jennings

CHARLESTOWN — Matthew Thomas, the Narragansett Indian who rose from janitor to tribal leader, yesterday won a third term as chief sachem of the 2,400-member tribe.

In unofficial returns, Thomas won 306 votes during an all-day election at the tribe’s Four Winds Community Center on Route 2. Challenger Paulla Dove Jennings, a former tribal councilwoman, received 145 votes.

The election was a rematch of the 1997 race in which Thomas defeated Jennings and another candidate to become the youngest chief sachem elected since Colonial times.

“I’m humbled,” said Thomas, 47, who has pushed for a Narragansett casino during his tenure.

Yesterday’s numbers were provided by the candidates. The official vote will be announced tomorrow, a spokeswoman for the election committee said.

The tribe faces a number of challenges going forward, including housing its elderly and finding new ways to make money, Thomas said.

The tribe will also continue to fight to repeal a law sponsored by the late Sen. John H. Chafee, he said. The law requires the Narragansetts, unlike most tribes, to seek state and local voter approval for any gambling on their land.

Thomas and six other tribal members face misdemeanor charges related to the state police raid on a tax-free smoke shop the Narragansetts opened in 2003. That trial has been postponed indefinitely as the state Supreme Court decides whether Governor Carcieri, who ordered the police to execute the search warrant, can be called to testify.

Jennings, who served as the tribe’s business manager and first councilwoman in the late 1980s, promised to move the tribe in a new direction.

Tribal members must be more involved in state politics, and federal health coverage must be extended to tribal members in Providence and Newport, she said.

Jennings also promised to restore membership rights to individuals who have been ousted from the tribe in recent years.

Thomas yesterday said voters saw through the membership issue. The chief sachem has no voice in who makes the tribal roll, he said. “I have nothing to do with that.”

Thomas also said the wide margin of his victory showed that tribal members “are satisfied with the job I’m doing.”

But Jennings said the election results “are a wake-up call for the chief and the council.”

Elections for the full nine-member Tribal Council, which had been indefinitely postponed, will be held the last Saturday in January.

“All the seats are up for grabs,” said Jennings.

“New council members need to be more responsive to the needs of the tribe,” she said. “Hopefully, the council will be more balanced. Members need to be more worldly. They need to walk in both worlds.”

Jennings, who works at the Tomaquag Indian Memorial Museum in Exeter, says she won’t run for chief sachem again. But she’ll continue to work for the tribe, as her father and mother urged her to do, she said. “I’ll help in any way I can.”

pdavis@projo.com