Those interested in helping Seattle’s homeless Native population can now do so by picking up a limited-edition, signed poster by Nooksack artist Louie Gong.
Proceeds from the posters, which are on sale at KessInHouse.com for $25 each, benefit Chief Seattle Club, an organization that provides food, services “a sacred space to nurture, affirm and renew the spirit of urban Native peoples.” The poster design is Gong’s “good morning” pattern, which features a pair of hummingbirds and a coffee cup that repeat seamlessly. (The pattern is currently the main motif of Gong’s new housewares line, and is featured on blankets, pillows, and shower curtains — check them out at eighthgeneration.com/collections/housewares.)
‘Good morning’ poster by Louie Gong
The 24″x36″ posters have been produced in a limited edition of 200, and each will be signed by Gong.
EVERETT – Drivers who use southbound State Route 529 to travel between Marysville and Everett should plan for nightly closures of the highway this week.
The southbound lanes of the SR 529 Snohomish River Bridge will be closed as contractor crews working for the Washington State Department of Transportation continue replacing the heavy pieces of machinery that operate the southbound drawspan.
The bridge will be closed nightly from 8 p.m. to 4 a.m. Monday, Sept. 16, through the morning of Friday, Sept. 20. Southbound drivers will be detoured to I-5 in Marysville.
Crews are replacing four steel axles, wheels and dozens of counterweight cables on the southbound lift span. The lift mechanisms are showing signs of wear and fatigue after years of raising and lowering 250 tons of counterweight with each drawspan opening.
ISABELLA INDIAN RESERVATION – The Saginaw Chippewa Tribe’s Environmental Department is pleased to announce the release of a book entitled, “Manoomini-miikaans –The Wild Rice Road.”
The informative book was created in a way that provides respect for natural resources, such as wild rice and a connection to Mother Earth through the Anishinaabe language.
The book is filled with fun games and activities for all ages and tells of two children on their way to an annual traditional rice camp on the Saginaw Bay.
Funding for the book came from the US Environmental Protection Agency, Clean Water Act, Section 106 and Great Lakes Restoration Initiative Funding. The Tribe’s Environmental team collaborated with other departments such as Anishinaabe Language Revitalization, Tribal Observer Graphic Designer, students and teachers from the Saginaw Chippewa Academy and Ziibwing’s Center for cultural and language correctness.
“I’m very proud of our internal departments who came together to produce the book. Wild rice as always been one of our traditional foods and is making a big comeback to the Saganing Bay area with the help our Environmental Team,”
stated Saginaw Chippewa Tribal Chief Dennis Kequom, Sr.
The Tribe will be distributing 10,000 copies of the book to local schools as a supplement to language curriculums, as well as libraries, conservation groups and educational organizations. If you would like to request copies, please call the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe’s Environmental Department at 989.775.4014.
The Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe of Michigan is based on the Isabella Indian Reservation in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan.
Much of the battle over transgenic crops has occurred in the realm of science fiction. There, entirely hypothetical health risks square off against visions of wondrous but imaginary benefits. This isn’t nearly as ridiculous as it sounds: To decide which technologies to pursue and which to avoid, modern Jules Vernes need to dream up best and worst-case scenarios.
The problem is, the debate tends to get stuck in the future. We’ve had transgenic plants for nearly two decades, which is enough time to fairly ask, who has actually benefited from genetically modified crops? We’ve had these plants long enough now that we don’t have to look to fantastic visions of the future; we can simply look at the reality.
In search of reality, I began emailing economists, lawyers, and advocates to ask them this question. The first to answer was Andrew Kimbrell, executive director of the Center for Food Safety. Kimbrell said the companies that bet on GM technology have been its greatest beneficiaries. “The chemical companies, right? The big five: Monsanto, DuPont, Dow, Bayer, and Syngenta … No. 2 would be farmers, specifically big farmers, because it makes their herbicide application a lot easier.”
Farmers pay more to buy the GM seed, and more for the herbicides to treat herbicide-resistant crops, but they save on labor costs. Rather than meticulously spritzing individual weeds by hand to avoid killing the crop, farmers can quickly spray an entire field when using herbicide-resistant plants, Kimbrell said.
Beneficiary No. 3? There is none, according to Kimbrell. “These companies have completely failed, in over 30 years, to come up with a trait that benefits a consumer. Nobody gets up in the morning wanting to buy a genetically engineered food.”
