Author: Kim Kalliber

Everything we know about neonic pesticides is awful

By John Upton, Grist

 

bee
Shutterstock
 

Neonicotinoid pesticides are great at killing insect pests, which helps to explain the dramatic rise in their use during the past 20 years. They’re popular because they are systemic pesticides — they don’t just get sprayed onto plant surfaces. They can be applied to seeds, roots, and soil, becoming incorporated into a growing plant, turning it into poison for any bugs that might munch upon it.

But using neonics to control pests is like using a hand grenade to thwart a bank robbery.

Which is why the European Union has banned the use of many of them – and why environmentalists are suing the U.S. EPA to do the same.

The pesticides don’t just affect pest species. Most prominently, they affect bees and butterflies, which are poisoned when they gather pollen and nectar. But neonics’ negative impacts go far beyond pollinators. They kill all manner of animals and affect all kinds of ecosystems. They’re giving rise to Silent Spring 2.0.

“It’s just a matter of time before somebody can point to major species declines that can be linked to these compounds,” said Pierre Mineau, a Canadian pesticide ecotoxicologist. “Bees have been the focus for the last three or four years, but it’s a lot broader than that.”

Mineua contributed to an epic assessment of the ecological impacts of neonics, known as the Worldwide Integrated Assessment, in which 29 scientists jointly examined more than 800 peer-reviewed papers spanning five years. Their findings are being published in installments in the journal Environmental Science and Pollution Research, beginning last week with a paper coauthored by Mineua that details impacts on vertebrate animals, including fish and lizards. Here’s a summary of highlights:

 

Overview

Neonics can remain in the soil for months — sometimes for years. As they break down, they form some compounds that are even more toxic than the original pesticide. Because of these long-lasting ecological impacts, traditional measures of pesticide toxicity fall short of describing the widespread damages caused by neonics. In some cases, neonics can be 10,000 times more toxic to bees than DDT.

Ecosystem impacts

Noenics don’t stay where they are sprayed or applied. They can be found in soils, sedimentation, waterways, groundwater, and plants far away from farms and manicured gardens. They can interfere with a wide range of ecosystem functions, including nutrient cycling, food production, biological pest control, and pollination services. Of course, the animals that are worst affected are those that visit farmlands — and water-dwelling species that live downstream from farms.

Land-dwelling bugs

Everything from ants to earthworms can be affected, absorbing the poisons into their tiny bodies from dust in the air, through tainted water, and directly from plants.

Pollinators

Pollinators, including bees, butterflies, birds, and bats, are “highly vulnerable” to the pesticides. Not only do they drink poisoned nectar and eat poisoned pollen, but they can also be exposed to the pesticides through water and the air. This jeopardizes the ability of plants to reproduce, and the impacts can reverberate through ecosystems.

Aquatic invertebrates

Crabs, snails, and water fleas are among the water-dwelling species that can be exposed to the pesticides through the water in which they live. High concentrations of the pesticides found in waterways have reduced population sizes and diversity. The insecticides can affect the animals’ feeding behavior, growth rates, and movement.

Birds and other animals

Birds eat crop seeds treated with pesticides. Reptile numbers have dropped because the pesticides kill off their insect prey. And fish downstream from farms literally swim in the poison.

Knowledge gaps

Still, despite their prevalence, there’s a scary amount that we don’t know about these insecticides. The toxicity of neonics to most species has never been measured. For example, just four of the 25,000 known species of bees have been subjected to toxicity tests involving the pesticides.

And that’s not all

That’s just the ecosystem impacts of the poisons — the review doesn’t even deal with the effects of these insecticides on farmers or on those who eat farmed goods.

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.

Northwest Tribal Courts Using Cutting Edge Technology to Promote Access to Justice

 

Source: Northwest Intertribal Court System

The Northwest Intertribal Court System (NICS) today launched a powerful online database providing attorneys and the public free access to hundreds of tribal court appellate opinions from thirty Indian tribes in the Pacific Northwest, Alaska, and Northern California.

The new NICS platform features a “Boolean” search engine, hyperlinked subject matter and tribal indexes, U.S.-based technical support, and a mobile application. Until now, the opinions have been available only in print or on CD.

