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Snoqualmie Indian Tribe Announces Donations Focusing on Environmental Education

SNOQUALMIE, Wash., Jan. 15, 2014 /PRNewswire/ — The Snoqualmie Indian Tribe recently donated $15,000 to the Mercer Slough Education Center, run by the Pacific Science Center. “The partnership with the Snoqualmie Tribe helps us to provide memorable and exciting encounters with environmental science, reaching 10,000 students, parents, and teachers a year,” says Dana Fialdini. “The Pacific Science Center is grateful for the support we have received.”

Another recent donation of $25,000 to the Burke Museum is supporting the exhibit Elwha: A River Reborn, which focuses on the removal of the Elwha Dams. Julie Stein, Executive Director for the Burke, says the museum is “delighted to partner with the Snoqualmie Tribe” and that the sponsorship helps the Museum and others “celebrate and share the historic and transformational story with tens of thousands of people in our community, across the state, and far beyond.”

The Tribe also made donations to Sightline Institute and the Seattle Aquarium for $6,000 and $40,000, respectively. “We are honored to support these worthwhile organizations that focus on educating the community on important conservation and environmental matters,” said Tribal Secretary Alisa Burley.

These most recent donations are part of the Snoqualmie Indian Tribe’s long-standing commitment to investing in various nonprofit initiatives in the Snoqualmie area and statewide. Since 2010, the Tribe has donated over $3.5 million to hundreds of Washington State nonprofit organizations, including the Woodland Park Zoo, the Swedish Hospital, Seattle International Film Festival, Pike Place Market Foundation, and the Seattle Art Museum.

“We are truly humbled by the amazing work these local non-profits are doing in our communities and are proud to partner with them in their endeavors,” said Tribal Chairwoman Carolyn Lubenau. “We look forward to what the future may bring for the Tribe and its community partners.”

To qualify for a donation from the Snoqualmie Indian Tribe, an organization must be located within Washington State and a 501c3 non-profit organization. Applications are available online at www.snoqualmietribe.us with the next application cycle deadline set as Friday, January 31^st.

The Snoqualmie Indian Tribe is a federally recognized tribe in the Puget Sound region of Washington State. Known as the People of the Moon, Snoqualmie Tribal members were signatories of the Treaty of Point Elliott with the Washington territory in 1855. The Tribe owns and operates the Snoqualmie Casino in Snoqualmie, WA.

Oregon Proposes Removing Hatchery Fish From Wild Fish Areas

A new plan for six species of salmon and trout in Oregon's coastal rivers would shift the balance of hatchery and wild fish. | credit: caddiseug/Flickr — A new plan for six species of salmon and trout in Oregon’s coastal rivers would shift the balance of hatchery and wild fish. | credit: caddiseug/Flickr

By Cassandra Profita, OPB

Hatchery-reared fish would get the heave ho from certain rivers along the Oregon Coast under the latest strategy to help Oregon’s wild salmon and steelhead.

The new management plan proposed by the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife would designate several coastal rivers as “wild fish emphasis areas,” while increasing the number of hatchery fish planted in other coastal rivers to expand fishing opportunities in those waters.

The idea is to improve the way six species of wild salmon and steelhead are managed without shortchanging those people who count on hatcheries to produce enough fish for them to catch.

To find the right balance, the agency convened several stakeholder committees with members from sportfishing, commercial fishing and conservation groups. Stakeholders spent months debating which rivers should get more hatchery fish and which ones should get less.

ODFW’s Coastal Multi-Species Conservation and Management Plan aims to conserve six species in 20 different river basins along the Oregon coast. None of the species are listed under the Endangered Species Act, and the state wants to make sure it stays that way.

The fish face threats from habitat loss, predators and overfishing. And also from their own hatchery-raised relatives. Studies show hatchery fish can compete with wild fish for habitat, and they can impact genetics through interbreeding. Several lawsuits are targeting hatcheries in the Northwest as scientists continue to document conservation risks to wild fish from hatchery releases.

Of course, hatcheries also serve an important role in coastal communities.

“They provide fish for people to catch,” ODFW program manager Tom Stahl says. “We’re trying to balance the hatchery program in terms of providing that fishing opportunity and also conserving wild fish populations.”

