News Archives - Page 325 of 451

Seeping Alberta Oil Sands Spill Covers 40 Hectares, Still Leaking

Source: ICTMN

As debate rages south of the 49th Parallel over developments such as the Keystone XL pipeline, bitumen from four underground oil spills is quietly seeping into wetlands and soils in the oil sands in northern Alberta—and has been for at least three months, if not longer.

Bitumen leakage now totals at least 1.2 million liters—about 8,024 barrels, or 317,000 gallons, the Alberta Energy Regulator, a provincial agency, said in an August 16 update. And despite claims by the operator, Canadian Natural Resources Limited, that the spills are contained and being remediated, recent provincial statements indicate that that is not the case.

“It’s ongoing. The spill is still ongoing,” said Cara Tobin, a spokesperson for the provincial agency Alberta Energy Regulator, to the website DesmogCanada.com on August 6. “There is still bitumen coming up from the ground.”

The spills at Canadian Natural Resources’ Primrose facility first came to light in mid-July, but they had been ongoing for weeks, and one may even date back to last winter, the Toronto Star reported on July 19. The operations lie on the Cold Lake Air Weapons Range, which is also an active weapons-testing site for the Canadian military and thus restricted to public access.

Documents brought to light by the Star show that 26,000 barrels of bitumen combined with surface water had been removed between May, when cleanup began, and mid-July, when the spills came to light via a television station. More than 4,500 barrels were straight bitumen, the Star reported. The latest update nearly doubles that number.

“Everybody [at the company and in government] is freaking out about this,” said a whistle-blowing government scientist to the newspaper back in July. “We don’t understand what happened. Nobody really understands how to stop it from leaking, or if they do they haven’t put the measures into place.”

The company issued a statement on July 31 saying that it was remediating the spills.

“Each location been secured, clean up, recovery and reclamation activities are well underway,” the company said. “The bitumen emulsion does not pose a risk to health or human safety.”

Nearby Cold Lake First Nation, whose residents are Dene, was of a completely different mind.

“We are extremely alarmed with the environmental damage from the blow out that occurred at Cold Lake Weapons Range as this is in the federally recognized traditional territory of Cold Lake First Nations and close to CLFN Indian Reserve 149C,” said Cold Lake First Nation Chief Bernice Martial in a statement on August 7. “We contacted Canadian Natural Resources Limited (CNRL) to express CLFN’s concerns and we are now demanding answers and want factual information on the contamination of four recent surface releases of bitumen emulsion from oil wells.”

Canadian Natural Resources did admit that “unfortunately some animal fatalities have occurred including 16 birds, 7 small mammals and 38 amphibians. Two beavers, two birds and two muskrats are currently being cared for prior to being returned to their natural environment.”

Critics of the process being used to extract the bitumen suspect that the leaks stem from a method of “steaming” the ground in a process not unlike fracking (hydraulic fracturing of rock that loosens oil and gas deposits in shale). Steaming entails injecting highly pressurized water into the sands to melt the bitumen so that it can be pumped to the surface. Canadian Natural Resources said that its process is not the cause—the company does not use enough pressure to cause that type of leakage, a spokesman told the Star, and blames instead improperly capped wells from other companies’ defunct operations.

The Dene are demanding not only answers but inclusion in the evaluation and cleanup process as well.

“Our community needs to be respectfully involved in the remediation of this environmental disaster as our health and safety hangs in the balance,” Martial said. “We live, hunt, fish in the area and need to know the damage that has been done to our land, water and wildlife.”

Oklahoma governor seeks end to Native American adoption fight

By Heide Brandes, Reuters

(Reuters) – Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin on Wednesday stepped up pressure on the biological father of “Baby Veronica,” a 3-year-old Native American girl caught in a protracted adoption custody battle, warning him to cooperate with the girl’s adoptive parents or face charges for interfering.

After initially declining to sign an extradition warrant for biological father Dusten Brown to face felony charges in South Carolina, where the girl’s adoptive parents live, Fallin warned Brown that if he did not meet the adoptive parents, Matt and Melanie Capobianco, in Oklahoma, she might force him to go to South Carolina.

