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2019 in review (Part 2): A sea change in San Juan County governance


Utah Diné Bikéyah, a tribal-affiliated activist group based in Salt Lake City, played a prominent role in changing San Juan County governance. Their fly-swatter "schwag" was handed out at a political rally two days before the county's November special election. (Bill Keshlear)

It's hard to overstate the influence of Utah Diné Bikéyah. Staffers participated as panelists at a U.N. conference in Salt Lake City in August: From left, Eric Descheenie, former Arizona state House representative, Cynthia Wilson, traditional foods program director for Utah Diné Bikéyah, Angelo Baca, cultural resources coordinator for Utah Diné Bikéyah, and Kate Kopischke, moderator and social and environmental safeguard specialist for Green Climate Fund (Kopischke is married to former Salt Lake City mayor Ralph Becker, whose former chief of staff, David Everitt, was hired as interim San Juan County administrator by commissioners Willie Grayeyes and Kenneth Maryboy, both former board members of Utah Diné Bikéyah).


In 2019, former tribal activists Kenneth Maryboy, chairman of the San Juan County Commission, and Willie Grayeyes, District 2 commissioner, faced cultural and political fault lines in governing the county. (Bill Keshlear) 


Part 1: Rule by resolution.  Kenneth Maryboy and Willie Grayeyes took their oaths of office as commissioners a little under a year ago after what was described as a “historic” election. They immediately staked their claim to power by choosing to govern primarily through resolutions written by their longtime private attorney and approved without advice or informed consent of virtually anyone in the county.

TODAY

Part 2: The power of environmental nonprofits.  It’s hard to overstate the influence of Utah Diné Bikéyah, the tribal-affiliated nonprofit founded and run by Grayeyes and Maryboy until they took office. They’ve succeeded as leaders in attempts to create Bears Ears National Monument in a way that took results of a presidential election and proclamation to derail.

Part 3: Open-records stonewalling. Numerous requests for public records filed under GRAMA were generated in 2019 due in part to the climate created by the new commissioners’ evasiveness and open hostility toward many constituents and those constituents’ forceful, if sometimes rowdy, responses. The county (Grayeyes and Maryboy) was ordered to produce records in three cases.

Part 4: Gutter rhetoric. Unfiltered comments of public figures were part and parcel of 2019’s hard-edged politicking in San Juan County. It was on full display in the weeks and months leading up to November’s special election that asked voters whether they wanted to form a committee to study possible changes in county government.

Part 5: A defeat for good government. A full-court press of a campaign mounted by the San Juan County Democratic Party, its allies and prominent Navajo Nation politicians defeated an ostensibly non-partisan effort to change the way the county works. Results of November’s special election hinged on rhetoric of retribution and the politics of payback. An alternative story line — charting a path toward better democracy — was a non-starter.

Part 6: But can they fix the roads? To a certain extent the new commissioners’ relationship with officials of the Navajo Nation will determine their success in office. They’ve played an insider’s game of reservation politics for a long time, but so far they’ve been unable to leverage that experience into discernible benefits for county residents.

______________


Part 2: The power of environmental nonprofits

By Bill Keshlear

One of the resolutions introduced in the first months of the Kenneth Maryboy and Willie Grayeyes administration of San Juan government would’ve authorized the county to sue County Attorney Kendall Laws.

A possible outcome of the lawsuit could’ve been Laws’ removal from office, according to the resolution. Laws, performing his role as a duly elected official, advised commissioners it was a bad idea; cost of the action to county taxpayers could be “tens of thousands.” The county would lose no matter who wins.

It charged without accompanying evidence that “in 2018, the County Attorney participated in and directed an unlawful investigation into the residence status of Willie Grayeyes; he was aware of an unlawful and unconstitutional scheme to remove Mr. Grayeyes as a candidate for the County Commission District 2 seat; and he made a baseless request to the Davis County Attorney to initiate a criminal action against Mr. Grayeyes.”

Laws failed to comply with “lawful directives” of the commissioners, according to the resolution. Oneof those directives was to withdraw the county’s support of President Trump’s version of Bears Ears National Monument and its association with Colorado-based Mountain States Legal Foundation, which was assisting the county free of charge.

