Community leaders for the Rincon Band of Luiseño Indians announced Friday the death of Bo Mazzetti, the 77-year-old chairman who stood at the helm of the Tribal Council for nearly two decades.
Officials said Mazzetti, a Vietnam War veteran with a decades-long track record of advocating for California’s Native American population, will be ed as a dedicated caretaker of the community on the reservation, as well as a generous neighbor to the nearby Valley Center and San Diego County communities.
“His impact was immeasurable,” San Diego County Sheriff Kelly Martinez said in a statement. “He never failed to have a smile and quick wit. His kindness and love shined brightly and I will miss him deeply.”
Officials said Mazzetti had been battling cancer and was comforted by his family until the very end. The council waited a day before publicly announcing his death.
“While prioritizing the needs of tribal , Mazzetti championed the Rincon tribe’s generous of community organizations and causes throughout the region,” tribal council leaders said in a statement. “Under Mazzetti’s vibrant leadership, the tribe grew in stature and influence throughout the state, while providing for the care and protection of its tribal .”
Mazzetti attended Orange Glen High School in Escondido before he ed the Navy and served in the Vietnam War, officials said. After returning home, he graduated from California Polytechnic State University and received a degree in behavioral science.
From there, he took a job as the San Diego County Indian Affairs officer. During that time, he established the Southern California Tribal Chairmen’s Association and later, the statewide Tribal Chairmen’s Association. He left that post to attain a general contractor’s and engineering license and start his own company.
Although he had stepped away as an officer in lieu of the private sector, officials said Mazzetti remained interested in solving issues that continued to face Indians and reservations. Eventually, he became the roads officer for the Bureau of Indian Affairs andestablished the Reservation Transportation Authority.
During that time, he also served as president of the San Luis Rey Indian Water Authority, a coalition of five tribes, and won a 50-year-long lawsuit to regain tribal water rights.
In 2002, he was elected to the Rincon Tribal Council and eventually became vice chairman. In 2008, he was elected chairman and would stay in that role for over 16 consecutive years.
During his tenure, tribal officials said, Mazzetti advocated for tribal sovereignty while also looking out for the needs of the surrounding communities through various nonprofit causes and programs in the region. The chairman was a regular contributor to the Union-Tribune’s opinion page.
His pieces would highlight the generous funding and emergency services the tribe provided to the surrounding communities — money raised through its tribal gaming revenues — while also calling on the county to help the tribe improve its reservation infrastructure.
From 2021 to 2022 , Mazzetti advocated for the state to help California tribes receive better access to clean water. In 2023, he said AT&T and the tribe had signed an agreement to design and engineer a fiber network that would connect more than 400 homes on the reservation to reliable, high-speed broadband, marking the first time in the tribe’s history it would have access to reliable internet.
But, even after the agreement was signed for the Rincon tribe, Mazzetti continued to advocate for the many other Indian tribes in the state who still suffer from connectivity issues, which he said inherently hurts their economic opportunity and further excludes them from educational options.
In his final piece published by the U-T last year, Mazzetti cited an FCC report that found 28% of tribal land residents in California lack high-speed broadband, compared to 1.5% of urban residents. He ended the piece with a call to action, saying the work toward universal access to high-speed internet will not be over until all 108 other tribes in California have equitable access.
Mazetti is survived by his wife, Mary; daughter, Emily; and son, Joseph. The Mazzetti family requests privacy at this time.
Public funeral services are pending, officials said.
