PHILADELPHIA - At 77, Chief Phillip Martin still has unfinished business.
That's why he's running for a seventh consecutive four-year term as Tribal Chief of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians instead of settling into retirement.
The election is Tuesday.
Martin spoke of his re-election plans Friday, just hours after gleefully smashing a Gibson Epiphone Special guitar to commemorate the opening of the Hard Rock Cafe and Beach Club at the tribe's Pearl River Resort.
"We've got to finish the resort," Martin said. "We're on the right track to create a bona fide resort. This gives me a challenge if we do things right."
By any measure of economic success, the Choctaw tribe has done many things right over the past two decades.
Since Martin was first elected in 1979, the tribe has opened more than two dozen businesses, the largest of which is the $600 million resort, which includes two hotel-casinos, a water park, lake and white sands beach.
The Choctaw tribe, 9,100 members strong and possessor of a 35,000-acre reservation sprawling across 10 counties, has - under Martin's leadership - transformed itself into a powerful economic force in the state.
Unemployment among tribal members, once 75 percent, is less than 4 percent. More than 400 of its young people are enrolled in college, up from 30 in 1992. The tribe also has built its own schools, hospital, fire stations and an extensive network of tribal services.
Martin's forceful presence and the tribe's extensive lobbying efforts and political contributions have won the Choctaws considerable political clout.
"I can do things through the tribal government I couldn't do otherwise," said Martin, who last year fended off efforts to alter the state's gaming compact with the tribe so that Indian casinos could be taxed. "It's a good job if you want to do something."
Bobby Thompson, Linda Farve and Kennith H. York will challenge Martin in the election.
Tribal members predict Martin will win easily because he can point to the tribe's hard-won prosperity.
"It would be hard for somebody else to come in and have the same kind of influence," said Jason York, 28, an assistant manager at the Golden Moon.
Most of the almost 6,000 tribal members who live in or near Neshoba County work either for the tribal government or one of its business enterprises.
Martin will also benefit from tribal members' reluctance to change the status quo without a compelling reason.
"Within the tribal community, we're used to a certain way and there's an unwillingness to change," said Tonka Wallace, 29, marketing manager for the resort's water park and Clearwater Key. "When you have a proven leader, there's no reason to change."
Martin says his focus will continue to be development of Choctaw business enterprises with an emphasis on creating more jobs in high-tech manufacturing, computer services and telecommunications.
But he has other plans, too, beyond his goal of serving as tribal chief for another term.
"I'd rather be an entrepreneur," Martin said. "I want to start my own business for my own fringe benefits."
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