When the resolution to authorize the lawsuit was introduced on April 2, Laws told the commissioners he was waiting on an advisory legal opinion from the Utah State Bar related to a possible conflict of interest and never said he wouldn’t comply with directives of the resolution to withdraw support of Trump’s monument, which passed on February 19.

“My concern was that I did not want to open the county, or myself, to liability if in fact there was a conflict of interest that hadn’t been declared,” Laws said.

Laws confirmed the possible conflict of interest was related to the commissioners’ longtime roles as founders and board members of Utah Diné Bikéyah, an advocate for creation of the monument and tribal management of it. Specifically, the resolution OK’d by Maryboy and Grayeyes terminated the county’s litigation involving UDB.


 Utah Diné Bikéyah board members are regular attendees at San Juan County Commission meetings: Albert Holiday, center, and Hank Stevens, right, were at the San Juan County commissioner meeting on May 7. (Bill Keshlear)

Jake Palma joined the Bureau of Land Management as an intern in Nevada after leaving Utah Diné Bikéyah in 2015. (American Conservation Experience)

It’s hard to overstate the influence Utah Diné Bikéyah and its national allies have had in advocating for Native American interests connected with use and management of public lands in southeastern Utah.

For instance, Jake Palma, a former staffer at Utah Diné Bikéyah, was named manager of Bears Ears National Monument, according to minutes of a Bureau of Land Management Resources Advisory Council meeting held in Kanab in June. The promotion put him in a leadership role charge of President Trump's version of the monument, which is currently being challenged in federal court by his former employer and others in an attempt to restore the version he worked to create in 2015.

Maryboy and Grayeyes, as leaders in Utah Diné Bikéyah's effort to create the monument, succeeded in a way that took results of a presidential election and proclamation to derail.

The advocacy organization based in Salt Lake City has a staff of eight and an estimated 50 volunteers, according the latest IRS Form 990. It has assumed a visible lead in the national initiative to create Bears Ears National Monument.

Part of that success is directly attributable to its ability to tap funding sources outside of San Juan County and even Utah.

The organization had revenues of $1,281,371 in 2017 — all but $45,847 came from grants and contributions. Total revenue since UDB began reporting to the IRS beginning in 2014 is $2,656,931.

UDB and its allies give voice to a historically marginalized group of Americans. Ironically, voices of hundreds of Utah Navajos unaffiliated with the nonprofits have been muted in the multimillion-dollar, multiyear national political campaign conducted ostensibly on their behalf to create what is becoming less a sacred sanctuary to protect artifacts of indigenous peoples than a playground for tourists, rock climbers, mountain bikers and ATV riders.

Laws wanted a legal firewall to protect the county if the new commissioners crossed an ethical or legal line.

And that’s what he got.

The bizarre resolution to authorize a county lawsuit against its county attorney then possibly oust him from office because of “unlawful” and “unconstitutional” schemes was tabled. Grayeyes and District 1 Commissioner Bruce Adams voted in favor of the action; Maryboy abstained and expressed his disappointment.

______________


Related essays published in the Canyon Country Zephyr

Rhetoric of retribution, the politics of payback (December 2019). https://www.canyoncountryzephyr.com/2019/12/01/the-rhetoric-of-retribution-the-politics-of-payback-by-bill-keshlear/

A take-no-prisoners style of politics in San Juan County (October 2019). https://www.canyoncountryzephyr.com/2019/09/30/a-take-no-prisoners-style-of-politics-in-san-juan-county-by-bill-keshlear/

My excellent adventure into the heart of Gramaland (June 2019). https://www.canyoncountryzephyr.com/2019/06/02/my-excellent-adventure-deep-into-the-heart-of-gramaland-by-bill-keshlear/

A rough transfer of power (June 2019). https://www.canyoncountryzephyr.com/2019/06/02/be-it-resolved-five-months-in-a-rough-transfer-of-power-for-san-juan-county-by-bill-keshlear/
 
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss (February 2019). https://www.canyoncountryzephyr.com/2019/02/03/meet-the-new-boss-same-as-the-old-boss-the-san-juan-county-saga-continues-by-bill-keshlear/

Whose county is this anyway (August 2018)? https://www.canyoncountryzephyr.com/2018/08/01/whose-county-is-this-anyway-bears-ears-activist-wins-squeaker-for-sjco-commissioner-district-3-what-now-by-bill-keshlear/



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