May 2013 - Page 4 of 21

Potawatomi bingo casino’s sustainable energy project

Food manufacturers evaluate Potawatomi digester option for waste.

Manufacturing, Food & Agriculture

May 27. 2013 2:00AM

Southeastern Wisconsin food and beverage manufacturers recently had a chance to tour the anaerobic digester being constructed at Potawatomi Bingo Casino during a “first look” event hosted by Advanced Waste Services and the Forest County Potawatomi Community in Milwaukee.

The tour introduced interested businesses to the digester project, which is being coordinated by FCPC Renewable Generation LLC and would serve as a community food waste recycling facility. Its proponents are encouraging food and beverage manufacturers, grocery stores and other large organic waste producers to send their waste product to the digester instead of landfills.

The Potawatomi Community, which is adding a service road near the Milwaukee casino for the increased truck traffic the digester would bring, expects the digester to be completed by July and start accepting industrial, commercial and institutional waste by September.

There would be a tipping fee for contributors, which the tribe says it plans to price competitively with local alternatives.

“What we’re trying to do here is put a little twist in the model you’ve been working with and hopefully it will be a win-win,” said Jeff Crawford, attorney general for the Forest County Potawatomi Community. “We want to be able to build this thing so it’s good for the environment, making energy, but we’re not trying to make money off it.”

The digester would offset 30 percent of the energy costs for the Forest County Potawatomi Community.

Before beginning the project, the Potawatomi Community completed an energy audit, after which it purchased renewable energy credits and installed a 132-panel solar array on the FCPC administrative building in Milwaukee.

In addition, local food waste that’s currently being dumped could be converted to energy in the Potawatomi digester, Crawford said.

The energy produced by the digester will be sold back to Milwaukee-based Wisconsin Energy Corp. under a special tariff to offset the Potawatomi Community’s energy costs throughout the state. The Potawatomi tribe has about 17,000 acres of land in northern Wisconsin and in Milwaukee.

Milwaukee-based Titus Energy has been developing the digester for three years, said Bryan Johnson, renewable and sustainability leader. The $18.5 million project will include two 1.3 million gallon tanks that will generate 2 megawatts of continuous power, enough to power 1,500 homes. A $2.6 million Department of Energy grant awarded to the FCPC in 2011 is contributing to the project.

The tanks are 50 feet tall and 80 feet in diameter. General Electric Waukesha Gas Engines has provided the engines for the conversion process. The controls were made by Rockwell Automation.

Smaller feed tanks will accept individual waste streams that have been converted to slurry. The slurries will be combined into the proper mix of materials to meet certain carbon, nitrogen, pH and chemical levels. When the mix is right, it’s fed into the digester tanks, heated to about 100 degrees and held in the tanks for about 30 days.

The digester will turn the waste into methane gas to power an on-site biogass engine that will produce electricity. Heat recovery and fertilizer are also byproducts.

The facility will accept between 100,000 and 130,000 gallons of waste material per day, Johnson said. Tipping fees will be based on each customer’s situation and shipping costs. The casino will not be an initial supplier, because its waste stream is too small.

Project organizers have been targeting the meat, cheese, dairy, grocery, produce and bakery industries to participate in the process. Many types of feedstock, including dry ingredients like spices, can be converted to energy.

“About any type of food waste has fairly high energy potential in it,” Johnson said.

West Allis-based Advanced Waste Services has been testing potential feedstock samples and marketing the digester to local businesses.

FCPC has retained Advanced Waste to transport the waste and slurry from producers to the digester. AWS may also oversee the slurry production, though the offsite conversion process has not been finalized.

Right now, AWS is using its industry connections to approach potential feedstock generators, said Joe DeNucci, marketing manager.

“We see this as opportunities for companies to be known for their green initiatives,” Johnson said. “We expect at any one time to have more than 20 suppliers for this project. That all depends on the size of the waste material coming in.”

More than half of those suppliers have committed to the project, he said. The digester is on track to be at capacity by fall.

Gilbert Jasso, plant maintenance director at Kemps in Cedarburg, attended the tour to find out more about the digesters.

Kemps currently sends about 6,000 gallons of dairy waste per day from its Cedarburg plant to digesters in West Bend, and is exploring the alternative digester at Potawatomi.

“We’re just trying to be a good neighbor, because we do produce waste and we’re not going to change that,” he said.

Michael Keleman, lead environmental engineer at InSinkErator in Racine, also attended the informational meeting to learn more about the digester.

InSinkErator produces both residential and commercial waste disposal products, mostly on the home kitchen end.

But the company may be able to assist with the industrial, commercial and institutional sector’s waste-to-slurry preparation.

