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Indian entrepreneur helps build business environment on reservations.

Article Excerpt
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Bob Gauthicr's resume runs the gamut, from beer truck driver to tribal jailer to presidential appointee.

While he may have taken an unusual path to success, his heritage, experience, and entrepreneurial spirit make Gauthier uniquely qualified as one of the only independent economic development consultants for Montana's Indian reservations.

Across Montana and across the United States, reservation economies face higher levels of unemployment and poverty, along with lower worker productivity, per capita income, wages, and housing values. At the heart of the economic disparity are the comparatively small private sectors found on reservations.

Nationwide, 33 percent of reservation jobs are government jobs compared with only 15 percent in the country overall. Conversely, 44 percent of reservation jobs are in the private sector compared with 80 percent in the nation as a whole, according to a presentation by Senior Research Analyst for the Montana Department of Commerce Susan Ockert. And Montana tends to follow suit, she said, with tribal governments, not consumers, being the main drivers of tribal economies.

Tribal members represent 7 percent of Montana's population, and reservations occupy 5 percent of Montana's land base. Yet American Indians owned only 1 percent of all privately owned Montana businesses in 2002, according to that year's U.S. Census. And while there were 110 firms for every 1,000 Montanans, there were 34 American Indian owned firms per every 1,000 American Indians in Montana.

So the answer to stimulating reservation economies is not tribes being in business, said Gauthier, but tribes creating an environment that is conducive to business.

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This is why in 2005, he formed Ahoy Leasing and Development and began providing economic development consultation to tribes.

Economic Climate on Reservations

Gauthier provides the technical assistance tribes need to build capacity and create vibrant economies. His job, he explains, is to help create the vision and link the resources. There is no shortage of opportunity, or good ideas, he said, but the economic climate does not encourage Indian entrepreneurship.

For many years, reservation economies were administered by federal government, leaving little incentive for private business ventures. As a result, values such as entrepreneurship and homeownership, often associated with the greater American psyche, were suppressed on reservations.

More fundamentally, the culture of borrowing and lending is absent from reservation economies, largely because the necessary financial institutions aren't readily available. Uncertain legal framework...

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