Bay Mills News Editor Jennifer Dale and Staff Reporter Michael C. Guilmette Jr. are both slated to leave the tribal newspaper after accepting new positions. Dale's begins July 1.
“It's more of a transfer than a move,” said Dale, who has been working as CORA's public information officer part-time since 1995, in addition to her editorial duties. The double-duty had been rewarding but wearing, said Dale. Finally, Tribal Chairman Jeff Parker last year encouraged the five-tribe Authority to consider a full time public information and education office, which it approved at its April meeting.
It's a good time for a move, said Dale, who feels she can confidently place the now well-respected Bay Mills News into younger hands and turn to a new challenge.
Her new position requires a unique blend that Dale thinks she brings to the job — a working knowledge of journalism and public relations, design and layout, treaty rights and fishery education. As an Anishinabe enrolled at Sault Tribe, she is well acquainted with tribal communities and culture.
Dale anticipates spending a lot of time helping support efforts to better market tribal fishery products as well as further educating the public about treaty rights in the 1836 treaty ceded territory. “We have a healthy, wholesome product here that's high in omega-3s and low in contaminants, and we need to get the word out,” she commented.
Dale makes her home on Spectacle Lake in Bay Mills Twp. next to the reservation, and volunteers for the Bay Mills Boys and Girls Club, where she serves on its board and teaches beadwork to the kids. “I can't miss out on seeing all my young friends,” she said.
An award winning journalist and newspaper editor, Dale occasionally writes for Native journals and newspapers. Right now she is concentrating on a Health and Human Services grant pilot program, “Eat More Fish but Choose Wisely” for vulnerable populations in the Upper Peninsula, working with the Inter Tribal Fishery Assessment Program and the Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan.
Guilmette, who has been with the Bay Mills News since Oct. 2002, will be the layout editor of The Daily Advance, a 12,000-circulation daily newspaper in northeastern North Carolina. He is scheduled to begin his new job in mid-June.
“This has all been a whirlwind,” said Guilmette. He was contacted by the editor of the newspaper at the end of April, flew down for an interview on May 8, and then accepted the position on May 14.
“It will be difficult leaving everyone behind,” he added, “but this is an opportunity I could not pass up.”
Guilmette will oversee the layout and design staff of The Daily Advance, directing the appearance of the newspaper. Guilmette said that layout and design was his first love in the newspaper business — a skill he was able to put to use in the May 20 issue of the Bay Mills News — and he looks forward to taking on the challenge of working on a large daily newspaper.
Guilmette, 33, was born and raised in Chippewa County.