I could think of exceptions: Papaya genetically engineered to resist ringspot virus is more appealing to many consumers than diseased fruit. But these are exceptions that prove the rule; the vast majority of transgenic plants are designed to make farmers, rather than eaters, happy.
What about price? I asked Kimbrell. Do we eaters see lower prices because of genetic modification?
“No. There are no lower prices. GMOs have not lowered prices at all. They have massively increased prices for seed.”
Indeed, seed prices bumped up with the introduction of genetically modified varieties.
What about GM crops lifting small farmers out of poverty? Kimbrell scoffed at that. “Smallholders can’t afford to buy [the herbicides] RoundUp and 2,4-D,” he said.
Ask people on opposite sides of this issue if genetic modification benefits the poor and you’ll hear wildly different claims. Kimbrell’s point is that GM crops are designed to save farmers time and money if they are involved in high-tech agriculture. Vandana Shiva, an environmental activist and longtime critic of industrial agriculture, has pointed to cases in which small farmers in India have killed themselves when the debt they’ve taken on to buy seed, fertilizer, and pesticides grows too crushing.
On the other hand, biotech industry consultant Clive James maintains that GM crops are a ladder to prosperity. James has calculated that in 2012, for the first time, farmers in the developing world planted more GM seed than farmers in industrialized nations. These farmers must have a reason for seeking out transgenics.
As usual in this debate, I find myself stranded between irreconcilable claims. But fortunately, it turns out there’s a large body of economic analyses that have asked precisely the same question I have: Who has benefited?
One of the people I’d emailed, UC Berkeley agricultural economist David Zilberman, sent me a short note from the Ivory Coast suggesting that the benefits of GE food are widespread:
“The seed companies captured less than 50 percent of the economic gains in most studies (frequently less than 30 percent),” he wrote. “The rest [is] distributed between farmers and consumers.”
The studies Zilberman consulted on this question have found that the biotech industry captures between 10 and 70 percent of the money generated by their transgenic seeds. The rest of the benefit (30 to 90 percent) is shared by U.S. farmers, U.S. eaters, and the rest of the world. That’s a huge range, but it’s interesting that every study examining this issue has found that consumers do benefit from food prices. It may not be much — less than 2 percent is the estimate at the lower end — but the average Joe and Jane are probably getting some extra change thanks to GMOs.
During the first decade of their use by smallholder farmers in developing economies, peer-reviewed research has indicated that, on average, transgenic crops do provide economic advantages for adopting farmers.
Makhathini Flats.
But hold on: That average hides all sorts of highs and lows. I love this review, done by the International Food Policy Research Institute, because the authors carefully noted the problems with each analysis. For instance one study, following the introduction of GM cotton to the Makhathini Flats in South Africa, found that small farmers were major beneficiaries of the technology. But another, more thorough, analysis suggested something more complex: Small farmers had made a little more money with the transgenic cotton, but only because the Vunisa Cotton company had set them up for success.
Vunisa pitched the transgenic seed to farmers; supplied them with pesticides, fertilizer, loans, and advisors; and then bought up all their cotton. Farmers are vulnerable when they can only buy from, and sell to, one company. That company can ratchet up the cost of seed, while ratcheting down the amount it pays for cotton. So in the Makhathini Flats, farmers were making a little more money — at least for the first few years — but they were also in a much more precarious position.
And this example is part of a theme. In general, GM crops do seem to give small farmers an economic boost, but the studies rarely look at the bigger political and economic tradeoffs those farmers are making. Those tradeoffs do sometimes have dire consequences — like farmer suicide.
But it doesn’t look like the introduction of GM crops is responsible for a large percentage of those deaths. Check out this graph from Nature:
The sad fact is that a lot of farmers kill themselves in India. The numbers didn’t budge significantly with the introduction of GM plants. There are, however, many well-documented cases in which debt — in part from the purchase of GM seeds — drove farmers to suicide. That’s absolutely true. It’s more accurate to say that suicides are caused by the bigger economic monster: The system that requires farmers to take on extravagant debt to compete.
A small farmer who owns his land and saves his seeds each year is relatively independent. A farmer who must take out loans to buy GM seeds, fertilizer, irrigation equipment, and pesticides is beholden and making a riskier (though also potentially more lucrative) bet. For each technological innovation, farmers trade some of their independence for a shot at greater profit. Perhaps it’s fair to say GM seeds are a synecdoche — a part that represents the whole — for the larger system that’s causing farmer suicide in India, especially in those areas where the only seed available to farmers is genetically modified.