Other legal databases, like Westlaw and LexisNexis, charge a substantial fee for similar services. NICS can provide its database for free, in part because of grants from the charitable funds of the Tulalip, Muckleshoot, and Shoalwater Bay Indian Tribes, and ongoing support from NICS’ other member tribes.

“Publishing these appellate court opinions online with a powerful search engine and making it available for free puts NICS and the many tribes participating in this project on the cutting edge of using technology to promote access to justice,” said Michael Rossotto, the NICS Appellate Department Director. “While federal, state and many tribal courts publish their decisions online, we are not aware of any other court system, federal, state or tribal, that offers online access to its decisions with all of the features we are offering free of charge,” said Rossotto.

Formed in 1979, the Northwest Intertribal Court System (NICS) is a consortium of Indian tribes that have joined their resources to ensure that each tribe is able to have its own court by sharing judges, prosecutors, and court-related services. The database represents a new and important chapter in the development of tribal justice systems and demonstrates NICS’ dedication to its member tribes.

The new NICS database will support its member courts by increasing efficiency, promoting access, bolstering tribal court credibility, and demonstrating the inherent sovereignty of the tribal governments, tribal officials said.

“Published appellate decisions are a testimony of tribal sovereignty and our inherent right to govern our affairs according to Shoalwater Bay Tribal laws and customs,” said Lynn Clark, Court Administrator for the Shoalwater Bay Tribe. “It promotes the Tribal Court’s professional credibility and shares appellate judgments and precedents in tribal laws.”

Pro se litigants will especially benefit from the new system. For the first time, tribal members who represent themselves in the tribal courts administered by NICS can tap into the collective wisdom of hundreds of tribal court jurists with a free and easy-to-use online database. Legal scholars, judges, and tribal law practitioners throughout the U.S. will also benefit from being able to access and research this rich resource, which now spans over 27 years of court decisions and will be continually updated as new opinions are issued by NICS-administered courts.

“Making our Court of Appeals’ opinions available online will better enable our tribal members to represent themselves,” said Muckleshoot Tribal Council Chair Virginia Cross. “It should also reduce costs for those who are able to afford a spokesperson or attorney, and will reduce the overall cost of administering our justice system by making legal research quicker, easier and more effective.”

“The Tulalip Tribes have for many years published the opinions of our Court of Appeals with NICS, the Indian Law Reporter, and Westlaw. Making these opinions available and researchable for free through the NICS website is yet another example of Tulalip’s exercise of its sovereign authority and its leadership in implementing the federal Tribal Law and Order Act and Violence Against Women Act,” added Herman Williams, Chairman of the Tulalip Tribes.

NICS’ tribal court appellate opinions, previously compiled in books known as “appellate reporters,” are published online by Code Publishing Company, Inc., of Seattle, Washington.  NICS is also taking pre-orders for a library-quality bound reprint edition of the entire series of reporters.  To access the NICS Tribal Court Appellate Opinions database, view a list of the participating tribes, or order the library-quality print edition, visit NICS on the web at: www.nics.ws.

About the Northwest Intertribal Court System

NICS’ mission is to assist its member tribes, at their direction, in a manner that recognizes the sovereignty, individual character, and traditions of those tribes in the development of tribal courts that provide fair, equitable, and uniform justice for all who come within their jurisdiction. NICS promotes tribal sovereignty through the administration of professional, efficient and unbiased courts that provide a forum for the peaceful and fair resolution of disputes. NICS was formed in the late 1970s in direct response to the requirement of the “Boldt decision” that a tribe needed to have a comprehensive scheme for enforcing its fishing regulations before the federal court would give final authorization for a tribe to regulate its own fisheries free from interference by the State of Washington. As the federal government returned to a policy of promoting tribal self-governance during this period and tribal governments began to reassert their sovereignty and pass tribal ordinances in many areas besides fishing, NICS-administered tribal courts quickly grew from hearing fishing disputes to being courts with broad jurisdiction under the laws of their tribes. In 2002, NICS was recognized by Harvard University as one of the top 100 programs in its annual Innovations in American Government Awards competition. Many of the original NICS member tribes now administer their own courts, while NICS now provides services to numerous non-member tribes on a fee-for-service basis. NICS’ current member tribes include the Chehalis, Muckleshoot, Port Gamble S’Klallam, Sauk-Suiattle, Shoalwater Bay, and Tulalip Tribes. For more information, visit www.nics.ws.

