At 8:02 AM inside the Wallowa County Courthouse, I signed over 2,260 acres to the Nez Perce Tribe. The tribal elders performed a short blessing right there in the records office. The clerk, who had known me for twenty years, stood up from her desk and said, “Well, it’s about time.”
They Cut My Grandfather’s Tree for Their Million-Dollar Entrance — So I Made Them Pay $75,000 a Year to Use It
By 10:00 AM, we were back at my kitchen table. The tribe’s attorney drafted a formal 30-day notice of termination of encroachment. It was addressed to the Bitterroot Ridge Estates HOA, care of Corrine Ashburn.
It stated that the new fee simple owner of the land was a sovereign Indian nation. It gave the HOA thirty days to vacate the road entirely or enter into a negotiated license agreement.
A Wallowa County Sheriff’s Deputy and a Sergeant from the Nez Perce Tribal Police delivered the notice together.
Personal service by a tribal officer in full uniform is not a piece of mail you can throw away. The Sergeant reported back that Corrine opened her door in a bathrobe, holding a glass of rosé. She read the notice and said, “This has to be a joke.”