So who has made money from GM technology? Seed and chemical companies, for sure. Big farmers, too. Little farmers have gained less, and have had to trade away more privileges. And the rest of us probably pay a little less for GMO food (industrial meat, for example). And all of this is a little fuzzy, because economics is an inexact science, and the studies are still coming in.
The question of who benefits goes beyond money, of course. We also need to look at the environment: Some see GM crops as an environmental savior, while other say they are a disaster. I’m going to make my usual kamikaze run into this minefield to see if there’s any way to reconcile the evidence each side presents.
Before I do that, though, I’m going to talk to some farmers and learn what the pluses and minuses look like from their perspective. Do farmers feel they are trading away intangibles for each new technological advancement?
On Friday, ICTMN published an essay, “Fun Racism Quiz: Would NFL Have a Team Called Washington Blackskins?”, and provocative image by Gerard Miller that he had published some time ago, as a college undergraduate. Miller, an African American, said that the piece had convinced some of his fellow students — ones who didn’t care about the controversy over the Redskins football team name — that it was an issue they should care about.
The image is a strong one, and it inspired strong reactions from many of our Facebook followers, as well as debate in a comment thread that has now stretched to over 500 entries. There are many insightful comments in the thread—and many that aren’t insightful.
Wayde Sid McCloud contributed one of the first responses, and to some extent hit the nail on the head: “When the African American cries racism, America has your back 100%. When Native Americans talk about racism towards them, it’s ignored!”
He may be exaggerating with “has your back 100%” but it’s safe to say that America has developed pretty good radar when it comes to racist images and words directed at African Americans. The Blackskins image is obviously racist. Nobody could argue that it is a “tribute” to African Americans. Through perseverance, the black community has largely succeeded in educating the rest of America about what images and words are disrespectful and harmful—but, unfortunately, Native Americans haven’t gotten to that stage. When Natives call out an image as racist, they are often challenged. Everything from “It’s a tribute” to “You’re just being politically correct” to “It’s a tradition—get over it.” Would anyone advance those same arguments to a black person who was (rightfully) offended by the Blackskins image?
Some commenters (and there is no telling, on Facebook, whether the people chiming in have read the article) saw the Blackskins image as a “cheap shot” directed at African Americans, and wondered why American Indians would “attack” another group that also faces discrimination but isn’t involved in the Redskins mascot discussions. The Blackskins image was not an attack on African Americans.
Look how far we have come—from a country that allowed slavery 150 years ago to one in which the Blackskins image would not be tolerated for a second. Every thinking American sees that it is racist, and that’s laudable progress. And “Blackskins” isn’t even a racial slur anyone uses.
Unfortunately, take the same image, substitute a 19th-century conception of a noble Indian and print the word “Redskins—which is a slur according to any dictionary—beneath it, and America goes blind to the racism. So blind that it’s considered suitable for t-shirts, bumper stickers, and baby attire. And that’s the point. American Indians have seen black Americans make great strides in reclaiming human dignity after brutal historic oppression. Black Americans in the year 2013 have made progress toward that mountaintop, and as a black man, Gerard Miller knows that. He also knows that American Indians would like to catch up.
WINDOW ROCK, ARIZONA – Since Monday, nearly 50 chapters have called for assistance in Arizona, New Mexico and Utah. Chinle was hardest hit by the floods as 22 people had to be evacuated from their homes. The floods continued downstream to Many Farms and Rock Point where another 40 people were either evacuated or rescued. In Tonalea, Arizona, officials reported that 20 homes were damaged due to flooding.
Most of the flash flooding happens after short bursts of intense rain.
“I want our people to know we are working with several different agencies to ensure that our people are safe and their basic needs are met,”
Navajo Nation President Ben Shelly said, In an attempt to calm concerns.
“Though we are thankful for the rain we have received, I want our people to know that the Navajo Nation programs and departments are responding to calls regarding flash flooding. Please be careful and don’t drive or cross flooded roadways. We want everyone to make through the rains safely,”
President Shelly said.
President Shelly has been getting regular updates about flooded communities throughout the week.
“We need everyone to exercise caution and be alert to their surroundings. Though it might not be raining in your area, it can be raining in areas upstream,”
said Navajo Department of Emergency Management Director Rose Whitehair.