The state plan, which is currently in draft form and open to public comment, wouldn’t reduce the overall number of hatchery fish being released into coastal rivers. In fact, it would increase that number slightly from 6 million to 6.3 million per year. But it would reduce the number hatchery fish being released in some rivers such as the Kilchis, Siletz, and the Elk.

The plan has sparked outcry from both sportfishing and conservation groups. Some fishermen prefer to catch fish on rivers that would have fewer hatchery fish under the plan, and some conservation groups have put a lot of effort into improving wild fish runs on rivers that would get more hatchery fish.

After sitting on one of the committees, Alan Moore of the conservation group Trout Unlimited says it will be impossible to make everyone happy.

“The Kilchis River will be a wild fish emphasis area, and hatchery production will be moved to Nestucca River,” Moore says. “Trout Unlimited is planning a bunch of habitat conservation work on the Nestucca. We’re wondering: Should we be thinking about moving it to a different river where it stands a better chance of helping wild fish?”

Meanwhile, fishermen who rely hatcheries to ensure enough fish to catch are counting to make sure that the hatchery fish proposed to be removed from the Kilchis are actually going to be released somewhere else.

“Everybody’s counting fish,” Moore says.

The plan would also put more effort into preventing hatchery fish from interacting with wild fish overall, Stahl says, and it proposes a sliding scale for fishing seasons that would allow more fishing in years with higher predicted runs of fish.

“The plan really is trying to be proactive in increasing conservation as well as increasing fishing opportunity,” he says. “We’re threading that needle.”

ODFW is holding six meetings this month to collect public comments on the plan. The first meeting is from 6 to 9 pm Thursday at ODFW Headquarters, 4034 Fairview Industrial Drive SE, in Salem.

Other meetings will be held from 6 to 9 pm:

Jan. 21 at the TIllamook County Library Meeting Room, 1716 3rd St., in Tillamook;
Jan. 23 at the Best Western Plus Agate Beach Inn, 3019 N. Coast Highway, in Newport;
Jan. 27 at Douglas County Library Meeting Room, 1409 NE Diamond Lake Blvd., in Roseburg;
Jan 28 at North Bend Community Center, 2222 Broadway St., in North Bend; and
Jan. 29 at Reedsport Community Center, 451 Winchester Ave., in Reedsport.

Bill would clear convictions during 60s fish-ins

Ted S. Warren / Associated PressBilly Frank Jr., a Nisqually tribal elder who was arrested dozens of times while trying to assert his native fishing rights during the Fish Wars of the 1960s and ‘70s, holds a late-1960s photo of himself Monday (left) fishing with Don McCloud, near Frank’s Landing on the Nisqually River. Several state lawmakers are pushing to give people arrested during the Fish Wars a chance to expunge their convictions from the record. — Ted S. Warren / Associated Press
Billy Frank Jr., a Nisqually tribal elder who was arrested dozens of times while trying to assert his native fishing rights during the Fish Wars of the 1960s and ‘70s, holds a late-1960s photo of himself Monday (left) fishing with Don McCloud, near Frank’s Landing on the Nisqually River. Several state lawmakers are pushing to give people arrested during the Fish Wars a chance to expunge their convictions from the record.

By PHUONG LE, The Associated Press

SEATTLE — Decades after American Indians were arrested for exercising treaty-protected fishing rights during a nationally watched confrontation with authorities, a proposal in the state Legislature would give those who were jailed a chance to clear their convictions from the record.

Tribal members and others were roughed up, harassed and arrested while asserting their right to fish for salmon off-reservation under treaties signed with the federal government more than a century prior. The Northwest fish-ins, which were known as the “Fish Wars” and modeled after sit-ins of the civil rights movement, were part of larger demonstrations to assert American Indian rights nationwide.

The fishing acts, however, violated state regulations at the time, and prompted raids by police and state game wardens and clashes between Indian activists and police.

Demonstrations staged across the Northwest attracted national attention, and the fishing-rights cause was taken up by celebrities such as the actor Marlon Brando, who was arrested with others in 1964 for illegal fishing from an Indian canoe on the Puyallup River. Brando was later released.

“We as a state have a very dark past, and we need to own up to our mistakes,” said Rep. David Sawyer, D-Tacoma, prime sponsor of House Bill 2080. “We made a mistake, and we should allow people to live their lives without these criminal charges on their record.”

