"We had good intentions when we held our Camp 4 public meeting on Jan. 21 at Hotel Corque in Solvang. We had hoped to begin a sincere dialogue with the community by presenting a professional and carefully planned study of alternative housing options for our Camp 4 land — 1,390 acres of Santa Ynez ranch land where we would like to build homes for our tribal members and their families.

But in their usual aggressive fashion, a few local tribal opponents did everything they could to disrupt the dialogue and turn the meeting into a mayhem milieu.

When a handful of community members brought their same stereotypical rage to the meeting and turned dialogue into a rant, there was little opportunity for meaningful discourse. Unfortunately, the same small group overshadowed the many people in the audience who had legitimate questions and wanted to proceed with a meaningful dialogue."

Get the Story:
Vincent Armenta: Tribe has rights, not entitlements (The Solvang Valley News 1/31)

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Chumash Tribe holds public meeting to discuss plan for land (1/22)
Richard Gomez: Chumash Tribe has tradition of caring for land (1/18)
Chumash Tribe to hold public meeting to discuss plans for land (1/10)