About the Tulalip Tribes

The Tulalip Tribes are the successors in interest to the Snohomish, Snoqualmie, Skykomish and other tribes and bands signatory to the 1855 Treaty of Point Elliott.  The 22,000-acre Tulalip Indian Reservation is located north of Seattle in Snohomish County, Washington. Tribal government provides membership with health and dental clinics, family and senior housing, human services, utilities, police and courts, childcare, and higher education assistance. The Tribe maintains extensive environmental preservation and restoration programs to protect the Snohomish region’s rich natural resources, which includes marine waters, tidelands, fresh water rivers and lakes, wetlands and forests both on and off the reservation. Developable land and an economic development zone along the I-5 corridor provide revenue for tribal services. This economic development is managed through Quil Ceda Village, the first tribally chartered city in the United States, providing significant contributions and benefits tribal members and the surrounding communities. The Tribes have approximately 4,400 members. For more information, visit www.tulaliptribes-nsn.gov.

About the Muckleshoot Tribe

The Muckleshoot Indian Tribe is a federally recognized Indian tribe whose membership is composed of descendants of the Duwamish and Upper Puyallup people who inhabited Central Puget Sound for thousands of years before non-Indian settlement.  The Tribe’s name is derived from the native name for the prairie on which the Muckleshoot Reservation was established.  Following the Reservation’s establishment in 1857, the Tribe and its members came to be known as Muckleshoot, rather than by the historic tribal names of their Duwamish and Upper Puyallup ancestors.  Today, the United States recognizes the Muckleshoot Tribe as a tribal successor to the Duwamish and Upper Puyallup bands from which the Tribe’s membership descends.  For more information, visit the Muckleshoot Tribe at www.muckleshoot.nsn.us/.

About the Shoalwater Bay Tribe

The mission of the Shoalwater Bay Tribe is to become self-sufficient and provide for the spiritual, social, economic and physical health of tribal members, while honoring traditions of the past and leaving a responsible legacy for future generations. The Shoalwater Bay Indian Reservation is located on the shores of Willapa Bay in southwestern Washington at the southern end of the Tribe’s ancestral homeland. The Tribe draws its membership from the Lower Chehalis, Shoalwater Bay, and Chinookan peoples. A small but strong tribe, the Shoalwater Bay Tribe is deeply connected to its history, and works hard to preserve its language and culture. Meanwhile, the Tribe also strives to grow its reservation economy, which includes the Shoalwater Bay Casino, a tribally chartered construction firm called Willapa Bay Construction, LLC, and a number of other tribal enterprises. The Tribe is especially dedicated to improving the health and lifestyles of its members while also increasing awareness of Shoalwater Bay Tribe culture and expanding the Tribe’s influence. For more information, visit

www.shoalwaterbay-nsn.gov/.

About Code Publishing Company

Code Publishing Company (CPC) is an innovative, full-service publishing company.  CPC offers codification and electronic publishing services to help its customers keep pace with the information age. CPC uses the latest technology to provide customers with high quality print publications along with an electronic version of all documents published. CPC provides print on-demand services, Internet/Intranet access services, and technical and legal editing services and data conversion to a variety of organizations and Indian tribes. Visit CPC on the web at www.codepublishing.com.

Instagram Idiocy for Pocahotties: Redskins Cheerleaders Shamed

source: instagram.com/1stladiesoffbThe above graphic, created in 2012 to celebrate 50 years of Redskins cheerleaders, showed up on the squad's Instagram page yesterday.
source: instagram.com/1stladiesoffb
The above graphic, created in 2012 to celebrate 50 years of Redskins cheerleaders, showed up on the squad’s Instagram page yesterday.

 

Source: Indian Country Today

 

Not content to let Daniel Snyder’s office hog all the screwups, the Washington Redskins Cheerleaders have pulled their own social-media blunder by posting to Instagram pictures of the sexualized faux-Indian getups that their ancestors wore in the 1960s.