Lawmakers in the House Community Development, Housing and Tribal Affairs Committee are hearing public testimony on the bill Tuesday afternoon.

Sawyer said he’s not sure exactly how many people would be affected by the proposal. “Even if there’s a handful it’s worth doing,” he added.

Sawyer said he took up the proposal after hearing about a tribal member who couldn’t travel to Canada because of a fishing-related felony, and about another tribal grandparent who couldn’t adopt because of a similar conviction.

Under the measure, tribal members who were arrested before 1975 could apply to the sentencing court to expunge their misdemeanor, gross misdemeanor or felony convictions if they were exercising their treaty fishing rights. The court has the discretion to vacate the conviction, unless certain conditions apply, such as if the person was convicted for a violent crime or crime against a person, has new charges pending or other factors.

“It’s a start,” said Billy Frank Jr., a Nisqually tribal elder who figured prominently during the Fish Wars. He was arrested dozens of times. “I never kept count,” he said of his arrests.

Frank’s Landing, his family’s home along the Nisqually River north of Olympia, became a focal point for fish-ins. Frank and others continued to put their fishing nets in the river in defiance of state fishing regulations, even as game wardens watched on and cameras rolled. Documentary footage from that time shows game wardens pulling their boats to shore and confiscating nets.

One of the more dramatic raids of the time occurred on Sept. 9, 1970, when police used tear gas and clubs to arrest 60 protesters, including juveniles, who had set up an encampment that summer along the Puyallup River south of Seattle.

The demonstrations preceded the landmark federal court decision in 1974, when U.S. District Judge George Boldt reaffirmed tribal treaty rights to an equal share of harvestable catch of salmon and steelhead and established the state and tribes as co-managers of the resource. The U.S. Supreme Court later upheld the decision.

Hank Adams, a well-known longtime Indian activist who fought alongside Frank, said the bill doesn’t cover many convictions, which were civil contempt charges for violating an injunction brought against three tribes in a separate court case. He said he hoped those convictions could be included.

“We need to make certain those are covered,” said Adams, who was shot in the stomach while demonstrating and at one time spent 20 days in Thurston County Jail.

He also said he wanted to ensure that there was a process for convicted fishermen to clear their records posthumously, among other potential changes.

But Sid Mills, who was arrested during the Fish Wars, questioned the bill’s purpose.

“What good would it do to me who was arrested, sentenced and convicted? They’re trying to make themselves feel good,” he said.

“They call it fishing wars for a reason. We were fighting for our lives,” said Mills, who now lives in Yelm. “We were exercising our rights to survive as Indians and fish our traditional ways. And all of a sudden the state of Washington came down and (did) whatever they could short of shooting us.”

Decision postponed on housing plan for coastal Native American site

A decision on the fate of a five-acre parcel known as the Ridge at the southeast corner of Bolsa Chica Street and Los Patos Avenue has been postponed. (Kevin Chang / Huntington Beach Independent / December 31, 2013)http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-housing-decision-postponed-native-american-site-20140110,0,7313049.story#ixzz2qOzsnYbw — A decision on the fate of a five-acre parcel known as the Ridge at the southeast corner of Bolsa Chica Street and Los Patos Avenue has been postponed. (Kevin Chang / Huntington Beach Independent / December 31, 2013)

By Anthony Clark Carpio

The Los Angeles Times January 10, 2014

The California Coastal Commission has postponed a decision on whether to allow new housing construction on land in Huntington Beach that opponents say is home to Native American artifacts and remains.

At the request of the city, commissioners voted unanimously this week to postpone deciding whether to allow Huntington Beach to amend its Local Coastal Program — local governments’ guide to development in the coastal zone — to allow for new homes on the northwest portion of Bolsa Chica.

Huntington Beach Planning Director Scott Hess told commissioners that city officials and housing developers want more time to analyze and respond to late changes made to a report by coastal commission staff which had recommended denying the proposed amendment because it would “eliminate a higher priority land use designation and does not assure that significant culture resources and sensitive habitats will be protected” under the California Coastal Act.

