http://www.grandforksherald.com/articles/index.cfm?id=65816

UND NICKNAME: Spirit Lake may hold referendum

By Joseph Marks, Herald Staff Writer
Published Saturday, February 02, 2008

The Spirit Lake Sioux Reservation likely will hold a referendum vote on
whether to allow UND to continue using its Fighting Sioux nickname, a
member of the tribal council said Friday.

According to the terms of a legal settlement with the NCAA, UND must retire
that nickname and its Indian head logo within three years if it cannot win
the support of both the state's Sioux tribes.

At a general assembly meeting of tribal members Thursday, several people
suggested the nickname authorization question should be decided by a
referendum vote, and tribal chairwoman Myra Pearson said she would support
such a vote, said Lois Leben, a member of the tribal council.

Pearson did not return a phone call Friday seeking comment.

Pearson has said several times that she personally opposes the nickname.
Leben said Friday she supports the nickname's use.

Leaders at Standing Rock, North Dakota's other Sioux reservation, have been
more firm in their opposition to the nickname. Tribal Chairman Ron His
Horse Is Thunder spoke out strongly against the nickname during a November
visit to UND, and the tribal council later passed a resolution reaffirming
its earlier opposition.

Spirit Lake's current resolution regarding the nickname states the tribe
does not oppose the nickname providing "something positive" comes from the
controversy surrounding it.

Pearson has said she reads that resolution as neither supporting nor
opposing the nickname, and the NCAA deemed the resolution insufficient to
grant UND a tribal exception to its policy banning all American Indian
nicknames and other imagery.

Leben said she does not know when the referendum vote will be held.

Marks reports on higher education. Reach him at (701) 780-1105, (800)
477-6572, ext. 105; or jmarks@...">jmarks@....