The Colorado Commission on Indian Affairs on Thursday opted to clear all but one of the dozen schools listed as out of compliance with a state law barring the use of any American Indian mascot or symbol in public schools unless that school had an agreement with a Native American tribe.

That left Lamar High School out of compliance ahead of Senate Bill 21-116’s June 1 deadline, after which any public school that still has an Native American mascot without prior approval could face fines of up to $25,000 per month. But last-minute action by the Lamar RE-2 school board may have been enough to spare the school.

Thursday’s meeting was the last chance for the last of the schools with those mascots to make their case for keeping their mascots or win approval for changes. Ahead of the meeting there were 12 schools with mascots flagged by the commission, including three schools in Kiowa, the three schools in the Yuma School District, Lamar High School, and two schools in the Arickaree School District.

The commission approved removing 11 of the 12 schools on the list. The one left: Lamar.

The school did submit a bison to be known as “Savage Thunder” as a new mascot, but that didn’t fly with the commission due to the district’s previous refusal to drop the word “savage” from the title. 

Commission member Crystal Loudhawk-Hedgepeth pointed out that the word has been used in legal and government documents to describe Native people.

“Words do matter,” she said.

Chad Krug, superintendent of schools for Lamar RE-2, said the district’s view was that dropping the Native American imagery was enough to separate the term from the mascot. 

That failed to move commission members.

Given that the school has used Native American imagery in the past in association with the term, continuing to use the term “savage” with the new mascot does not meet the spirit of the law, said Jill Hunsaker Ryan, a commission member who is also executive director of the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.

Doug Vilsack of the Department of Natural Resources agreed. The term “historically referred to Native Americans” and “savage thunder” is a continuation of that, he said.

Legislation has been adopted in the past that recognized Native Americans as “savages” and not equal to Europeans coming to the United States, said Manuel Heart, chairman of the Ute Mountain Ute tribe.

“We need to change that and take away the savage imagery of how they first thought about us,” he added.

The Lamar school board, which was meeting at the same time as the commission, voted almost immediately to remove “savage” from its mascot, and will now just be known as the Lamar Thunder. 

“This must end for the benefit of our students,” Krug said. “It’s not a game. It’s a merger of the two realities. … We got it. We never wanted to disrespect anyone.”

That information was relayed to the commission near the end of their meeting, including the resolution the board voted on. Krug asked for a second vote, but didn’t get it. Instead, the commission pledged to follow up with the school district.

The commission did grant permission to the Kiowa schools, part of the Elbert County School District, to keep their Indian mascot, the only school on the list to be allowed to do so. All eight other schools removed from the list opted to change their mascots.

That’s because the district submitted an agreement they made with the Kiowa tribe of Oklahoma, as well as examples of curriculum on Native American culture for the elementary and high school. The middle school does not include that curriculum as it is not approved for inclusion by the state Department of Education.

The Kiowa school board, in a statement, said “we appreciate the recognition of our efforts to comply with SB21-116 by the CCIA.  The district is excited that as a school we have the honor of helping to preserve the history of the Kiowa Indians. Our town and district are dedicated to working with the Kiowa Tribe in the education of our students and community. We look forward to maintaining this relationship and proudly representing the Kiowa Indians.”

The commission also approved the addition of 10 other schools not previously identified as having mascots out of compliance with SB 116. All the schools use a thunderbird as a mascot, which Native Americans also claim as a symbol. Those schools have a year to come into compliance, based on a change to the School Finance Act last week.