“We see this as a tremendous opportunity to be involved in feedstock preparation for anaerobic digestion,” Keleman said. “Our appliances have mainly been sold for convenience in kitchen hygiene, and really we’ve only been focused on the residential side, and that’s only about 50 percent of the food waste generated in the U.S.”

Read previous article here.

Be Dentist for a Day! Dental Camp at Tulalip

Join the Society of American Indian Dentists, UW School of Dentistry and the Tulalip Tribes for a dental career exploration day for middle and high school students

Saturday, June 1, 2013 9:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., Tulalip Tribes Gymnasium

Carmen: Treaty Council’s Inclusion on Racist List is ‘Badge of Honor’

Gale Courey Toensing, Indian Country Today Media Network

Groucho Marx famously said, “I wouldn’t want to belong to a club that has someone like me as a member.” In a kind of reversal of that humorous sentiment, Andrea Carmen, the executive director of the International Indian Treaty Council, says she’s glad her organization belongs to a club in the form of a list of allegedly “UnAmerican” people, places and things. The reason? The list was compiled by the late Billy James Hargis, a southern white racist preacher who was anti-communist, anti-union, pro-segregationist, anti-black and, apparently, also anti-Indian, and it includes some of the most revered civil rights leaders, artists, activists and other people and organizations that have worked for social justice.

In 1950, Hargis founded a ministry called Christian Crusade, a media empire that included a magazine, a daily radio program, Christian Crusade Publications, and a direct mail operation in those pre-e-mail times that distributed his propaganda throughout the world. His heyday as a televangelist peaked during the 1950s and 1960s when he made daily broadcasts on 500 radio stations and 250 TV channels. He died in 2004 at the age of 79.

The International Indian Treaty Council (IITC) was founded in 1974 at a gathering by the American Indian Movement in Standing Rock, South Dakota that was attended by more than 5,000 representatives of 98 Indigenous Nations. The organization advocates for treaty lands and the basic human rights of freedom and sovereignty. Carmen (Yaqui Indian Nation) has been a staff member of the International Indian Treaty Council since 1983 and its executive director since 1992.

“IITC is the only Indigenous Peoples organization to be listed on this racist list, and yes I do consider it to be a badge of honor,” Carmen told Indian Country Today Media Network in an e-mail. “These types consider anyone making a serious stand for Treaty Rights, justice and human rights to be a threat to their vision of how society and its power relationship should be organized.”

On May 3, Carmen received an e-mail from a colleague who notified her that the International Indian Treaty Council was included on one of Hargis’s immense files of “UnAmerican” people and organizations in a collection of his papers housed by the University of Arkansas. “I found this today in a link sent to me from a woman in Tulsa who was researching her pro-choice organization,” Carmen’s colleague wrote. “The files were compiled by the Oklahoma equivalent of Joseph McCarthy, Tulsa racist minister Billy Hargis, who was alleged to have been having sex with male and female students at his Christian College in Tulsa.”

The particular file that includes the International Indian Treaty Council is listed under “Series II, Domestic Policies and Issues, Subseries #5: Social Issues.” The subsector is divided into categories on race, the civil rights movement, Hispanics, racist organizations, women’s issues and organizations, families and the changing sexual morality of the 1960s and 1970s, the 1960s counterculture, drug and alcohol abuse, crime and law enforcement, health care and poverty. Among the “UnAmerican” individuals Hargis listed are civil rights hero Martin Luther King Jr., comedian Bill Cosby, author James Baldwin, jazz great Louis Armstrong, Nobel prize-winning social worker Jane Addams, and singer Harry Belafonte. Among the “UnAmerican” organizations and initiatives are the Black Panthers, Fisk University, the Equal Rights Amendment, and Freedom Riders.

The International Indian Treaty Council is listed as number 31, squished between “Hispanics, 26-30” and “Racist Individuals and Organizations, 32-46,” oddly under the heading “African Americans and Civil Rights by State.”

News about the inclusion of IITC on Hargis’ target list was posted to the mailing list of the North American Indigenous Peoples Caucus to the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. The posting elicited a number of congratulatory responses. “IITC has to be doing something right to make them list you,” one writer told Carmen. “Congratulations!”

Recognition for Service by Native Americans May Finally Be Coming

Indian Country Today Media Network

Native Americans, including American Indians, Alaska Natives and Native Hawaiians, serve at a higher rate in the U.S. Armed Forces that any other group and have served in all of the nation’s wars since the Revolutionary War honorably and courageously. Twenty-eight Natives have won the Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest military decoration. The Navajo, Comanche, Choctaw, Tlingit and other Native nations created codes that enemies couldn’t break, turning the tide in both world wars.