Whitehair added that it is difficult to predict what areas would experience flash flooding since most of the flooding happens after short bursts of intense rain.
“And with the long term drought, the ground is hard so there is nowhere for the water to go,”
Whitehair said.
County and state emergency departments have all been coordinating efforts with the Navajo Department of Emergency Management along with the Red Cross, the Hopi Tribe and the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
“I want to thank all the first responders and agencies for working together. I know you are all working hard but remember the work you are doing is for the good of all the people in need. We are a strong nation and we will endure through these difficult times,”
President Shelly said.
Since July nearly 60 chapters have reported to the Navajo Department of Emergency seeking assistance for damages occurred as a result of flooding. Issues have been from road washouts, road closures, rescue operations, shelter for flood victims and road clearing.
President Shelly signed a declaration of emergency in August regarding the flooding and plans are to update the declaration for recent flood events.
Navajo Department of Emergency Management and chapters are working according to a declaration of emergency that President Shelly signed in August.
For those unfamiliar with the Navajo Nation, a chapter is a unit of local government most similar to townships found in most midwestern and northeastern states of the US and Canadian provinces.
Courtesy Xiuhezcatl Martinez Xiuhezcatl Martinez a 13-year-old indigenous youth with Mother Earth’s wellbeing on his mind
By Vincent Schilling, Indian Country Today Media Network
Xiuhtezcatl Martinez, (his first name pronounced ‘Shoe-Tez-Caht’) is a 13-year-old indigenous environmental activist, rapper and public speaker from Boulder, Colorado. He is also the youth director of Earth Guardians, a youth based environmental non-profit organization that is committed to protecting the water, air, earth, and atmosphere.
At the early age of six, Xiuhtezcatl began speaking to crowds at rallies and demonstrations and has spoken at such events as the United States iMatter March in Denver in 2010, which was attended by more than 2,000 youths and other events. He has also worked with Boulder City council members to change city policy and has traveled to several countries and cities to include Rio De Janeiro and Washington D.C. about environmental concerns for Mother Earth.
This year, he has been invited to speak at the United Nations. He is also the youngest member of the 2013 Presidential Youth Council.
A piano composer whose music was used in a documentary that featured him and was filmed by Peter Gabriel’s organization – Witness, recently did an interview on Native Trailblazers radio. During the interview the young Earth Guardian shared his message of strength and hope and how he hopes to remain an inspiration for others.
How did you get started doing what you are doing?
That is a great question. I have been doing activism since I have been six years old. Also we’ve been organizing rallies and educating kids at schools. Kids can be inspired to become activists, leaders and change makers in their community.
Tell me about you as a hip-hop singer with impressive videos.
We have a performance group and we write positive rap songs with lyrics to educate and inspire kids. Kids these days, teenagers these days, everyone is listening to music. That is a huge part of our culture in general. There is a huge hip-hop culture, including slam poetry and break dancing. There are all of these different branches off of hip-hop culture.
Can you talk about your song “Be the Change?”
We got this idea to write a song that was a little bit different and outside the box. We want to make the song uplifting and empowering so that when people hear it, they will say, ‘Dang, I want to do something about fracking, about climate change or about the next generation’s future.’
The song is based on Mahatma Gandhi’s theory and most famous quotes, ‘Be the change that you wish to see in the world.” He is a huge role model of mine.
It is a really cool inspiring song and I hope everyone likes it.
Can you explain your Earth Guardian movement?
The Earth Guardian movement is a gateway and a portal to act for people of any age. No matter whom they are or where they are in the world. It doesn’t matter what your status is in society – none of this matters, we can all be Earth Guardians.
This movement is growing globally. People can see young people standing up in their communities and they are changing things that are not working, so that their world is a better place.
When people see this, they say, “I want to do something similar to that.’ people tell me they have a 12-year-old son who wants to get involved, we get such e-mails all the time. It is very hard to keep track of everything. Right now we have 30 requests to set up Earth Guardian groups. Right now there are places in Canada, Germany, France in other places around the world are requesting these Earth Guardian groups. There are groups going now in Australia, Brazil, India and Africa.
You are also a public speaker in a lot of places aren’t you?
There is a large rally in Washington D.C. called Powershift. Out of the thousands of requests they receive each year, this year they accepted my application to deliver a presentation. I will be giving a presentation on the global effects of fracking. We are currently working on fundraising for that.
