Letter to the Editor - Examples of senior citizen abuse at Rocky Boy

Editor,

I am writing a letter to the editor expressing my grief over two cases of senior citizen abuses by the tribal entities here in Rocky Boy. It should be three, but I did receive one tiny load of wood that lasted two days.

A disgruntled roads worker ran over my mail box on purpose last summer. Since I caught the person doing it, I made the roads department fix it or was signing a complaint. It got fixed but not without having to threaten to file a complaint. The roads department also plowed out everyone around here but me. I am a disabled senior citizen and this is behavior not known to real Indians as real Indians help their disabled senior citizens.

The senior citizen department failed to inform me of Energy Share going on, claiming it was my fault for not seeing posters somewhere. Who says disabled senior citzens go out in public to see a poster? In the past, when we had good senior citizen  workers there, I would get an application delivered to me with my meals and never missed an Energy Share in over 10 years. When I called Ted Whitford, who is a councilman, he only said he would look into it, which means nothing will happen. When I said I will write the newspapers, he got smart and said, go ahead, you always do.

We need people in these positions who care about the elders and especially those disabled elders like me. I am disabled but can still type, and I will type all I can for all to hear about this place I have always called Lil Russia since 1994 when the corruption started here.

Russell Houle Sr.

North Central Montana American Indian movement