BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) – A new state law that orders the University of North Dakota to keep its Fighting Sioux nickname won't shield the school from penalties for continuing to use a moniker the NCAA considers hostile to American Indians, an NCAA executive told the school Tuesday.
The law, which says UND must use the nickname and a logo featuring the profile of an American Indian warrior, "cannot change the NCAA policy" against using American Indian nicknames, logos or mascots that are considered offensive, said Bernard Franklin, an NCAA executive vice president.
In a letter to UND President Robert Kelley, Franklin said the university must follow an agreement it made in October 2007 to discontinue using the nickname and logo by Aug. 15, 2011, unless it received approval from North Dakota's Spirit Lake and Standing Rock Sioux tribes.
Spirit Lake tribal members endorsed the nickname and logo in a referendum, and the tribe's governing council followed. The Standing Rock Sioux's tribal council, which has long opposed the nickname, has declined to change its stand.
The letter means UND will be subject to NCAA sanctions after the new law takes effect in August. According to NCAA policy, the school will be barred from hosting NCAA postseason games and its teams will not be able to wear the nickname and logo on its uniforms in postseason contests.
"We thought it was important to clarify the NCAA's position, given all of the activity that's taken place with this issue over the last two months," university spokesman Peter Johnson said. "I think the letter is pretty clear."
Grant Shaft, the vice president of the state Board of Higher Education and a board spokesman on the Fighting Sioux dispute, did not respond late Tuesday to telephone messages and emails requesting comment.
Supporters of the "Fighting Sioux law" had argued it could prompt the college athletics association to rethink its position on the nickname and logo. Franklin's letter includes no hint that will happen.
"Unfortunately, (the law) cannot change the NCAA policy nor alter the contracted terms of the agreement," Franklin said.
The legislation, sponsored by state Rep. Al Carlson, R-Fargo, the Republican majority leader in the North Dakota House, was approved in the House and Senate overwhelmingly. It was signed by Gov. Jack Dalrymple last month a few hours after it was delivered to his office.
Carlson said that NCAA officials, legislators and the governor should meet to discuss the issue. Kelley had arranged a meeting Friday with Franklin and Mark Emmert, the NCAA's president, but the two officials declined after Kelley informed them the meeting might be open to the public.
"I think the citizens of our state view this quite differently than they do," Carlson said. "We want to know a lot more than what they're going to do. We want to know the reasons why, and we want them to listen to our side of the story."
Carlson said he hoped Emmert, who became the NCAA's president last October, would bring a fresh perspective to the issue.
"We got the impression that they were willing to look at new ideas," Carlson said. "We thought they were coming here to discuss some options, and hopefully those are still available, and we can get down and talk to them about it."
The earlier agreement settled a lawsuit UND filed against the NCAA, which claimed the association violated North Dakota's antitrust laws and used an arbitrary process in determining the logo and Fighting Sioux nickname were hostile to American Indians.
UND was among a group of 18 schools singled out for using allegedly disparaging nicknames, logos and mascots when the NCAA first announced in 2005 that it would push member colleges to get rid of them.
Last week: Fighting Sioux meeting with NCAA cancelled
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) – A meeting between two top NCAA executives and North Dakota officials to discuss the future of the University of North Dakota’s Fighting Sioux nickname,which the college athletics association considers an insult to American Indians, has been cancelled.
Grant Shaft, vice president of the state Board of Higher Education, said last week that the NCAA’s president, Mark Emmert, and its executive vice president, Bernard Franklin, confirmed they would not attend the April 22 meeting in Bismarck after UND President Robert Kelley informed them it might be public.
The meeting itself, which was to have included Gov. Jack Dalrymple, Kelley, state legislative leaders and Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem, has been cancelled, Kelly said Friday.
The NCAA considers the Fighting Sioux nickname and UND’s logo, which features the profile of an American Indian warrior, to be hostile and abusive. The University of North Dakota was included in a group of schools that were informed six years ago they could face NCAA sanctions if they kept American Indian-themed nicknames, logos or mascots.
UND had planned to retire the nickname and logo in August, but the North Dakota Legislature last month approved a bill ordering UND to continue using both. Shaft said Friday the meeting with Emmert and Franklin was intended to explore the NCAA’s response to the legislation.
Franklin, in an email message to Kelley on Wednesday, said the “difference of opinion seems to transcend the nickname/logo issue to the fundamental matters of governmental operation and authority.” The NCAA, Franklin wrote, “has no role in that discussion.”
“The NCAA and the University of North Dakota have agreed to the parameters of the NCAA’s Native American mascot policy, and we remain ready to assist the institution in its implementation,” Franklin wrote.
That policy says UND, should it keep its nickname and logo, will not be allowed to host postseason athletics tournaments. Its teams will not be allowed to wear uniforms bearing the nickname or logo in postseason games, and other NCAA teams will be encouraged not to schedule UND’s teams.
“What we had hoped to address is if there would be any room for either reopening those discussions as to how that policy applies to UND, or a whole gamut of other possibilities,” Shaft said.
UND will still seek “clarification” about the legislation’s effect, if any, on NCAA policy, Shaft said.
“We now have a situation where we have a law that’s been passed, and I believe that’s the only time, with regard to this policy, that this has presented itself to the NCAA,” Shaft said. “I don’t know if it is any more leverage, but at least it is a new dynamic.”
An NCAA spokesman did not respond April 15 to a telephone message left for comment or an emailed list of questions.
Dalrymple, Stenehjem, Kelley, Shaft and the North Dakota Legislature’s GOP majority leaders, Bismarck Sen. Bob Stenehjem and Fargo Rep. Al Carlson, had been invited to attend the meeting, along with UND’s athletics director, Brian Faison; William Goetz, the chancellor of the state university system; and Jon Backes, president of the Board of Higher Education.
The meeting was to be closed to the public, which prompted protests from The Associated Press and other media organizations and the Legislature’s Democratic leaders. Dalrymple, who is a Republican, told the AP he believed the meeting should be open.
Franklin’s email declaring that NCAA officials would not attend came days after Kelley, in his own email to Franklin, mentioned the objections and said that “members of the public may be in attendance, as will state and local media.”
Shaft said Emmert and Franklin had committed to come to Bismarck for the meeting. “The only circumstance that changed” was the information in Kelley’s email that the meeting might be open to the public, Shaft said.
Bob Stenehjem and Carlson, who sponsored the UND nickname legislation and has advocated that the meeting be open, said they were not surprised by the cancellation. Late Friday afternoon, Stenehjem was wearing a bright green shirt with UND’s Indian head logo and the slogan, “Fighting Sioux. It’s The Law.” Carlson had an identical shirt hanging in his office.
“They (the NCAA officials) were afraid it was going to be a media circus, and you know what? It would have been,” Carlson said. “Because people are interested in it.”