Property owner Signal Landmark and developer Hearthside Homes want to build 22 “green” homes on a five-acre parcel called the Ridge near Bolsa Chica Street and Los Patos Avenue, the Huntington Beach Independent reported.

Preservationists say the Ridge site, as with the rest of the mesa, contains Native American artifacts and remains.

The updated report recommends that before the commission considers rezoning the Ridge, the city and the property owners “irrevocably” offer an adjacent 6-acre parcel to be dedicated to a governmental or nonprofit organization to be used as open space.

Other new recommendations include requiring a cultural resources protection plan and requiring current biological assessments to be done for both sites.

Huntington Beach Councilwoman Connie Boardman, who was at the hearing Wednesday with 30 or more Bolsa Chica Land Trust members, said the coastal commission made the right move in postponing the hearing.

“It’s appropriate to postpone something when the developer brings in something the morning of the hearing so that the public and the commissioners have a chance to evaluate the changes that they’re proposing,” she said.

2000-year old Native American woman’s skeleton unearthed at Florida dig site

Underneath the asphalt of a modern highway can be treasures of history. This proved to be the case for workers trying to install a water pipe in Davie, Florida. The workers were apparently working on a historical site, as upon survey, inspection, and some digging of archaeologists, a 2,000-year-old intact human skeleton on Pine Island Road was found.

By Randell Suba, Tech Times | January 13 2014

The bones belonged to a five feet tall woman who might have been a member of the Tequesta native American tribe and estimated to be in her 20s or 30s at the time of her death. The remains did not indicate trauma, leading experts to conclude that she died of a disease.

“It’s unusually well preserved, considering it’s been under a highway with thousands and thousands of cars going over it every day,” said director of the Archaeological and Historical Conservancy Bob Carr.

Ryan Franklin, another member of the archaeological team corroborated Carr’s assessment.

(Photo : Lindsey Gira) A native American woman. In Davie, Florida, experts have unearthed an intact set of human bones at a construction site. The bones are believed to have belonged to a native American woman who lived 2,000 years ago.

“It was pretty exciting to find. We found the toe, which became a foot. When you find a toe, there’s a good chance there’s something else going on. We had to stop and contact the state,” Franklin said in an interview. “She was almost perfectly intact, which is unusual. Usually when we find graves that are this old, the acidity of the soil can deteriorate the bones, it was unusual given her age.”

Indications that this can be historical site led to a three-week pause of the construction work on Dec. 18, in accordance with Florida laws. The construction resumed last Thursday.

Out of respect to the tribes,, the skeleton cannot be photographed. Scientists cannot also chip a part of it to do carbon dating and accurately check its age. To estimate the age of the skeleton, experts based it on artifacts found earlier in the area.

According to experts, the Tequesta woman was accustomed to the life on the Pine Islands about 2,000 years back. She could have been a skilled weaver and knew how to prepare smoked fish. The woman might have also hunted and fished from her canoe. The area where the remains were discovered were actually surrounded by the Everglades that stretched as far as Fort Lauderdale and Davie.

In the 1980s, three intact skeletons were discovered in the area. The latest archaeological dig is considered as one of the oldest recovered skeletons and among the best preserved ones.

Grant advances Kasaan longhouse repairs

The roof of Kasaan’s Chief Son-i-Hat House, also known as the Whale House, is covered by a tarp during repair work. (Organized Village of Kasaan.)

By Ed Schoenfeld, CoastAlaska News

A nearly-half-million-dollar grant will speed restoration of Alaska’s oldest Haida longhouse. The structure was first built 130 years ago.

Haida Chief Son-i-Hat built the original longhouse in the 1880s at the village of Kasaan. It’s on the eastern side of Southeast’s Prince of Wales Island, about 30 miles northwest of Ketchikan.

It was called Naay I’waans, The Great House. Many know it as The Whale House, for some of the carvings inside.

It deteriorated, as wooden buildings in the rain forest do. The Civilian Conservation Corps, a depression-era employment program, rebuilt it in the late 1930s.

Now, the house badly needs repair again.

An insect-infested house post is prepared for heat treatment to kill carpenter ants. (Organized Village of Kasaan)

“It’s a matter of our cultural revitalization, showing that we’re still here and part of these lands,” says Richard Peterson, president of the Tribal Council for the Organized Village of Kasaan.