In New York there will be a huge U.N. conference at the end of September. It is about the global water crisis and what people are doing about it around the world. If you think about it, water is the most basic necessity of life. If we do not have access to clean sustainable water supply, we do not have life. This is a human rights issue.
Just today in my fifth period science class we were talking about the characteristics of living things. One of the characteristics of living things is that they all require H2O. It is not a living thing if it does not require water. That stuck out to me. There is a huge global issue with our water supply – This is what the United Nations conference will be about.
The Pope is going to stream in, the Dalai Lama is going to stream in about the water, so it is a huge deal. Young people and activists from all over the world have been asked to come in and talk. They invited myself and representatives from the other Earth Guardian groups in Australia and Africa and others.
All of these leaders will be tuning into this conference. Never before in history, have we had the opportunity to stay connected with social media. All of these things are keeping our world connected. This is how movements are starting to spread all over the world.
Ultimately we are all working together toward the same thing, to create a better future for the next generation. Whether it is working on the water crisis, hunger – we are working on creating a better world for people.
Can you tell us about your song – “Live as if our Future Matters?”
We cannot wait for our government to change the world, before power, before money, before greed – their purpose is to protect people. In my eyes they have failed us at that, so now it is time for the people to stand up for themselves and to be part of this global movement that is going to change the fundamental beliefs of our entire society.
Who is the other young guy in your video?
That is my younger brother. He is an amazing rapper who has a great stage presence. He is so adorable and everyone loves him. He comes out with his black pants and black leather jacket like Michael Jackson everyone goes crazy, he doesn’t like to speak.
He is so great to have around. We’ve gone to Australia, Oregon, and Rio de Janeiro. In Brazil we had a four-hour bus drive; we spent the whole time laughing. That was great, if I didn’t have him with me on my side, I don’t know that I could do it.
What can kids do?
I go to school and I have advanced classes so I have a lot of extra work but I still play soccer – someone cannot force you to do this you have to ask yourself is this something that is important enough to take time out of my everyday life to do something like this. Kids don’t understand this really is not a joke. You know it’s not about polar bears and icecaps you have to turn this into something that affects us in our own backyard. Nature is not a separate being from us.
When we can realize the problems of the Arctic and Alaska and Africa and the Amazon rain forest they are our problems too – we come from the same planet and as soon as we recognize that, then they will be willing to make a change.
Do your teachers get nervous when you raise your hand in class?
(Laughs) In general I’m a very talkative person. My teachers don’t want to call on me because I talk forever.
Do you have any last words?
My school is giving the award for all the work that I’ve been doing, and that is very exciting to be recognized. To all the young people and adults, to anyone of any color no matter where you are from. Please think that we as humans, the greatest, have the most amazing opportunity in the entire world. Our generation with the elders, adults and youth on this planet – this generation now has the greatest opportunity of any generation.
We have opportunity to change our fundamental beliefs, and we can take the next step in our evolution from this consumption of greed, we have the opportunity to evolve and grow and prosper from that. This generation, this is what we are meant to do – to bring forth a new revolution in a new mindset to this world.
If we work together we can do it. Please everyone get involved, because we need you all out there.
Oh and yes, I truly could not do anything without my mom. I could not have done any of this in the past six or seven years of my life without her so I give a huge shout out to her. I could not have grown into who I am without her she is a huge part of what I’ve done. I love her so much.
Opponents of a food labeling initiative are gearing up to air their first television commercials in an ad campaign expected to cost millions of dollars and run up to Election Day in November.
A copy of a contract filed with the Federal Communication Commission shows the No on Initiative 522 campaign has booked $72,000 worth of advertising this week on KOMO-TV in Seattle. A 30-second spot would air beginning with the early-morning newscast Monday, according to the contract.
Additional contracts reserve time every day on the station through the last day of voting, Nov. 5.
A representative of the campaign declined to confirm the schedule, which could be amended after the filing of the contracts.
“I am not going to give out our playbook,” said campaign spokeswoman Dana Bieber.
Supporters of the measure are anticipating the launch of television ads now that the opposition has received millions of dollars from Monsanto and DuPont, two corporations that worked to defeat a similar labeling measure in California in 2012.
“This goes to show these corporations are really more focused on protecting their bottom line than giving grocery shoppers in Washington state more information about their food,” said Elizabeth Larter, spokeswoman for the Yes on 522 campaign.