“Mr. and Mrs. Capobianco deserve an opportunity to meet with their adopted daughter. They also deserve the chance to meet with Mr. Brown and put an end to this conflict,” Fallin said on Wednesday. “If Mr. Brown is unwilling to cooperate with these reasonable expectations, then I will be forced to expedite his extradition request and let the issue be settled in court.”

The case has highlighted overlapping parental claims in two states and the clash between a Native American culture seeking to protect children from being adopted outside their tribes and U.S. legal safeguards for adoptive parents.

Veronica’s birth mother, who is not Native American, arranged the adoption with the Capobiancos before the girl was born. Veronica lived with them after her birth in 2009. Brown intervened in 2010 before the adoption process was final, and a South Carolina family court ordered that Veronica be turned over to Brown in December 2011.

Brown, a member of the Cherokee Nation who was not married to the birth mother, argued that the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 allowed him to have Veronica, who is 3/256th Cherokee.

The law was intended to keep Native American children from being separated from their families.

In June, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the ruling, and the adoption was finalized in South Carolina in July.

But Brown refused to give up Veronica and was arrested on August 12 in Oklahoma on a charge of “custodial interference.”

South Carolina is seeking his extradition.

Veronica is believed to be staying with Brown’s relatives in Oklahoma.

The adoptive parents are in Oklahoma this week to try to visit Veronica and resolve the case. After the couple were denied the opportunity to see her, they called on Brown on Wednesday to meet with them and reach a compromise.

“I look forward to when we can restore our private life with Veronica,” Melanie Capobianco said at a news conference Wednesday in Tulsa, Oklahoma. “We want to ensure a lifelong relationship with her Oklahoma family as well. We want to see a resolution for Veronica.”

Cherokee Nation leaders said on Wednesday that Brown has the right to have his arguments heard in court hearings in Oklahoma and asked that he be allowed his “due process.” Brown is scheduled for a hearing September 12 to contest his warrant.

“We will continue to stand by Dusten and his biological daughter, Veronica, and for what is right,” said Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Bill John Baker.

Troy Dunn, a lawyer who specializes in locating and reuniting birth families and adopted children, joined the Capobiancos in seeking a compromise.

“I think it may be possible to structure an arrangement to allow Veronica to be the most loved girl,” Dunn said. “A resolution can be sculpted if Dusten is willing to participate.”

(Additional reporting by Harriet McLeod in Charleston, South Carolina; Editing by Karen Brooks and Ken Wills)

Crow Tribe introducing new ‘Scout’ currency

By Ed Kemmick; Source: Buffalo Post

The Crow Tribe in Eastern Montana is gearing up to mint sets of copper, silver and gold coins it hopes will slowly replace the dollar as the reservation’s main currency.
Billings Gazette reporter Ed Kemmick has the full story on the “Scout”:

“We’re not looking to trade clams or wampum anymore,” Ceivert LaForge said. “We’re looking at trading gold and silver.”

LaForge, director of the tribe’s LLC Department, which helps people establish small businesses on the reservation, will join with other tribal leaders to introduce the new currency during the grand entry for the Crow Fair powwow Friday night at 7.

LaForge has been working on the project since March with Eddie Allen, director of Sovereign Economics, a Dallas-based business that helps “nations, states, communities and groups around the world” establish their own currencies, according to the company’s website.

The new currency will be introduced gradually, LaForge said, and could eventually be used to pay tribal employees.

Business that have contracts with the tribe could also be asked to accept partial payment in scouts, he said.

One obvious benefit of having a Crow currency would be to encourage tribal members to spend their money on the reservation, LaForge said, which could in turn prompt people to open more small businesses on the reservation.

Allen said the slogan of the Lakota Nation effort to use its own currency is “Keep it on the rez.”

Though the currency is designed to be used on the reservation, Allen said, it could be used by anyone anywhere who finds another person willing to accept it in return for wares or services.

