Greetings Tribal Membership,
As our Nation continues to make great progress forward, we (the LCO Tribal Governing Board) are honored to continue the energy and eagerness to seize the opportunities of tomorrow for the betterment of our people.
Per our communications in June of 2019, the Tribal Governing Board (TGB), utilizing Blue Stone Strategy Group, has diligently taken action to accomplish the immediate short-term government and economic development priorities set forth to continue to serve our mission of preserving our past, strengthening our present, and embracing our future. We are grateful to our people, and our government and economic development management and staff for the collaborative support and dedication to modernizing our Tribal governance structure, empowering our employees, and building our Tribal economy to strengthen our resiliency and strategically use our resources to better serve our membership.
We are excited to support and empower our organizational teams to make positive change, and collectively build the organizational roadmap to meet the ongoing needs and future growth of our Nation. Leadership is everyone’s business. It’s not knowing the answer - but about the gift that is found in the collective discovery of it. By working together, we will continue to strive to overcome challenges and meet the ongoing needs of our Tribal Membership, taking steps to ensure our collective future is bright.
Accomplished To-Date:
· Operational Efficiency Assessment of LCO Retail Businesses: evaluation of five of our revenue generating focused businesses to build collaboration and the LCO brand, improve operational efficiency, and increase revenue generation.
· Assessment of Accounting Processes: identified steps needed to be taken to fully implement our updated accounting system, clean back audits, and stabilize processes moving forward.
· Hiring of an Interim CFO: to handle management of implementation processes and stabilize and standardize our accounting system.
· Evaluation of the Existing Governance Structures: analyses of government and economic development oversight and management to modernize our system, to better support our employees in making positive change, and to better provide services to our people.
Work In-Progress:
· Organizational Structure Implementation: implementation of desired government and economic development structures including standardizing policies and procedures, and streamlining reporting and decision-making processes.
· Implementation of Retail Group: implementation of recommended oversight and collaboration of our LCO branded retail businesses to strengthen operations, better represent our Nation, and build our Tribal economy.
· Continued Assessment of Existing Tribal Businesses: continuing the process of identifying areas for improved operation efficiency and potential increase in revenue generation.
· Development and Implementation of Tribal Taxes: upholding our Tribal sovereignty through the right to charge various taxes that would result in additional revenues to the Tribal Government to support services to our Membership.
· Feasibility Planning for Potential Diversification Opportunities: initiated the Health Center Feasibility project in hopes of supporting implementation of the desired goal to expand into a for-profit enterprise and provide additional services.
We will continue to keep our stakeholders updated on the initiatives and progress being made.
Miigwech,
LCO Tribal Governing Board