The tribal government is partnering with the Native village corporation Kavilco, and its cultural arm, the Kasaan Haida Heritage Foundation.

“A lot of the building is still in really good condition. Some of the supports are what’s failing. I think we’re fortunate enough that we don’t need a total reconstruction, so we want to maintain as much as we can,” Peterson says.

Poetry works show Alexie at his best

Kathryn Smith The Spokesman-Review

January 12, 2014

Death. Family. Loss. Love. Wealth. Poetry. Spirituality. Genocide. Prejudice. Sherman Alexie’s new poetry collection, “What I’ve Stolen, What I’ve Earned,” demonstrates the National Book Award-winning writer’s ability to tackle big themes, weaving them together in the context of his Indian identity and with his wry, unapologetic sense of humor.

And he wastes no time doing it. Alexie takes on all these topics in the collection’s first poem, the wide-ranging and powerful “Crazy Horse Boulevard,” always through the lens of his Indian identity (a member of the Spokane Tribe, he uses the term “Indian” almost exclusively). He addresses being Indian in a white world (“Most of the people who read this poem will be white people”), as well as within Indian culture, on and off the reservation (“Among my immediate family, I’m the only one who doesn’t live on the reservation. What does that say about me?”). The poem brings historical prejudices into a modern context, and Alexie calls things as he sees them, especially when it comes to the choices people make from what he sees as places of luxury (“If my sons, Indian as they are, contract some preventable disease from those organic, free-range white children and die, will it be legal for me to scalp and slaughter their white parents?”).

The focus on racial and cultural identity comes through strongest in the book’s first section. “Happy Holidays” pointedly discusses the complicated relationship modern Indians have with American holidays. “Sonnet, with Slot Machines” wrestles with the politics of Indian casinos and issues of gambling.

“Slot Machines” is one of many so-called “sonnets” in the book; the poems comprise the second section and are scattered throughout the others. In labeling these poems sonnets, Alexie initiates a conversation about form, forgoing the traditional 14-line rhyme and metrical structure and instead following formulas of his own. This reinvention of form allows Alexie to stay true to his own voice, never sacrificing his natural vocabulary for the sake of someone else’s definition of “poetic.” Yet Alexie pays homage to formal poetry and to his literary forbears by recognizing the significance of the form’s constraints while giving it his own spin.

Whatever form he uses, Alexie stays true, too, to his own style of storytelling. And “What I’ve Stolen, What I’ve Earned” is, at its core, a book of stories, told piecemeal, which hit the reader with their poignancy in the way Alexie weaves the seemingly disparate pieces together. In “Sonnet, with Tainted Love” he does this with a missing persons case, nightmares and the movie “Dirty Dancing.” “Hell” links Dante, Jimmy Durante, Moses and a fear of heights.

At 156 pages, it’s lengthy for a poetry collection, and the book does drag at times. (“Phone Calls from Ex-Lovers,” for example, probably doesn’t need to list all top 100 songs from 1984. Surely 10 would have made the point.)

But the slow moments are overcome by the tenderness of “Steel Anniversary,” by the undeniable momentum of “The Naming Ceremony,” and by the sledgehammer truths that catch us off-guard, the laugh-out-loud surprises and the utter honesty with which Alexie delivers it all.

“What I’ve Stolen” creates a world that, to borrow a line from “Sonnet, with Tainted Love,” “is equal parts magic and loss,” and it’s a book worth savoring to the final line.

Legislators Pre-file Bi-partisan Bill to Make Alaska Native Languages Official State Languages

By Mark Gnadt | House Democratic Caucus 01/10/2014

Alaska Native News

On Thursday, Representative Charisse Millett (R-Anchorage), Representative Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins (D-Sitka), Representative Benjamin Nageak (D-Barrow), and Representative Bryce Edgmon (D-Dillingham) announced they are pre-filing the Alaska Native Language Bill to make each of the Native languages in Alaska an official language of the state.

In current state law, English is Alaska’s only official language. This bill would expand the list to include Iñupiaq, Siberian Yupik, Central Alaskan Yup’ik, Alutiiq, Unangax̂, Dena’ina, Deg Xinag, Holikachuk, Koyukon, Upper Kuskokwim, Gwich’in, Tanana, Upper Tanana, Tanacross, Hän, Ahtna, Eyak, Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian.