To help finance the launching of the Crow currency, the tribe commissioned the minting of 1,000 silver medallions commemorating the Battle of the Little Bighorn and began selling them during Crow Native Days in June.

Those 1-ounce medallions are not considered currency and are being sold at $50 each, mainly to coin collectors or people with an interest in the Battle of the Little Bighorn, Allen said.

The Photo that Should Not Be

Source: Native News Network

SALLISAW, OKLAHOMA – It was one of those things that should have never happened. Here was an award-winning member of the Oklahoma National Guard who fought for the United States in Iraq getting a mug shot after his arrest for not complying with a South Carolina family court order to turn over his biological daughter, Veronica.

Dusten Brown after his arrest for being Veronica Brown’s father

Here was another American Indian father being penalized for wanting to raise his own child. History is full of American Indian children being taken away. So much so, the US Congress passed the Indian Child Welfare Act in 1978 to allow more tribal input into American Indian adoptions.

Somehow the US Supreme Court decided by a close vote – five to four – that the Indian Child Welfare Act was misapplied by the South Carolina Supreme Court. The US Supreme Court remanded the case back to the South Carolina high court, who basically punted it back to the South Carolina family court.

So, once again an American Indian parent loses in court. Go figure. No, it should have never come to this.

What is more incredible, a warrant was issued in South Carolina because Veronica was not turned over “immediately” as stipulated by the family court in South Carolina. Dusten Brown was at a mandatory training by the Oklahoma National Guard in Johnston, Iowa.

Most legal experts agree, according to Oklahoma state law, Brown has until August 23 to respond to the South Carolina family court.

So, no it should have never come to this – a soldier being arrested for wanting to raise his own daughter. It should have never come to this – another American Indian losing out on the ability to raise his own child.

The mug shot should have never been taken.

But, it was and we choose it as our Photo of the Week as a reminder American Indians still have a long way to go to gain parity in these United States.

The Native News Network’s prayers are with the Dusten Brown, Veronica, and his entire family.

Snohomish County waters still rich with salmon, trout

Dan Bates / The HeraldPhil Flick (left) and Tom Goggin, both of Lynnwood, show four of their seven pink salmon, one shy of their limit, to Jeff Lowery of the Washington State Fish and Wildlife Department after pulling their boat out at Mukilteo last week. — Dan Bates / The Herald
Phil Flick (left) and Tom Goggin, both of Lynnwood, show four of their seven pink salmon, one shy of their limit, to Jeff Lowery of the Washington State Fish and Wildlife Department after pulling their boat out at Mukilteo last week.

Bill Sheets, The Herald

EVERETT — Every odd-numbered year, visitors to local shorelines in late summer are often struck by the sight of an extraordinary number of small boats on the water.

They might also see people standing along the beach with fishing poles in their hands.

It’s pink salmon season.

“Everyone hears the word ‘pink’ and they just want to come out and join the rat race,” fisherman Nigel Anders of Arlington said as he launched his boat in Mukilteo recently.

While some species of salmon and trout are struggling to survive — Puget Sound chinook and steelhead are both listed as threatened under the federal Endangered Species Act — pink salmon and other species are thriving or holding steady.

Every major species of Pacific salmon and trout can still be found in Snohomish County waters — chinook, coho, chum, pink and sockeye salmon, along with rainbow and cutthroat trout. A species of char, called a bull trout, is found here as well.

There’s also a large sturgeon population that visits Port Susan, near Stanwood, according to state fish biologists.

These fish are all anadromous, meaning they travel into streams to spawn, and spend the bulk of their lives in saltwater. The salmon, trout and char are part of the salmonid family.

“We have a lot of fish here and a lot of water,” said Justin Spinelli, a biologist for the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Each river, stream and lake has its own unique, colorful mix of fish. The Snohomish River, for example, is home to one of the largest coho populations on the West Coast, generally exceeded only by the Skagit River and the Columbia, said Mike Crewson, fisheries enhancement biologist for the Tulalip Tribes.