And yet, among all the memorials and monuments on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., there is not one that recognizes the contributions of Native warriors. But that, hopefully, will soon change.

On May 23, Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) introduced a bill, S. 1046, Native American Veterans’ Memorial Amendments Act of 2013, that would facilitate the construction of a Native American Veterans Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Senators Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), John Barrasso (R-Wyoming), and Jon Tester (D-Montana) are original co-sponsors.

“Every Memorial Day we honor the men and women who have served our country in the armed forces, and [this] legislation would allow for construction of a memorial on the National Mall so that people from across the country can honor the extraordinary contributions and sacrifices of our Native American veterans,” said Schatz, after introducing the bill.

“Our Native veterans have sacrificed their lives for this country and it is important that we recognize their bravery and patriotism with a fitting memorial. I look forward to working with my colleagues on the Indian Affairs Committee and in the United States Senate to get this bill passed and finally have a National Native American Veterans Memorial in our nation’s capital.”

Schatz’s bill would clarify the Native American Veterans’ Memorial Establishment Act of 1994, proposed by then-Senators Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) and Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii) and Senator John McCain (R-Arizona), amending the bill to allow for the completion of the long-standing project. The 1994 act okayed the construction of the memorial, but didn’t provide for the funding of it.

According to the National Congress of American Indians, the project has encountered a number of obstacles since the legislation’s passage, including limitations placed on the involvement of the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI). The new language removes a number of technical barriers that have hindered completion and allows for the memorial to be built adjacent to NMAI, not inside the museum as originally proposed. Additionally, NMAI would be able to participate in raising funds for the effort.

“It is essential that we fulfill Senator Inouye and Indian Country’s vision for a memorial to honor the service and sacrifice of our Native American service members. NCAI supports the amendments to the Native American Veterans’ Memorial Establishment Act of 1994, which will make the memorial a reality and allow for it to be built on the property of the National Museum of the American Indian,” said Jefferson Keel, President of NCAI and a decorated veteran, in a press release. “Most importantly, this bill allows for more flexibility for tribal nations and the United States to work together to honor the contributions and sacrifices of American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian military service members and veterans. As a Native veteran myself, I look forward to the day my fellow veterans are recognized for their contributions to protecting the sovereignty of tribal nations and the United States.”

Increased efforts for a memorial honoring the military service of Natives on the National Mall can be traced back to the 1980s when the well-known The Three Soldiers sculpture was unveiled near the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Depicted are three American soldiers: one white, one black and a Hispanic. The exclusion of a Native American was seen as disrespectful by Indian country.

‘The Three Soldiers’ sculpture does not recognize the contributions of Native service members.

Robert Holden, director of the National Congress of American Indians, said that the sculpture excludes Native Americans, and does not fully depict their contributions. During the Vietnam era, for example, more than 42,000 Native Americans served in the military and 90 percent of those service members were volunteers. Holden also said during a press conference call that the national organization was told that the Hispanic figure in the sculpture was meant to represent not only Hispanics but also Native Americans: “that is not satisyfing.”

“Given that Native American people are not currently acknowledged anywhere in the National Mall,” said Holden, “I think Native Americans are seeking that recognition—that Native people are true patriots and have been really since the American Revolution.”

In the press conference call, NMAI Director Kevin Gover said he didn’t know how much the memorial will cost. But he said the entire project will be funded by private sources. “We are grateful to Senator Schatz for his interest, and Senators Inouye and Akaka for their contribution. And we look forward to working with Senator Schatz as we move forward, empowering the National Museum of the American Indian to be directly involved in the process of erecting this memorial,” said Gover.

Gover also said he didn’t know where the memorial will be placed. The museum will solicit proposals from artists. There are several possible locations, he said, “But artists being who they are may see other places.”

Regardless of where it stands, the memorial would be meaningful for Native peoples, said Native Hawaiian veteran Allen Hoe during the conference call.

“Native Americans, Alaskans, and Hawaiians have a traditional belief in honoring our warriors,” he said.

“Native Americans have fought bravely and been a critical part of the American military for generations,” Senator Tester said recently. “It’s long-past time we honor their sacrifices with the recognition they earned. This memorial is one more way we can pay our respects and say ‘thank you’ for their courageous service to our country.”

To track the progress of Schatz’s bill in Congress, click here.

Haida-Tsimshian Boy is One of Top Bowlers in Washington State

Richard Walker, Indian Country Today Media Network

My bowling partner’s ball hugged the edge of the lane before curving into the pocket. He started game one with a spare, and followed with a strike and a spare in the next two frames.

My performance? Not so good.

