, fraught with hardship and disease for hundreds of years, will help them make it through this crisis.

Evers said: "They've been faced with obliteration throughout their interactions with Europeans."

Added Bad River's Wiggins: "There is a record of small pox and a lot of other sicknesses our people have endured. There are a lot of gravestones in the cemetery from those periods."

Contact Cary Spivak at (414) 223-5467 or cspivak@jrn.com. Follow him on Twitter at @cspivak or Facebook at facebook.com/cary.spivak.