“Losing a language is losing a way of understanding the world,” said Kreiss-Tomkins. “We hope this legislation will add even more momentum to the revitalization of Alaska Native languages.”

“Native culture enriches the lives of Alaskans in so many ways,” said Millett. “Naming Alaska’s twenty indigenous languages as official languages of the state of Alaska demonstrates our respect and admiration for their past, current, and future contributions to our state.”

“This legislation will highlight the importance of preserving and revitalizing the rich and diverse cultural legacy inherent in Alaska Native languages,” said Edgmon, chairman of the House Bush Caucus. “We recently celebrated our 50^th year of statehood. In another 50 years I would like to see the many languages of our first Alaskans playing a vibrant role in the lives of people all over the state.”

“I want to thank Representative Kreiss-Tomkins for starting the process of the passage of this bill. We, the co-sponsors, feel this bill will be a positive and long overdue formal legislative recognition of all the Native languages still spoken in this great state of ours and the people who still speak their own language,” said Nageak.

Nageak continued, “Those of us who still speak and write our language want to make sure that all Native languages in the state of Alaska do not die off and want them passed on to the younger generation and the generations that will come in the near and distant future. The first words I ever spoke in my life were Iñupiaq words. My generation spoke only Iñupiaq when we were growing up and did not learn to speak English until the age of 6 years old when we started school as kindergartners. Our generation has struggled with and has been somewhat complicit in not speaking our languages when we became parents, therefore the majority of the generation we parented does not speak or write the different Native languages that were spoken entirely by Native people from generations past. We, as prime co-sponsors, feel that this bill is a start in making sure that future generations of Native speakers multiply until someday all of our Native people will once again be totally fluent in their own Native tongue with the added capability of speaking the English language.”

Making these languages official languages of the state of Alaska is a symbolic gesture to acknowledge their importance to Alaskans and the state’s heritage. Passage of the bill will not require public signs and documents to be printed in multiple languages, and it will create no additional costs to the state.

The bill will be assigned a bill number and released on Friday, January 10. It will be read into the official record and assigned committees of referral on the first day of the upcoming legislative session, January 21, 2014.

State ferries have started their winter schedule. Privately-owned Coho ferry in Port Angeles now only U.S. ferry to Vancouver Island

By Peninsula Daily News

SEATTLE — Washington state ferries started their winter sailing schedule Sunday.

Service to Sidney, B.C., is suspended, and fewer sailings are scheduled in the San Juan Islands and some other routes.

The winter schedule is in effect through April 5.

Schedule details, including the Port Townsend-Coupeville route, are online at http://tinyurl.com/pdn-winterferries.

Unaffected is the privately owned MV Coho ferry between Port Angeles and Victoria, which already has begun its winter schedule.

The Coho makes one round trip daily — departing from Port Angeles at 8:20 a.m. — until the vessel goes out of service Jan. 20 for its annual two-week maintenance.

It will return to service Feb. 6. More schedule information can be found at http://tinyurl.com/pdn-coho.

Canada’s energy officials take over job of protecting fish from pipelines

By John Upton, Grist

Move aside, Canadian federal fisheries and oceans officials. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s administration has decided that the nation’s fossil-fuel-friendly energy regulators would do a better job of protecting fish in streams and lakes that cross paths with gas and oil pipelines. Northwest Coast Energy News has the scoop:

The Department of Fisheries and Oceans has handed responsibility for fish and fish habitat along pipeline routes over to the National Energy Board. …

DFO and NEB quietly announced a memorandum of agreement on December 16, 2013, that went largely unnoticed with the release three days later of the Joint Review Panel decision on Northern Gateway and the slow down in news coverage over the Christmas holidays. …

Enbridge no longer has to apply to DFO for permits to alter fish habitat along the Northern Gateway route. …

Fish and fish habitat along [that] pipeline is now the responsibility of the Alberta-based, energy friendly National Energy Board.

This looks to be another horrifying step in Harper’s efforts to quash any science (or common sense) that might slow down the extraction and transportation of gas and oil in Canada.

Source

DFO hands over fisheries protection along pipelines to the NEB, Northwest Coast Energy News

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.