Yuma tribe rejects money from Redskins owner's foundation

• The Fort Yuma Quechan (Kwatsan) Tribe turned down a "blank check" from the foundation run by Washington Redskins team owner Daniel Snyder.
• "The words that came out of (foundation executive director) were unbelievable," said Escalanti. "He said he was a proud Redskin and had been a proud Redskin since he was a child.

The Quechan Tribe turned down a "blank check" from the foundation run by the owner of the Washington Redskins because it didn't want to be used to prop up the reputation of the controversial team, a tribal member who attended the meetings said Thursday.

Representatives from team owner Daniel Snyder's Original Americans Foundation offered the Quechans money to build a memorial skate park on the Fort Yuma Reservation on the Arizona-California border, according to Kenrick Escalanti, who attended the meetings at the tribal administration building.

The Quechans turned down the money, saying in a statement, "We will not align ourselves with an organization to ­simply become a statistic in their fight for name acceptance in ­Native communities. ... We know bribe money when we see it."

Escalanti said he and Tribal Council members met Wednesday with the foundation's executive director, ­Gary Edwards, and director Karl Schreiber.

Escalanti's organization, Kwatsan Media Inc., and a partner are trying to raise $250,000 to build the Quechan Memorial Skatepark, a project designed to curb youth suicides among Native Americans.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says suicide is the No. 2 cause of death for ­Native Americans under age 35, at a rate 3.5 times of the ­national average.

Snyder set up the foundation to fund ­Native American causes in March, following renewed criticism of the NFL team's name and logo.

Native Americans have been protesting the use of their images and names as mascots for decades, but the conversation has grown even louder since June, when the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office canceled the trademark registration for the Washington team, ruling that its name is ­"disparaging to Native Americans."

Escalanti described some of Edwards' comments during the Wednesday meetings as "unbelievable."

Edwards is Cherokee and serves as CEO of the National Native American Law Enforcement Association.

"He said he was a proud Redskin and had been a proud Redskin since he was a child," Escalanti said. "And that's when the council sped up the meeting. They just wanted to wrap things up really quickly and said, basically, 'We appreciate your time.' "

The foundation released a statement Thursday confirming the meeting but not responding to Escalanti's comments, saying it has a policy of not disclosing details of conversations with tribal leaders.

The statement ­further said that the foundation was proud to be working on "more than 145 projects with 40 tribes."

Escalanti said during the two meetings — the first with the Tribal Council, which lasted about 20 minutes, the second one with his fundraising team, which lasted about 30 minutes — "Edwards just brought up key words that you just don't bring up in Indian country, like assimilation, annihilation. And he tried to talk down about White people, saying they're the oppressor.

"I don't know what he thought he was doing in talking like that to us — impress us? Like he thought he could talk like that among his ­fellow Natives? It was so awkward."

Snyder's foundation sought the meeting after the Quechans, partnering with Colorado-based Native Skateparks, put out a grant proposal. Escalanti said the foundation brought its own skatepark designer and an iPad filled with renderings.

"And when you looked at it, it wasn't just a park, it was corporate branding. It was all in burgundy and gold (Washington team colors), and the logo was all over it. And they tried to brush it off and say, 'These are just renderings.' But every rendering looked the same.

"After explaining to them how much the project was going to cost, the reps met with me and said, 'Look, we want to take care of this park for you.'

"That was the moment that I felt weird. If it was that easy for them, what does it mean for us to take that money from them?"