Mark Maryboy | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Navajo Nation Council Delegate | |
| In office January 1, 1991 – January 1, 2007 | |
| Succeeded by | Davis Filfred Jr. |
| Personal details | |
| Born | December 10, 1955 Utah |
| Nationality |  Navajo Nation and  USA |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouse | Roselyn Maryboy |
Mark Maryboy (born December 10, 1955) is a retired American politician for San Juan County, Utah, and a former Navajo Nation Council Delegate for the Utah Navajo Section of the Navajo Tribe. He is the brother of Kenneth Maryboy, who currently serves as the Navejo Nation Council Delegate, in the positions he once stood. He is of the Navajo Indian Tribe.
Mark Maryboy was also the San Juan County, Utah Commissioner for District Three. In 1986, he became the first Native American to be elected as county commissioner in Utah's history.
Maryboy, Rebecca M. Benally and protesters from the Aneth Chapter blocked the main ExxonMobil corporate office for three days in Aneth, Utah.[1]
Mark Maryboy was born on December 10, 1955, at St. Christopher's mission near Bluff, Utah. He was the fifth of eight children, all of whom were raised in a Navajo hogan.
Mark attended BIA boarding schools[2] in Kayenta and Aneth at varied times, even though it was hard for him to be separated from his parents during those periods. Government schools were difficult for him as there seemed to be a deliberate attempt to destroy the Indian person that he was.
Angry and resentful because of harsh treatment, he ran away from boarding school while in third grade. His parents then enrolled him and his beloved brother, Herbert, in the public school at Bluff. They were the first reservation Navajo students to attend public school in San Juan County.
Upon graduation from San Juan High School in Blanding, Utah he attended the University of Utah, majoring in history with a minor in business. He garnered a B.A. degree in 1978.
Some time after graduation, he returned to the Navajo Reservation. Working as the Director of Education for the Utah Navajo Development Council, he supervised Headstart, Adult Education, and Vocational Education programs. He created teacher training programs and a class for teen mothers.
Maryboy married Rosylyn Johnson, who is also a Social Worker on the reservation. They have one daughter.[citation needed]
One hundred and thirty years after Native Americans were pushed to isolated reservations, the Navajo people of Utah reclaimed a place in the American political process.
In 1986, Maryboy, then age 31 and politically ambitious, ran for San Juan Commissioner. This was the first election after the county was divided by Justice Department decree into commissioner districts. He was elected a San Juan County Commissioner and became the first Native American to hold such a position in the state of Utah.
An elected official, he realized even greater inequities in services given to his Navajo constituents. The Navajo people were bringing in more money for the county than they were receiving back in services. He mixed it up with the other commissioners, often battling the always capable right-wing former Commissioner Calvin Black, the undisputed kingpin of San Juan County politics, during hotly contested commission meetings.
Maryboy's four terms on the San Juan County Commission - particularly the first half-dozen years - were the subject of much press and the stuff of legend-making. His sword-crossing with the late commission chairman, Cal Black, spiked tensions across southern Utah as Maryboy fought for funding for roads, sanitation and water for Utah's Navajos.
In 1989 Navajo elders and other Democratic stalwarts determined to run a Navajo for every county post up for election. 56 percent of San Juan's population was Navajo at the time. The campaign aimed at getting tribal members to the polls was called "Niha-Whol-Zhiizh", meaning "It's our turn."
The Democratic-Navajo plan fizzled. Maryboy won a second commission term, but was the only Navajo Indian elected.
In 1933, Congress created the Utah Navajo Trust Fund. It is unique in that the state was deemed the trustee-delegate for oil pumped from Navajo land.
According to the law, 37.5 percent of royalties are supposed to go to Utah Navajos. But a 1991 report from the state found gross mismanagement. Some people were later indicted for misusing the trust fund
Navajos living in nearby San Juan County in southeastern Utah have long protested the saturation of oil and gas wells around their homes. Mark and other Utah Navajos have long argued that the Navajo Nation returns little profit to Navajos living in desperate conditions in the Utah portion of tribal land.
Utah Navajo allegations of corruption within the U.S. Interior gained support from an Interior whistleblower in 2003.
In 1997, local residents began the Aneth Oil Protest against Exxon-Mobil's Utah Navajo community policies. Protesters from the Aneth Chapter blocked the main ExxonMobil Corp. Office for 3 days at the McElmo Oil Plant near Aneth, Utah.
From the start, the protest was made up of local Navajo people who were becoming increasingly angry at Exxon-Mobil's stance towards the environment and its hiring practices within the local communities. Many other national political activist organizations such as the American Indian Movement wanted to get involved with the protest. However, it was agreed to not include outside affiliates, which might result in losing the original meaning and message of the protest [1] .
Former Navajo Nation president Albert Hale was also mobilized to the northernmost corner of the Navajo Nation where the protest was initiated. Mark, along with members of the Aneth Community, helped create a new standard for the Navajo workers working in the Aneth Oil area as well as the hiring process.
Heeding to his father's wishes, he did not seek a fifth term on the council.
Maryboy established Utah Navajo Health Systems in 1999 along with Donna Singer. Then he ramrodded tribal legislation that allows the agency to keep its profits, rather than return them to Window Rock. This remains a legacy for the policies Maryboy left.