These were the uniforms of the “Redskinettes,” a trademark that was one of the six that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office declined to renew last week — on grounds that the terms and imagery were considered “disparaging to Native Americans.” (“Redskinettes” has been out of use for some time — the cheerleaders are now called the “First Ladies of Football.”)

Given current events, the optics, as they say, are bad. The team continue to host a clinic in, as they say, not getting the memo.

There was a memo, wasn’t there? A memo summarizing a meeting of some sort, with slideshow presentations and perhaps a list of topics to avoid? When your sales pitch, to a public that is buying it less every day, is that your team name “honors” Native Americans, everyone at the organization should be on the same page. Here’s what that looks like:

Hey gang, let’s not do any of these:

Let’s not reference racist team owner George Preston Marshall. He is just not doing us any favors at this point (nor is that darn Nazi picture!!!) so let’s pretend he never existed. And that stadium deck named after him? Let’s come up with a new name.

Let’s never use the word Redskins to refer to the people in question. See, the Redskins are the team, and the team is a tribute to the people, but the people are not Redskins. In fact, let’s also avoid calling them Native Americans or American Indians, because that sort of demonstrates that there are other names they prefer. We’re just going to go with “Original Americans” because it’s none of the above. Got it? Original Americans.

Let’s not take our case to Twitter, which is teeming with clever people who will run circles around our fans, who try to win arguments by saying “HTTR!” a lot.

Let’s not use the old “but they’re doing it” excuse — especially if the “they” is a high school football team in Ohio. Remember, we’re in the big league now, we need to act like it. That’s not a metaphor — we really are in the big league.

Let’s not suggest that we aren’t changing our team name out of stubbornness. There’s a bad history in America of people holding onto things out of stubbornness (segregation, etc.) and we don’t want to be part of that. Got it? We are not stubborn. Never say “NEVER.” And please, please do not put it in caps.

Let’s not use the following words: Tradition, history, culture. Of course, we think there’s a lot of all three in our 92 years of pro football existence, but some people take a longer view. Some people, you tell them “We are proud of our history,” and they think you’re talking about really old stuff. You end up in an argument about whose history is older than whose, and there is really no point to that.

Let’s not suggest that we aren’t changing our team name because we have good lawyers. Legal department, please take note. 

Let’s not appear to be sneakily buying off some of the people in question.

Let’s not appear to be using the elderly as props.

Let’s not draw any attention to Chief Zee, cartoony old posters and game-day programs, or the sexy Pocahottie-style Redskinettes. We know all of these things  honor the people in question — the problem is, the people in question don’t know it. They see a picture of, say, a hot young non-Original American girl in a fringed miniskirt, wearing her hair in braids, with a feather sticking up, arms crossed like in the old movies — they just don’t get it. They don’t get that they’re being honored. So let’s just not draw attention to this sort of honoring. It is not being appreciated.

HTTR!

— end memo —

By the way, this is the second time that the Pocahottie Redskinettes outfits have shown up in the First Ladies of Football’s Instagram feed. In April, they posted a version of this 1962 photo:

 

Read more at http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2014/06/25/pocahottie-pride-redskins-cheerleaders-arent-getting-memo-either-155480

Scientists Release Landmark Worldwide Assessment Detailing Effects Of Bee-Killing Pesticides

Neonicotinoids threaten “heart of a functioning ecosystem,” says report co-author

 

bees2

By Brandon Baker, Mint Press News

The Worldwide Integrated Assessment (WIA), issued by the Task Force on Systemic Pesticides, documents significant damage to bees and the environment stemming from the wide-spread use of neonicotinoid pesticides (neonics). The report stresses that even at very low levels, neonics and the products resulting from their breakdown in the environment are persistent and harmful, and suggests that the current regulatory system has failed to grasp the full range of impacts from these pesticides. The authors analyzed more than 800 peer-reviewed publications before coming to their consensus.

The report will appear in a forthcoming issue of the journal Environmental Science and Pollution Research and will be released at events in Brussels, Manila, Montreal and Tokyo over the next two days.