If passed, Initiative 522 would require many food products made with genetically modified ingredients to be labeled as such. This would apply primarily to processed and packaged foods sold in supermarkets and other retail outlets.
What this means, for example, is a product made with corn, canola or soybeans grown from scientifically created seed stock would need a label to inform the buyer of the modified ingredients. Snack foods such as chips and soft drinks that contain artificial ingredients would need labels starting in July 2015.
Supporters argue the measure is about giving shoppers more information about what’s in the food they consume. Labels would not be required on food sold in restaurants nor on dairy and meat products, even if the cattle are fed genetically engineered foods.
Opponents counter that I-522 would create new and costly burdens on farmers and businesses and would increase food costs. They also say the state will need to spend money to enforce the labeling law.
As of Friday, the No on 522 Committee had raised nearly $12 million in donations and pledges, according to reports filed with the state Public Disclosure Commission. After expenditures, the committee had a little over $10 million available.
“We plan to use our resources to share with voters how misleading 522 is and how it is going to increase grocery costs by hundreds and hundreds of dollars a year,” Bieber said.
The majority of the opposition money arrived this month from the two companies, which are among the nation’s biggest producers of genetically modified seed products.
Monsanto wrote a $4.6 million check on Sept. 5, pushing its total donations to the campaign to roughly $4.85 million. On Sept. 10, DuPont gave $3.2 million and is now up to nearly $3.4 million in contributions.
The level of spending should come as no surprise. Last year, the two firms topped all contributors to the effort to defeat Proposition 37 in California.
In that campaign, Monsanto gave $8.1 million and DuPont $5.4 million, according to state campaign finance reports compiled by Ballotpedia.org.
In Washington, as of Friday, the Yes on 522 committee had collected $3.5 million in donations and, after expenditures, had about $2.6 million available in cash. The single largest donor is Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps, which has given roughly $1 million.
Reports filed with the FCC show the committee reserved time starting in mid-October on KOMO.
A statewide poll released last week shows the measure enjoys strong backing among potential voters. Of the 406 registered voters surveyed in the Elway Poll, 66 percent expressed support, with only 21 percent opposed. The survey has a margin of error of 5 percent.
Larter predicted the numbers will change once ads begin airing.
Yesterday afternoon, on the 12th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, a group of five protesters disrupted a memorial to the nearly-3,000 killed in order to draw attention to historical injustices done to Native Americans.
The incident occurred on the campus of Middlebury College, in Middlebury, Vermont. As has become a tradition at the school, a group of students from the school’s College Democrats and Republicans commemorated the loss by planting 2,977 flags, one for each victim of the attacks, on the lawn in front of the school’s Mead Memorial Chapel. Just before 3 PM, five individuals began pulling the flags out of the ground and putting them into garbage bags.
Later, one of the five people, and the only one who is a Middlebury student, stepped forward to explain the action. Anna Shireman Grabowski issued a written statement that reads, in part:
My intention was not to cause pain but to visibilize the necessity of honoring all human life and to help a friend heal from the violence of genocide that she carries with her on a daily basis as an indigenous person. While the American flags on the Middlebury hillside symbolize to some the loss of innocent lives in New York, to others they represent centuries of bloody conquest and mass murder. As a settler on stolen land, I do not have the luxury of grieving without an eye to power. Three thousand flags is a lot, but the campus is not big enough to hold a marker for every life sacrificed in the history of American conquest and colonialism.
Shireman Grabowski, who is not Native, went on to concede that this was “not a productive way to start a dialogue about American imperialism” and that she is grappling with her “complicity in the overwhelming legacy of settler colonialism.” You can read her full statement at middbeat.org.
The friend to which Shireman Grabowski referred was Amanda Lickers, Onondaga, who was on campus for a workshop on settler responsibility and decolonization. “Lands where our dead may lay must not be desecrated,” Lickers said, according to a release from Indigenous Action. “In my community, we do not pierce the earth. It disturbs the spirits there, it is important for me to respect their presence.”
“For over 500 years our people have been under attack,” Lickers continued. “The theft of our territories, the devastation of our waters; the poisoning of our people through the poisoning of our lands; the theft of our people from our families; the rape of our children; the murder of our women; the sterilization of our communities; the abuse of generations; the uprooting of our ancestors and the occupation of our sacred sites; the silencing of our songs; the erasure of our languages and memories of our traditions. I have had enough.”
