Chickasaw Nation seeking input from members outside its land base

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) _ The Chickasaw Nation will hold a ``listening conference'' here next month in an attempt to gather comments from members who live outside the tribe's land base. <br/><br/>Tribal

Friday, January 6th 2006, 10:05 am

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) _ The Chickasaw Nation will hold a ``listening conference'' here next month in an attempt to gather comments from members who live outside the tribe's land base.

Tribal administrators hope the conference, scheduled for Feb. 12-15, will give them a chance to receive input from tribal members in the Oklahoma City area and elsewhere about services they would like to receive from the tribe.

The tribe is based in Ada. Its jurisdictional area covers 13 counties in south-central Oklahoma. In the 2000 U.S. Census, 20,887 people said they were Chickasaw, 23,901 said they were a combination of Chickasaw and other tribes and 38,351 said they were a combination of Chickasaw and another race.

The tribe has mailed information about the conference to every member living outside its jurisdictional area. About 65 percent of the tribe's registered voters live outside that area, tribal spokeswoman Robyn Elliott said.