Spirit Lake Tribe of Mission Bay, North Dakota. After numerous renovations since its opening, it now has almost 150 hotel rooms, a 1,000-seat auditorium, a banquet hall, RV park, gift shop and a four-story aquatic center. In 2011 more job opportunities were added when the Spirit Lake Marina and Spirit Lake Grocery store were added to the grounds of the casino. The marina hosts a fishing tournament every summer. Spirit Lake Tribe The Spirit Lake Tribe (in Santee Dakota: "Mni Wakan Oyate", formerly known as Devils Lake Sioux) is a federally recognized tribe based on a reservation located in east-central North Dakota on
Native American recognition in the United States self-identify as Indian, merely by checking the racial category, "Native American/Alaska Native". In 1990, about 1.8 million people self-identified in the census as American Indian. About 60 percent of those, or 1.14 million people, are enrolled in federally recognized tribes. People who self-identify as Indian but are not a part of a federally recognized group often wish to join a recognized tribe. The tribal government, in the absence of some legal obligation which stipulates otherwise, has final jurisdiction over who is a member of the tribe. Holly Reckord, an anthropologist who heads the BIA Branch of Acknowledgment and Recognition, discusses