Middlebury president Ron Liebowitz issued a statement condemning the action and stating that a disciplinary investigation is underway. “There is always something to learn from differences of opinion,” he wrote. “In this case, the disrespectful methods of the protesters overshadowed anything that might have been learned from the convictions they claimed to promote.”
Indian Health Service (IHS) officials are pushing back against tribal concerns over an Obama administration plan that would cut contract support cost (CSC) reimbursements to tribes as part of the federal budget’s continuing resolution currently being considered by Congress.
At least 45 tribes and tribal organizations have written to Congress, asking for protection against the proposal, which they say cheats tribes out of millions of dollars they are due. They believe the proposed tribe-by-tribe federal cap on CSC funding would wipe out tribal legal claims and put tribes in the difficult position of being required to spend large amounts of money to administer contract support programs without providing them the funding to do so.
IHS leaders say the tribal concerns have been heard, but the administration believes the plan still needs to be implemented by Congress due to federal budget concerns and sequestration.
“The Administration’s decision was made after careful consideration of all views,” Dianne Dawson, a spokeswoman for IHS, told Indian Country Today Media Network by e-mail. “This option is a short-term approach in this difficult budget climate and is consistent with the Supreme Court’s decision in Salazar V. Ramah Navajo Chapter. We are currently consulting with tribes to find a long-term solution for CSC funding.”
Tribal leaders, concerned that they will be shortchanged millions of dollars, are not moved by the administration’s response, and they say it opposes the June 2012 Salazar v. Ramah Navajo Chapter ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that said the federal government must pay for the full CSC incurred by tribes while providing healthcare and other governmental services for their tribal citizens through Indian Self-Determination Act contract agreements.
“Our views were never asked for, and so the only views that were considered were views within the administration,” Edward Thomas, president of the Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes, told ICTMN after reviewing the administration’s response.
“This proposal should never be a short-term solution without clarifying what the impact would be,” Thomas added. “[This] interpretation of the Supreme Court decision as a budget or financial issue is wrong and not consistent with promises made by the President to not try to balance this nation’s budget on the backs of the less fortunate.”
Thomas noted that tribes have interpreted the Supreme Court decision to mean that finally the federal government must pay for the cost of tribes administering programs on their behalf. “The Supreme Court ruled in Ramah that the U.S. must pay 100 percent of our tribal CSC costs,” he said. “Maybe President Obama should tell his officials to read Ramah again and again until they get it. It appears to me that White House OMB [Office of Management and Budget] is opposing the President indirectly and this should never happen.”
Thomas said the right “long-term solution is to put 100 percent funding of indirect costs into each and every budget. It isn’t complicated. This can easily be absorbed by the administration.”
Lloyd Miller, an Indian affairs lawyer with Sonosky Chambers who represents several tribes with pending CSC claims, says that the administration framing of this situation as a budget issue is flat-out wrong. “A special account exists in the Treasury to pay any claims over contract shortfalls,” he said. “No other government contractors are being treated this way. The administration’s proposal to cut off tribal contract rights is nothing less than racial discrimination.”
Added Miller, “They seem to think that tribes are comfortable with treating contracts to operate government facilities as mere grants, with the tribes happy to cut services if the promised payments fall short. That is a bad miscalculation. Tribes have far too much knowledge of broken treaties, and they will not sit still while IHS seeks cover to break its contract obligations.”
In light of the administration’s response, Congress members are vowing to continue to fight the proposal. Republican leaders chose not to include the language in their continuing resolution proposal released September 10, but that legislation is on hold, since some conservative members of the Republican caucus want the continuing resolution to include language that would vote down Obamacare. The Senate has yet to decide if it will take up the CSC plan.
There will be a partial government shutdown if Congress can’t pass a continuing resolution by October 1.
Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), chair of the Subcommittee on Indian and Alaska Native Affairs, has taken the lead against decrying the administration’s CSC proposal, and he says their new rationale rings untrue.
“The administration is claiming that their proposed hard cap on contract support cost funding is both short-term and consistent with Ramah, and their claim is false on both fronts,” Young told ICTMN. “Their proposal would deny tribes compensation that they are rightfully due and has harmful long-term implications for health care delivery throughout Indian country.”
Young said that the tight federal budget “may continue to exist long into the future,” yet it “does not diminish the federal government’s trust responsibility.
“The real problem is not the budget climate, but the administration’s unwillingness to prioritize Native healthcare,” Young said.
