Standing Rock Members Petition For Vote on Sioux Nickname Use

Next Tuesday a group of Fighting Sioux nickname supporters on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation will circulate a petition around the community.

The petition will ask for a reservation-wide vote on the issue.

Nickname supporter Tom Iron says next Tuesday he and 8 others will start the petition to gauge tribal support in the next two weeks.

Iron says he will need 550 signatures to make it valid and that would override a moratorium that previously banned a vote.

He will present it to tribal chair Charlie Murphy and ask the council vote to allow a public vote to happen before February 18th.

That's the date of a North Dakota State Board of Higher Education meeting where some board members have indicated they might look toward retirement of UND's Sioux nickname.

Tags: steve bodakowski, news, und, sioux, breakingnews