Sockeye salmon — a small, tasty variety — are best known in this area for their large runs in Lake Washington and its tributaries, some of which reach into Snohomish County. Baker Lake in the North Cascades has a large population, as well. But sockeye also are found, at least in small numbers, in most other local rivers, biologists say. A large population of landlocked sockeye, or kokanee, swim in Lake Stevens.

Sockeye turn bright red before spawning, earning them the nickname “red salmon.” Coho salmon are known as “silvers” for their clean, shiny look. Rainbow trout are aptly named, with their scales reflecting a multi-colored hue. Cutthroat trout are named for a red strip that runs along the underside of their heads behind their mouths.

Pink salmon are named for the color of their flesh. The smallest of the Pacific salmon, they’re also called “humpies” because their backs develop a prominent hump before spawning.

What pinks lack in size or flavor compared to other salmon species, they make up in numbers. More than 6 million humpies are forecast to return to rivers in the Puget Sound region this year. That’s well shy of the record of 9.8 million pinks set in 2009, but this year’s run is still on the high side, state wildlife officials say. State records go back to 1959.

Of those expected back this year, nearly 1 million pinks are forecast to head for the Snohomish River to spawn and 400,000 more are forecast to return to the Stillaguamish River. About 1.2 million are expected in the Skagit River

Pinks can be caught both in saltwater and in the rivers. Saltwater and the Snohomish River are open to pink salmon fishing now. The season opens in the Stillaguamish and remaining areas on Sept. 1.

Humpies have a shorter life cycle than other salmon, returning to spawn after two years. While most return in odd-numbered years, some do return in even-numbered, “off” years, Crewson said.

Pinks currently have a combination of advantages working for them over other salmon species, biologists say.

They can spawn in more places, do it more quickly, head straight for saltwater after hatching and spend less time there once they arrive.

This makes them less susceptible to the habitat destruction and changing ocean conditions that can push down survival rates of other species.

Humpies can spawn in the tiniest of streams, Crewson said.

“Pinks can go up anything that’s flowing,” he said.

Juvenile chinook and coho stay in fresh water and grow for up to a year and a half after they’re hatched before heading to sea. Pinks head out in a matter of days, biologists say. That helps pinks avoid the ravages of urban runoff, which can scour and pollute salmon-bearing streams.

In saltwater, the issues are more complex, but survival rates there have been on the decline, biologists say.

Fish depend on upwelling of plankton from the lower reaches of inland waters and the ocean. These organisms form the base of the food chain for salmon and trout.

These upwelling patterns have become more erratic, especially in the Puget Sound basin, biologists say, creating more of a hit-and-miss proposition for the fish.

The causes haven’t been nailed down, but climate change is believed to play a part, Crewson said. More rain and less snow falls in the mountains, creating more flooding. This can affect upwelling along with habitat, he said.

“Changes in stream-flow patterns can alter when plankton blooms happen and when fish go out,” Crewson said

Pink salmon have been hitting the plankton blooms better lately than the other fish, he said.

“An early outmigrating salmon has got an advantage,” Crewson said.

El Nino conditions, in which warmer water moves northward from the central Pacific, also can throw food chains out of whack, he said.

Seals and sea lions also are suspects in falling survival rates for salmon. Populations of the fish-eating mammals have been increasing in the Puget Sound area in recent years.

Trout, like larger salmon, require longer rearing periods in fresh water. Puget Sound-area steelhead — rainbow trout that go to sea — have been having trouble getting there, biologists say.

Some have been planted with electronic tags and can be counted when they run across any of several electronic beams sent across the water along Admiralty Inlet and the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Many are disappearing before they get to these points, biologists say. That means the steelhead aren’t heading out to the Pacific Ocean.

“There’s something drastically wrong when you lose that many fish,” Crewson said. “Our steelhead numbers (in the Snohomish basin) have been way down.”

The other primary trout species in the area, cutthroats, are holding steady, said Brett Barkdull, a state fish biologist based in La Conner.

Some of these trout stay in rivers, while those that venture into saltwater, known as sea-run cutthroat, don’t go as far afield as steelhead, Barkdull said. They tend to stay in bays and estuaries.