“This report should be a final wake up call for American regulators who have been slow to respond to the science,” said Emily Marquez, PhD, staff scientist at Pesticide Action Network North America. “The weight of the evidence showing harm to bees and other pollinators should move EPA [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency] to restrict neonicotinoids sooner than later. And the same regulatory loopholes that allowed these pesticides to be brought to the market in the first place—and remain on the shelf—need to be closed.”

“The science clearly shows that, not only are these systemic pesticides lethal to pollinators, but even low doses can disrupt critical brain functions and reduce their immunity to common pathogens,” said Nichelle Harriott, staff scientist at Beyond Pesticides.

Neonics, as described by the Center for Food Safety, are a newer class of systemic insecticides that are absorbed by plants and transported throughout the plant’s vascular tissue, making the plant potentially toxic to insects. Imidacloprid (Bayer)—followed by clothianidin (Bayer), thiamethoxam (Syngenta) and dinotefuran—first came into heavy use in the mid-2000s. At about the same time, beekeepers started observing widespread cases of population losses—episodes that lead to the coining of the term “colony collapse disorder.”

Over the past few years numerous studies and reports, as well as advocacy groups and beekeepers, have called on the EPA to suspend the use of neonicotinoids, even filing lawsuits and circulating legal petitions against the agency. The EPA has continually stalled and indicated that a review of the pesticides will not be completed until 2018. Meanwhile, the European Commission instituted a continent-wide, two-year ban on neonicotinoids that began Dec. 1, 2013.

“To save our invaluable pollinators, EPA, USDA [U.S. Department of Agriculture] and all Federal agencies must read this report and immediately implement regulatory remedies against the ongoing neonicotinoid disaster,” said Doug Gurian-Sherman, PhD, senior scientist for Center for Food Safety. “We know from recent studies that neonicotinoid seed treatments are generally not improving yields or even keeping common pests at bay. They aren’t serving farmers and they certainly aren’t serving pollinators. It is time to address this common route of exposure.”

The report looks beyond the harmful affects on bees, noting the far-reaching impacts of neonics on entire ecosystems, including contamination of soil and water, as well similar effects being displayed in butterflies and other pollinators.

Since 2006, beekeepers in the U.S. have been losing, on average, more than 30 percent of their bees each year, with commercial productions losing upwards of 50 percent. Last month, the USDA reported that honeybees in the U.S. are dying at a rate too high to ensure their long-term survival.

“The report lends credence to what beekeepers have been saying for several years,” said Jeff Anderson, beekeeper and owner of California-Minnesota Honey Farms. “Our country depends on bees for crop pollination and honey production. It’s high time regulators realize that applying toxins to plants makes them toxic to bees.”

Behind the Scenes with Longmire Advisor Marcus Red Thunder

marcus red thunder

 

By Toyacoyah Brown, powwows.com

Are you a Longmire Fan? In case you’re not familiar with the show, Longmire is an A&E drama television series based on the “Walt Longmire” series of mystery novels written by author Craig Johnson.

One of the characters in the Longmire world is Henry Standing Bear, a Cheyenne man who is Walt Longmire’s best friend and confidant. As it turns out, Henry Standing Bear was based on author Craig Johnson’s real life friend, Marcus Red Thunder. The creators of the show turned to the Red Thunder when they needed a technical advisor to make sure they got all the Native details perfect.

In the video below you can see his contributions to the episode “Miss Cheyenne”.

 

 

In the “Miss Cheyenne” episode that aired Monday night the lead character Walt Longmire juggles a murder investigation and his duties as a fill-in judge for the Miss Cheyenne Pageant.

If you didn’t catch it, you can watch the full episode of Miss Cheyenne on A&E: http://www.aetv.com/longmire/video/miss-cheyenne

Longmire airs Monday nights at 10pm Eastern / 9pm Central on the A&E cable network.

NCAI, Former FCC Commissioners Call on FedEx to Cut Ties With ‘Redskins’

Flickr.comFedEx Field in Landover, Maryland
Flickr.com
FedEx Field in Landover, Maryland

 

Simon Moya-Smith, Indian Country Today

 

On Tuesday, the National Congress of American Indians sent a letter to FedEx CEO Fredrick W. Smith encouraging him to dissolve his company’s relationship with the Washington Redskins on the grounds that the team name is pejorative and that by using it the team continues to honor the legacy of a segregationist.