Keep your eye on your mark, my partner reminded me. When I finally got a strike, he gave me a high five and was as happy as if he had gotten it.

My partner, Cosmo Castellano, is the winner of the Pepsi State Bowling Championship. He bowled a 202 high game and a 505 series to win the title in his age group May 19 at Pacific Lanes in Tacoma, Washington.

Some bowlers say he could be the next Earl Anthony, the Professional Bowlers Association Hall of Famer who hailed from Tacoma. Here’s the kicker: Cosmo is 7 years old.

Cosmo, Hawaiian/Filipino/Haida/Tsimshian, is the son of Zachary and Rosita Castellano of Tacoma and a member of the Argel family of Metlakatla, Alaska. Cosmo’s grand-uncle is the late Julian Argel, who served in the Office of Minority Affairs at the University of Washington, directed education and social programs for Native communities in Washington and Alaska, and helped develop curricula for Native education.

Cosmo Castellano autographed the score sheet at Tower Lanes in Tacoma April 28. (Molly Neely-Walker)

Cosmo is a leading youth bowler in Washington state. This year, he won the state Division 3 Classic Masters title; during practice, he bowled a 220, his highest non-league score. Of state Little Juniors League bowlers, he led the list of top 50 bowlers for 26 of 28 weeks of the 2012-13 season, and led in high scratch games (189), high scratch series (471), and high average (33 pins higher than the nearest competitor).

Rosita said her bowling phenom first rolled a ball down a lane at age 2. She and her husband were bowling and they heard a ball in the lane next to them. It was Cosmo.

The boy started bowling regularly at age 3. His dad, a competitive amateur bowler, started his son with a 6-pound ball his first year, and Cosmo was bowling with a 12-pounder by age 5-and-a-half. Cosmo now bowls three days a week, including six to eight hours on weekends, and competes in tournaments throughout western Washington. Cosmo has topped his dad 201-173 and 188-187.

To handle his 12-pound ball—only four pounds lighter than his dad’s—Cosmo uses a two-handed style similar to his favorite pro bowler, Jason Belmonte, 2009 PBA Rookie of the Year.

Rosita, a reading specialist at Gates High School in Tacoma, said the science of bowling engages her son’s curious mind. He likes the challenge of a spare, figuring out ball speed and amount of spin needed to pick it up. Cosmo likes the challenge of getting a knocking down a split, and once picked up a 6-7-10—easier to pick up because of the 6 pin, but a killer shot nonetheless.

Cosmo enjoys watching other bowlers on the lanes and on TV. His role models: Belmonte; Chris Barnes, the third bowler in PBA history to win Rookie of the Year and Player of the Year honors in a career; and Osku Palermaa of Finland, who’s bowled more than 50 perfect games.

“He’s made goals for himself,” said Rosita. “As a parent, you can’t ask for anything more for your child than for him to set goals and to self-assess [his progress].” One goal he’s set: A clean game, in which every frame has a strike or spare.

Cosmo has also learned valuable life lessons from the sport. “He had a rough spot in his early 5s,” Rosita said of Cosmo’s sportsmanship. “He’s learned to encourage other bowlers, to be collegial. He still enjoys the game even when he doesn’t bowl well.”

When he won the state championship, Cosmo’s parents asked him, “Do you know what you did? You’re the best bowler in the state,” Rosita said, “It didn’t faze him. It was nice to not see him gloat. He was more concerned about being with his friends.”

Cosmo is indeed a collegial player. When I left a hidden pin standing in a spare attempt, Cosmo said, “That was a sleeper,” and gave me five for a good try.

Cosmo applies the same discipline in school that he does on the lanes. He’s a first-grader at Brookdale Elementary School in Tacoma but participates in the third-grade reading program. He’s received several Bobcat Excellence awards (the bobcat is his school’s mascot) for attendance, courtesy and thoughtfulness. He studies Northwest Native culture through his school district’s Indian Education Program.

The money he and other youth bowlers win is placed by the league in a college tuition savings account, his mother said.

Cosmo and I closed out our third and final game with strikes in the 10^th frame, and Cosmo finished in the lead by 37 pins.

I asked, and he shyly gave me his autograph. It’s not the first he’s been asked for. It likely won’t be his last.

BIA proposes regulation to address land-into-trust appeals

Indianz.com

The Obama administration is proposing a new regulation to address land-into-trust appeals in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Salazar v. Patchak.

In Patchak, the Supreme Court ruled that opponents can sue the Bureau of Indian Affairs for up to six years after the land is placed in trust. As a result, the administration says it is no longer necessary to wait 30 days for any appeals.