The sea-run cutthroats, while smaller than steelhead, are prized by many serious anglers for their fighting ability. They once were overfished, Barkdull said. In 1990, strict limits were placed on their harvest. Those regulations have helped the fish recover, but still in many areas now they are allowed to be caught but not kept, or may be kept only if they’re above a certain size.

Because of those rules, cutthroat trout tend to be overlooked by casual anglers, said John Martinis, owner of John’s Sporting Goods on Broadway in Everett.

“They’re a very, very popular fish among the fly fishermen,” he said.

Fish populations in the Skagit River are generally healthier than in the rivers in Snohomish County and others in urbanized Puget Sound, Barkdull said.

Many of the Skagit’s upstream waters are in North Cascades National Park or national forest land, he noted.

“I think part of that has to do with the fact that a lot of the rearing habitat is protected,” he said.

In general, numbers for all the fish in the Puget Sound region are down from historic levels, Crewson said. Some, like the pinks, are bouncing back, and that’s good news for people who like to fish.

“It’s one of those opportunities where novice anglers as well as experienced anglers can do really, really well,” Martinis said.

Learn more

For more information, visit the state Department of Fish and Wildlife’s information page on salmon and trout at http://tinyurl.com/ozu787a.

Wounded Knee Owner Tells Tribe: Buy or Site Goes on Auction Block

Vincent Schilling, Indian Country Today Media Network

James Czywczynski, the current owner of the Wounded Knee site has told the Oglala Sioux Tribe they have until September 2 to purchase the land. If no one steps forward to purchase the land for the tribe, Czywczynski says he will hold a public auction for the land.

“I feel that I have given the tribe every opportunity to buy the land or for someone associated with them to do it. They say they have multiple buyers ready to purchase it for them, but they have not taken the steps to get it done,” he told Brandon Ecoffey, managing editor of Native Sun News. “When I met with President [Bryan] Brewer and the descendants I thought it went well and something would have come from it… but I have heard nothing.”

That meeting took place at the newspaper’s offices July 14 between the Horn family, Brewer and Czywczynski. It was then that Brewer asked Czywczynski if he would consider selling the site with the tribe’s blessing and donating half the proceeds to the Survivors of Wounded Knee organization.

At the close of the meeting, Czywczynski said he would consider the offer.

Shortly after the meeting in Rapid City Czywczynski told ICTMN he sent an email and packet to the tribe and Brewer asking them to pay the entire $4.9 million asking price if they wanted to obtain the land and the deed.

Czywczynski has also been telling ICTMN that he has had offers from several interested parties that want to donate the land to the tribe, but as of yet, none of those parties have been able to raise all of the money or make good on their promises to buy.

“I have put other potential buyers off while I entertained the groups working on behalf of the tribe, but I can’t wait any longer,” he told Native Sun News.

Brewer doesn’t believe Czywczynski will have any buyers with the arrangement not to donate half of the proceeds to benefit the site. He also says a deadline is nothing new.

“This isn’t the first time he has said this, he set a deadline and we watched and waited and he had no buyers. No buyers are going to purchase this land because they will never be able to use it,” Brewer said.

Brewer also has not received an email or a package from Czywczynski about any counter offer.

“I have received nothing. I have not heard from him other than the letter I received from him that thanked us for having the meeting in Rapid City. I have not received anything else yet,” he said.

Johnny Depp Sighted?

For over a month since his interview in the UK’s DailyMail in which Johnny Depp announced an interest in purchasing the site of Wounded Knee, there is still no word from Depp or his publicists about his comments to buy the land.

There was however a recent rumor about a sighting of Depp on Pine Ridge. President Brewer said it was only a rumor though.

“That was a crazy rumor. There were rumors going all over. There was no Johnny Depp, at least not that I know of. There were rumors he was with me. He wasn’t with me. Every girl on the reservation was calling me to say ‘please give him my telephone number.’ I don’t know who started those rumors, but it spread like wildfire. I have a whole list of numbers I am supposed to give to him,” Brewer said. “It really would be great if he could come to our reservation.”

