Lac du Flambeau tribe won’t block roads

The Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians last week let it be known that until federal litigation against the town of Lac du Flambeau is decided the tribe won’t prevent access to four roads involved in that litigation.

That notice was given to William Conley, a United States federal court judge presiding over the lawsuit brought against the town by the U.S. Department of Justice (USDOJ) on the tribe’s behalf in late May, 2023, in connection with an ongoing dispute the tribe has with the town over four roads — Annie Sunn Lane, Center Sugarbush Lane, East Ross Allen Lake Lane and Elsie Lake Lane — because of the easement expiration for those roads.

As part of a Sept. 26, 2024, injunction Conley issued, he urged USDOJ attorneys to encourage the tribe “to eliminate any barriers or other restrictions impending Road access, and refrain from imposing any additional restrictions, on the Homeowners’ access to the Roads during the pendency of this litigation.”

Since that time, the tribal council, already seeking nearly $9.7 million for over a decade of what it contends is trespass on tribal land tied into the four roads, imposed a deadline of Jan. 16, 2025, for the town to come up with $60,000 in monthly permit fees that was owed. 

That deadline came and went and the tribal council soon after passed a resolution stating anyone caught using the four roads, including people with homes on along the roads, would be issued trespassing citations. 

The tribal council went so far as to have the tribe’s road crew set aside items such as the large concrete blocks in place to  to prohibit road access. 

However, no dollar amount for the citations was ever set, the resolution never enforced and on Feb. 25, George Thompson, the tribal council’s vice-president, sent a letter to Conley.

He wrote as the result of a Feb. 21 status conference held in connection to the federal case against the town and in answering the Conley’s “requested assurances” from the tribe, the tribe won’t issue trespass citations to users of the four roads “during the pendency of this litigation.”

Thompson wrote the tribe would also not use “data gathered from cameras during the pendency of this litigation to impose penalties retroactively on users of the Four Roads.”

In addition, he wrote the roads will remain open “during the pendency of this litigation.”

In return, Thompson wrote in the letter to Conley, the tribe requested that Conley “encourage defendants in this litigation to refrain from making derogatory or inflammatory statements aimed at the Tribe, Tribal Members, or the Reservation community, and to refrain from damaging Tribal property that may be located on town roads.”

Tribal spokesperson Araia Breedlove confirmed for The Lakeland Times the “derogatory and inflammatory statements” Thompson mentioned in his letter haven’t come from members of the Lac du Flambeau town board, listed as defendants in the USDOJ suit. 

“Not from the town but from the homeowners,” she said. “The homeowners are also involved in the case.”

That was a reference to the addition of homeowners on the four roads added to the lawsuit on the town’s side late in 2024. 

Lac du Flambeau town chairman Matt Gaulke told the Times he had no comment regarding the tribal council’s decision to wait on the lawsuit’s outcome.

Brian Jopek may be reached via email at [email protected].