Homeless in Arizona

But from this article is seems like the folks that run the Hualapai Tribe are now behaving like the members of the American government.

It seems like the Hualapai Tribe at some point in time figured they could use their position as a government entity to cheat the builders of the Grand Canyon Skywalk out of the money they agreed to pay them for building the Skywalk over the Grand Canyon.

Source

Battle Over Skywalk

$28.6 mil judgment could be devastating for Hualapais

By Dennis Wagner The Republic | azcentral.com Tue Feb 19, 2013 12:02 AM

The Hualapai Tribe of northern Arizona faces serious financial and political fallout from a $28.6 million judgment last week favoring a Las Vegas developer who built the Skywalk tourist attraction on reservation land overlooking the Grand Canyon.

Hualapai leaders said they are reviewing their options following the Feb. 11 decision by U.S. District Judge David Campbell.

Campbell’s ruling upheld an arbitration decision awarding David Jin, creator of the glass-bottomed Skywalk, millions of dollars in ticket revenue Jin said was owed to him under a 2003 contract with the tribe.

A lawyer for Jin warned that total damages may reach $277 million in the wake of the tribe’s move to take over the tourist attraction on the Grand Canyon’s West Rim.

Attorney Mark Tratos said the developer will immediately seek $10 million in a trust account controlled by the Hualapai Tribe’s corporate entity, while also going after continuing proceeds from the Skywalk business. “We’re entitled to take every dime out of there until the judgment is paid,” Tratos said.

Meanwhile, experts on economic development in Indian country said the Tribal Council’s move to take ownership of the Skywalk away from Jin through eminent domain could hurt Indian reservations across the United States if investors evaluating deals on tribal land fear being wiped out by condemnation.

Hualapai Chairwoman Sherry Counts sent a letter to tribal members last week saying the Indian nation is weighing “an array of possibilities to bring this painful and unavoidable matter to a resolution.”

She also released a statement to The Arizona Republic saying the tribe has “hundreds of outstanding relationships with outside contractors. ... Those partnerships are successful because both parties consistently abide by the terms of the contracts we sign — something David Jin failed to do.”

The Hualapai Reservation covers nearly a million acres south of the Grand Canyon. The tribe is composed of about 2,100 members, with roughly 1,090 living on the reservation. Tourism is a vital source of jobs and revenue.

Counts said in her letter that the Hualapais are “successfully managing operations” at the Skywalk and recently set a single-day record for the number of visitors.

In 2003, a tribally owned company, ‘Sa’ Nyu Wa Inc., signed a contract with Jin’s enterprise, Grand Canyon Skywalk Development LLC, for development of the overlook. Jin agreed to build the project for $30 million in return for half of the revenue.

The Skywalk, about 130 miles northwest of Flagstaff, opened to international media coverage in 2007 and reportedly attracts about 370,000 visitors annually. After the first year, court records say, the tribe stopped making payments to Jin’s company and refused to disclose financial documents.

In legal filings, Hualapai leaders and attorneys alleged that Jin’s company had failed to finish the project.

Skywalk Development, supported by testimony from former tribal officials, answered that a visitors center was not completed because the tribe failed to bring in power, sewage treatment and water systems, as required by contract.

That dispute went to arbitration. The tribe participated in negotiations until last year, when council members voted to condemn the Skywalk and take ownership of it. Hualapai attorneys argued in court that tribal sovereignty makes the Indian nation exempt from arbitration even though it was agreed to in the contract with Jin.

In a 27-page ruling, Judge Campbell described the tribe’s legal arguments as “odd,” “nonsensical” and “wholly unconvincing.” He concluded that the Hualapai Tribe “clearly waived its sovereign immunity.”

Tribal representatives would not say whether they intend to appeal.

Tratos said the judgment covers only damages to date. He estimated that the Skywalk’s value to Jin over the contract’s 35-year life may be $277 million. He would not say whether an effort would be made to hold the Hualapai Tribe liable for that amount of damages as a result of the condemnation action.

A Tribal Court is expected to consider arguments about the project’s fair-market value, which Hualapai officials have put at $11 million.

Louise Benson, who was chairwoman when the Skywalk contract was signed, said the tribe’s annual budget is about $20 million. Benson and other former officials have sided with Jin in the dispute, saying tribal leaders violated the contract.

“(They are) giving the Hualapai a terrible reputation that will injure the tribe for years,” Benson said. “All over Indian country, I think this is bad.”

Ted Quasula, a former board member of ‘Sa’ Nyu Wa Inc. who now works for Skywalk Development, said in an online statement: “This business grab by my own tribe hurts all Native American nations because it raises serious questions for American and foreign investors who must have a level of trust when dealing with tribal nations.”

Gavin Clarkson, a professor of finance at New Mexico State University, said that Native American tribes are entitled to exercise eminent domain the same as municipal governments and that threat should not deter investment with the Hualapai Tribe or in Indian country.

Clarkson, a member of the Choctaw Tribe, said he has been involved in about $1billion worth of development on Indian lands.

He acknowledged a lack of outside investments on reservations, in part due to trepidation about tribal governments and courts. But, he said, “good attorneys can contract around any concerns that investors may have.”