Tribes form national emergency council

Organization provides ‘united voice’ on efforts

Jonathan Brunt, The Spokesman-Review

A national tribal group with roots in Washington has a new, high-profile leader to help with emergency preparedness.

The association works to help tribes to prepare for floods, fires and other disasters and to make sure other governments work with tribes.

More than 300 people are attending the Northwest Tribal Emergency Management Council annual conference this week at the Northern Quest Resort and Casino. And on Monday, council officials announced they had created a separate organization focused on the whole country that will be led by the recently retired tribal affairs director for the Department of Homeland Security.

“The benefit is a united voice more than anything else,” said Steve Golubic, the new executive director of the National Tribal Emergency Management Council. “If we don’t speak for ourselves, nobody’s going to do it for us.”

Golubic, 63, has agreed to take the position as a volunteer and will work from his home in Wisconsin. The Northwest council is based in Snohomish, Wash. Before working at Homeland Security, he was the national tribal liaison for the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

The Northwest council was formed shortly after 9/11 when the federal government began awarding grants to local and state governments to improve emergency response. But at the time, none of the nearly 30 federally recognized tribes in Washington had emergency management offices, said Lynda Zambrano, executive director of the Northwest council. Today, almost all of the state’s tribes do.

Golubic said tribes often have been neglected by federal, state and local government planning for disasters.

Claude Cox, chairman of the Northwest council, noted that as of this year tribes can go directly to FEMA to request a disaster declaration. Before, they had to work through state governments.

“We’re going to prepare our members to better govern themselves,” said Cox, a member of the Spokane Tribe and police chief for the Sauk-Suiattle Tribe in Darrington, Wash.

Members of the Northwest council include the Spokane, Colville, Kalispel, Coeur d’Alene and Nez Perce tribes.

Blackfeet Tribal Council says energy leases on religious site cancelled

David Murray, Great Falls Tribune

The Blackfeet Tribal Business Council issued a news release Wednesday stating proposed oil and gas leases near Chief Mountain have been canceled. The mountain, located near the Canadian border and on the boundary between the Blackfeet Indian Reservation and Glacier National Park, is considered sacred by many of the Blackfeet people.

“The current proposed leases by Nations Energy, which are the subject of so much misinformation, were canceled on July 24, 2013 due to nonpayment by the company,” the tribal council news release states. “The intention of such leases was to explore an area of the reservation which is at least two miles from Chief Mountain and at least one half mile from the mandated buffer zone.”

The tribal council’s announcement comes three days prior to a planned protest in opposition to oil and gas development at the site. Reports that the council had approved exploration leases at Chief Mountain became public last week after a conservation activist posted lease documents purportedly obtained from the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) on his web site.

Included within those documents is a resolution signed by council chairman Willie Sharp, Jr. and acting council secretary Roger “Sassy” Running Crane reaffirming a prior resolution from January 3, 2013. The resolution approves the mineral lease development of 4,000 acres of tribal land by Nations Energy, LLC, with three wells to be developed within a five year primary term, the first to be drilled within 18-months of the lease signing.

Publication of these documents prompted a petition drive in opposition to the development, which had gathered more than 2,200 signatures by Wednesday afternoon.

The Blackfeet Tribal Business Council’s news release notes that as far back as 1982, nontribal people were prohibited from making incursions into a one mile buffer zone around the base of Chief Mountain, and that this protection was reaffirmed by tribal council action in 1992.

“The Blackfeet Tribal Business Council has always considered Chief Mountain as one of the most sacred sites on the Blackfeet Reservation,” the news release states. “This area was for spiritual use of the Blackfeet people only. This protection continues to this day and nothing has or will disturb this area, including any oil and gas development.”

It continues on to state that even if the agreement with Nations Energy had advanced to the drilling of wells, the tribe would have first had to complete an environmental and cultural resources study to see if the proposed wells would impact any Blackfeet cultural resources.

“However, since the leases no longer exist, this is not an issue,” the news release concludes.

The tribal council goes on reassert its “absolute right to develop its own resources on its own land.”