“We are asking for you to help us stop Washington’s NFL football team from using FedEx’s name to endorse a dictionary-defined racial slur and promoting the legacy of the infamous segregationist who decided to use this slur to brand the team,” the letter reads. “At FedEx field, your company is allowing its iconic brand to be used as a platform to promote the R-word – a racist epithet that was screamed at Native Americans as they were dragged at gunpoint off their lands.”,

The “infamous segregationist” mentioned in the letter is former team owner George Preston Marshall, who is remembered for his long refusal to include African Americans on his team’s roster. The lower level of FedEx field is named for Mr. Marshall.

The letter, signed by representatives of the Oneida Indian Nation and United Church of Christ, was sent to Smith after the U.S. patent office declared last week the team name is “disparaging to Native Americans” and cancelled six of its federally protected trademarks.

Following that landmark decision, individual Native Americans and former Federal Communication Commission officials are again calling on the FCC to reconsider the use of the name during broadcasts.

In a letter sent to Snyder earlier this year, former FCC Chairman Reed Hundt, former Commissioners Jonathan Adelstein and Nicholas Johnson argue that an indecency case could be made against broadcasters who air the disparaging word on the air, Politico reported.

“It is impermissible under law that the FCC would condone, or that broadcasters would use, obscene pornographic language on live television,” the letter, obtained by Politico, reads. “This medium uses government owned airwaves in exchange for an understanding that it will promote the public interest. Similarly, it is inappropriate for broadcasters to use racial epithets as part of normal, everyday reporting.”

Hundt spoke to Indian Country Today Media Network and said that the FCC should reevaluate whether or not Snyder is “fit” to have licenses from the FCC. By “fit,” Hundt said he means “a person of appropriate character.”

“The FCC should consider whether Mr. Snyder is fit to own radio station licenses given that he uses radio stations to broadcast an ethnic slur,” he said. “These licenses are owned by the public and they are given to individuals for the purpose of serving the public interest. The FCC does not give radio station licenses to felons; it doesn’t give radio station licenses to people of bad character. Historically, [the FCC] has been reluctant to give broadcast licenses to people who advocate racially intolerant positions.”

Hundt added that it’ll take financial pressure for Snyder to change the team name and that Native Americans should petition the FCC to reconsider the use of the slur on broadcast radio and television.

“Unfortunately the team owner has been completely deaf to the public opinion – that he should get a new name for the team,” he said. “And the only way to get the team renamed is to inflict economic impact on Mr. Snyder. This is sad, but true. Therefore it’s a very good idea to ask that [FedEx] publically state that they don’t want their name on the stadium, associated with this derogatory racial slur. Only if money talks will [Snyder] walk away from the name.”

Native Americans have already begun efforts against FedEx’s association with Snyder and the Washington team.

Jacqueline Keeler, Navajo and Yankton Dakota writer and activist, launched a campaign on Change.org to encourage consumers to boycott FedEx until Smith divests from the team. The petition – aptly titled, “Pledge to Stop Using FedEx While They Still Quietly Support Washington ‘Redskins’ Shameful Mascot” – asks individuals not to patronize FedEx while it remains associated with the team.

“The idea that a company as large and ubiquitous as FedEx could support an overt slur of Native people and not experience any negative side effects shows how marginalized Native people are in this country,” Keeler wrote in a message to ICTMN. “This company would never become part owner in a team that bore the name of an offensive ethnic slur of any other group in this country.”

Smith, who is a shareholder of the Washington team, told CNBC host Kelly Evans that he doesn’t have a dog in the fight and was mum when asked if Snyder should change the team name.

“Well, first of all, let me answer that question from the standpoint of FedEx, which sponsors FedEx Field,” Smith said, according to USA TODAY. “We have a long-standing contract with Washington Football, Inc. The Redskins play at FedEx Field, but there are many, many other events there — the Rolling Stones, Notre Dame, Army and Navy football, Kenny Chesney. So that’s our sponsorship, and we really don’t have any dog in this issue from a standpoint of FedEx. From a personal standpoint, I’m a shareowner in the Redskins football team, but Mr. Snyder – who’s the majority owner – and the Redskins speak for the franchise,” he said.

