Correction: John Berrey is chairman of the Quapaw Tribe of Oklahoma. His last name was misspelled in this story.
Officials from Mississippi County and the Arkansas Economic Development Commission and other agencies will have a meeting in Osceola with representatives from the Quapaw Tribe of Oklahoma on Wednesday in an attempt to reach an accord over what to do about an Indian site where the $1.1 billion Big River Steel mill will be built.
Tribe spokesman Sean Harrison said Thursday that the meeting would be “at noon at City Hall.”
The development commission and Clif Chitwood, director of economic development for Mississippi County, said the meeting is not open to the public, and he expressed concern that if the Indian site’s location were made public, that would open it to possibility of the plundering of artifacts.
The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette requested that Grant Tennille, the commission’s director, make the meeting open under the provisions of the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act.
Ann Early, the state archaeologist, who is invited to the meeting, said in an email that she was not familiar with provisions for open meetings under either the state or federal freedom of information laws.
“Specific locations of archeological sites listed in our database are not made public … unless the sites are protected (like Toltec Mounds Archeological State Park),” she wrote. “This is Arkansas law … designed to protect sites from looting and grave robbing, and to help protect landowners from trespassers.”
The tribe contacted the Democrat-Gazette about the meeting.
John Berry, chairman of the tribe’s council, said in an interview Wednesday that “we want to be cautious and careful. We want to know the impact on the sites.”
Asked why he contacted the newspaper, Berry would say only that “I do not want to be a tool of obstruction by someone else.”
Chitwood said that the county is prepared to spend approximately $200,000 to move a railroad spur to avoid disturbing what he said has been identified as a village.
The county allocated $14.5 million toward developing the steel mill site to go with the state’s issuance of $125 million in bonds for the plant, whose primary investors say will produce 525 jobs averaging $75,000 a year.
An archaeological firm hired by the county used sonar to find the site 4 feet below ground, Chitwood said. Archaeological research has shown that American Indians buried their dead below their houses, he said.
“Our intent is to deal with the [Indian] site by avoiding it,” Chitwood said, adding that the site is about 0.9 acre. “It appears … to be a small village.”
Berry inquired about it, and the county officials invited him to come to the state and talk.
“We’re not going to put a shovel anywhere near it,” Chitwood said. “We’ll put a fence around it before construction [of the plant] starts.” Construction is expected to start late this year.
The rail spur will be built “a few hundred feet” from the site, Chitwood said.
American Indians numbered about 50,000 in Mississippi County when Spanish explorer Hernando De Soto arrived about 1540 - about the county’s current population, Chitwood said. Berry said the Indians were Quapaws.
Under the federal Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, the Quapaw are recognized as one of the historic tribes of eastern Arkansas and are consulted on Arkansas archaeological sites related to American Indians, according to The Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture.
Berry said he would be accompanied by archaeological experts of his own.
County officials have been aware for months that the site might pose a problem for the two rail spurs planned for the project.
Business, Pages 27 on 07/26/2013