“The council is clear in its purpose to create a better economic environment for its people who currently suffer some of the highest rates of poverty and unemployment in the United States,” the news release states. “With that responsibility to better the lives of its people, however, comes the absolute mandate to do no harm to the tribe’s cultural sites, traditions and resources, including water. The two duties go hand-in-hand and this council will follow its oath and the Blackfeet Constitution to protect and defend its land and to responsibly develop its many and valuable resources.”

On Fate of Wild Horses, Stars and Indians Spar

By Fernando Santos, New York Times

It seemed at first like a logical alliance for boldface names in the interconnected worlds of Hollywood and politics. Bill Richardson, a former governor of New Mexico, and the actor Robert Redford, a staunch conservationist, joined animal rights groups in a federal lawsuit to block the revival of horse slaughter in the United States, proclaiming that they were “standing with Native American leaders,” to whom horse slaughter “constitutes a violation of tribal cultural values.”

Soon, though, the two men, who recently started a foundation to protect New Mexico’s wildlife, found themselves on a collision course with the Navajo Nation, the country’s largest federally recognized tribe, whose president released a letter to Congress on Aug. 2 asserting his support for horse slaughtering.

Free-roaming horses cost the Navajos $200,000 a year in damage to property and range, said Ben Shelly, the Navajo president. There is a gap between reality and romance when, he said, “outsiders” like Mr. Redford – who counts gunslinger, sheriff’s deputy and horse whisperer among his movie roles – interpret the struggles of American Indians.

“Maybe Robert Redford can come and see what he can do to help us out,” Mr. Shelly said in an interview. “I’m ready to go in the direction to keep the horses alive and give them to somebody else, but right now the best alternative is having some sort of slaughter facility to come and do it.”

The horses, tens of thousands of them, are at the center of a passionate, politicized dispute playing out in court, in Congress and even within tribes across the West about whether federal authorities should sanction their slaughtering to thin the herds. The practice has never been banned, but stopped when money for inspections was cut from the federal budget.

In Navajo territory, parched by years of unrelenting drought and beset by poverty, one feral horse consumes 5 gallons of water and 18 pounds of forage a day – sometimes the water and food a family had bought for itself and its cattle. Read More »

Mexico Now World’s Fattest Nation; President Hopes Stevia Can Save It

Brazil’s Indigenous peoples have sweetened teas with stevia since ancient times. (Flickr/kochtopf)

Source: Indian Country Today Media Network

This year Mexico surpassed America as the world’s fattest nation. According to the U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), 32.8 percent of adults in Mexico are obese and 70 percent are overweight, and roughly a third of the country’s teenagers are overweight, reported The Global Dispatch. Meanwhile, approximately 1 in 6 Mexican adults—or 70,000 people—suffer from weight-related diabetes each year.

Among the reasons for Mexico’s bulging waistline are increases in junk food and fast-food chains combined with a sedentary lifestyle, states a report by the FAO.

The news has spurred Mexico’s new President Pena Nieto to recommend stevia, a natural, zero calorie sugar substitute, as a solution to repair the “collapse in Mexico’s healthcare system” by 2030, reports Suzy Chaffee, 1968 ski racing Olympian and co-founder of the Native American Olympic Team Foundation, for enewschannels.com.

South American tribes discovered the rainforest herb Stevia. The Guarani Indians of Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Bolivia were among the first to enjoy the unique benefits of kaa-he-he, which translates to “sweet herb,” according to stevia.net.

“The rebaudiana extract from Stevia is the only known natural sweetener with zero calories, zero carbohydrates, and a zero glycemic index, which gives you zero fluctuations in blood glucose and zero contributions to any disease,” Olivia (Cherokee), a Master Gardener and Chaffee’s advisor, told Chaffee.

China and Japan have grown and used the most Stevia since the 1970s, and the country’s residents have the lowest rates of diabetes in the world. Chaffee says the countries’ health success likely inspired President Nieto to recommend stevia as a weight loss solution in Mexico.

Read Chaffee’s full article here.