 

Read more at http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2014/06/27/ncai-former-fcc-commissioners-call-fedex-cut-ties-redskins-155520?page=0%2C1

Tsilhqot’in Nation welcomes recognition of full aboriginal title for the first time in Canadian history

Photo from http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/brent-patterson/2013/11/council-canadians-supports-tsilhqotin-nation-supreme-court
Photo from http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/brent-patterson/2013/11/council-canadians-supports-tsilhqotin-nation-supreme-court

 

By Tsilhqot’in Nation, June 26, 2014. Source: Intercontinental Cry

The Tsilhqot’in Nation welcomes the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision overruling the BC Court of Appeal’s judgment on Aboriginal title. The Supreme Court of Canada upheld the 2007 ruling of the BC Supreme Court and declared Aboriginal title to approximately 2000 km2 in the heart of the Tsilhqot’in homeland, in the Cariboo-Chilcotin region of British Columbia.

The Supreme Court of Canada’s ruling ends a long history of denial and sets the stage of recognition of Aboriginal title in its full form. Rejecting the BC Court of Appeal’s impoverished view of title as specific, intensely used sites is a step towards true and lasting reconciliation for all First Nations. The Tsilhqot’in Nation has worked tirelessly with many organizations to make this a reality.

“We take this time to join hands and celebrate a new relationship with Canada. We are reminded of our elders who are no longer with us. First and foremost we need to say sechanalyagh (thank you) to our Tsilhqot’in Elders, many of whom testified courageously in the courts. We are completing this journey for them and our youth. Our strength comes from those who surround us, those who celebrate with us, those who drum with us” said Plaintiff, Chief Roger William of Xeni Gwet’in.

Xeni Gwet’in Chief William states, “First Nations across this country have taken legal action, entered into treaty, practiced their language and demonstrated use of the land and through this they have supported us – we thank you. Non-First Nation organizations and First Nation organizations are adamant in helping us and we are grateful. We are especially grateful for the support we received from our neighbors, the non-Aboriginal residents and businesses in the title area, who intervened before the Supreme Court of Canada to say that they welcomed a declaration of Aboriginal title. These organizations have been interveners and in general support – sechanalyagh.”

“Under our own laws and teachings there is no question that these are our lands. This is the end of denying rights and title. We met the legal test in 2007 and that should have been the end of it. This decision will bring much needed certainty for First Nations, government and industry. This case is about us regaining our independence – to be able to govern our own Nation and rely on the natural resources of our land. We are ready to move forward in this new relationship with government and industry. That work starts today” said Chief Joe Alphonse, Tl’etinqox Government, Tsilhqot’in National Government Tribal Chairman.

Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, President of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs stated “amazing, absolutely amazing! Thank you Tsilhqot’in for your courageous leadership, temerity and relentless tenacity! The Supreme Court of Canada completely repudiated the greatly impoverished and highly prejudicial positions of the BC and Federal governments which formed the basis of the BC Court of Appeal decision. As parties supporting the Tsilhqot’in in this case, we worked collectively to ensure the Supreme Court of Canada would understand that recognizing Indigenous Title and Rights do not diminish Canadian society, it enriches it. Let us celebrate this momentous and historical victory!”

BCAFN Regional Chief Jody Wilson-Raybould stated, “This decision is a game changer. The court has clearly sent a message that the Crown must take Aboriginal title seriously and reconcile with First Nations honourably.” She continued, “The decision is an opportunity to truly settle, once and for all, the land question in BC – where our Nations are not simply making claims to the Crown under an outdated federal policy but where there must be true reconciliation based on recognition and where the outcome of negotiations is certain. On behalf of the First Nations in British Columbia, heartfelt congratulations to the Tsilhqot’in people.”

This decision needs to be acknowledged as a positive step forward in reconciliation between the government and First Nations. Resolving Aboriginal title reduces conflict, creates the opportunity for respectful relations and ends an era of denial. We stand in solidarity with all other First Nations and Indigenous people globally in the necessity of resolving land claims and moving forward.