By Michelle Tirado

Pow wow season is here. But with the nation officially in an economic recession, what kind of season will it be?

Paul Gowder, owner/operator of PowWows.com, one of the Web’s top pow wow portals, said there has been a lot of discussion in the site’s forums about how the bad economy will impact pow wows this year.

“A lot of people have decided not to go to certain ones because it’s too far to drive and they can’t afford the gas and they can’t afford the lodging. So, they are trying to stay closer to home,” he said.

Gowder has seen an increase in the number of people e-mailing him to cancel their listings in the site’s pow wow calendar, which contains about 1,100 such events. He will also be doing fewer webcasts for these events. He lost two so far, one due to the pow wow being cancelled and the other because the pow wow did not have the budget for the webcasting.

“It’s tough all the way around,” Gowder, a Georgia Cherokee, continued. “The dancers are having a tough time getting there. Committees are having a tough time getting donations and money from their regular sources.”

He suspects vendor participation will be down too, as for them fewer spectators will mean fewer people buying.

While Gowder has not been to any pow wows yet this year, he went to several last year and saw little change in attendance levels despite skyrocketing gas prices. He agreed that, although gas prices may have kept some from going to far away pow wows, they may have attracted more locals, people who were looking for fun things to do nearby because they could not splurge on a big family vacation.

We checked with a couple of early spring pow wows to find out how they fared. What they reported was surprising.

The Denver March Powwow, a three-day event held in mid-March, usually welcomes more than 50,000. Grace Gillette, executive director, said this year its gate was up by around 700. She said, though, that its participant numbers were average, representing 92 tribes from 33 states and 5 Canadian provinces.

Montana State University’s 34th annual American Indian Council Pow-Wow, one of the largest in Montana, did unexpectedly well. Held April 10-11 at MSU's Brick Breeden Fieldhouse in Bozeman, the event attracted some 250 dancers, 18 drummers and more than 4,000 spectators.

“I would say the recession had no impact at all,” said Jim Burns, American Indian Council advisor.

The Indian Council Pow-Wow has two nice draws: It does not charge admission (it is supported by fund-raising and program advertising) and it offers a free chili meal.

Still, Burns had anticipated an impact. He even cut back on orders for caps and T-shirts, ordering less and just opting for T-shirts this year. The T-shirts ended up selling out — as did the Indian tacos and the programs.

The number of vendors was down, however. Burns said the ones that did not come are probably sorry because the ones that came were busy. Some told Burns it was the best they had ever done.

“It was one of the most successful pow wows to date,” Burns said, crediting in large part the strong local support the event gets.