“Specifically, this rule deletes the 30-day waiting period for implementation of decisions to acquire land in trust after such decisions are final for the [Interior] Department,” a forthcoming notice in the Federal Register states.

“Following the Patchak decision, this 30-day waiting period is now unnecessary because parties may seek, to the extent it is available, judicial review of the Secretary’s decision … even after the land is acquired by the United States in trust,” the notice states.

Assistant Secretary Kevin Washburn, the head of the BIA, said the new regulation will bring more clarity to the land-into-trust process. Tribes are invited to submit comments.

“The principal purpose of this proposed rule is to provide greater certainty to tribes in their ability to develop lands acquired in trust for purposes such as housing, schools and economic development,” Washburn said in a press release. “For such acquisitions, the proposed rule will create a ‘speak now or forever hold your peace moment’ in the land-into-trust process. If parties do not appeal the decision within the administrative appeal period, tribes will have the peace of mind to begin development without fear that the decision will be later overturned.”

Forthcoming Federal Register Notice:
Land Acquisitions: Appeals of Land Acquisition Decisions (To Be Published May 29, 2013)

Marysville gets $200K for waterfront cleanup at marina

Dan Bates / Herald file photo, 2009Rob Fuller (left) and Andrew Eaton, both of Marysville, cast for sturgeon from the dock at Ebey Waterfront Park in Marysville in October 2009. Marysville has received a federal grant to help fund cleanup near the park. — Dan Bates / Herald file photo, 2009
Rob Fuller (left) and Andrew Eaton, both of Marysville, cast for sturgeon from the dock at Ebey Waterfront Park in Marysville in October 2009. Marysville has received a federal grant to help fund cleanup near the park.

By Gale Fiege, The Herald

Marysville is one of eight communities in the region receiving a grant from the federal Environmental Protection Agency to assist with the Ebey waterfront marina land cleanup.

The $200,000 cleanup grant would be used to remediate the contaminated ground on the city-owned marina property at 1326 First St., just west of Ebey Waterfront Park.

The marina property contains waterfront chemicals and pollutants common to timber industry and marine operations that have existed since the late 1800s. Grant funds also will be used to conduct groundwater monitoring and support community involvement activities.

The grants help revitalize former industrial sites, turning them from problem properties to productive community use.

The EPA previously awarded the city a grant in May 2009 to clean up the Crown Pacific mill site at 60 State Ave. on the waterfront just east of State Avenue. The grant will be issued on Oct. 1, but hiring a consultant to develop a cleanup plan that meets approval of the state Department of Ecology and the EPA means that it could be 2015 before actual work starts, city officials said.

Long-term plans as identified in the city’s 2009 Downtown Master Plan would see Ebey waterfront redeveloped with trails, apartments or condominiums and some commercial development.

No specific plans have been decided for the marina site.

Arizona tribe claims bank mismanaged investments

By FELICIA FONSECA Associated Press

Posted: 05/23/2013 02:58:25 PM MDT

FLAGSTAFF, Ariz.—The Hopi Tribe of northern Arizona claims that advisers at a national financial services institute schemed to cheat the tribe out of tens of millions of dollars by lying about the value of tribal accounts, making risky investments and collecting fees to which they weren’t entitled.

The tribe has filed more than two dozen claims against Wachovia and some of its former financial advisers with the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority. It is seeking nearly $190 million in penalties and damages through arbitration that is expected to take more than a year to run its course.

“This is not a case involving a disagreement about a few investments,” tribal attorneys wrote in a statement of claims. “This is the limiting case of greed by a national bank and its agents, which despite their status as fiduciaries, created a risky, dangerous portfolio in which almost all investment assets in the portfolio violated Hopi investment guidelines.”

A spokesman for Wells Fargo & Co, which acquired Wachovia in 2008, said Thursday that the bank will present its side during an arbitration hearing.

The Hopi Tribal Council approved opening a $10 million line of credit at Wachovia in September 2007, which tribal attorneys claim the financial advisers used as a lure to gain access to then-tribal treasurer Russell Mockta and the Hopi assets. Even before the resolution was passed, the advisers worked with Mockta to transfer $2.5 million into a Wachovia account without the council’s approval and made non-permitted and unnecessary investments.

Tribal Chairman Le Roy Shingoitewa said that Wachovia had authority only to make low-risk investments that would guarantee a steady income to finance capital improvements on tribal lands, like a hotel and restaurant in Moenkopi. Instead, the tribe alleges that former Wachovia advisers opened a margin account and quickly purchased high-risk investments, including hedge funds that were barred by tribal policy. By October 2007, more than half of the Hopi’s portfolio had been moved out of fixed income investments, the tribe claims.

Mockta, who was removed from office over what the tribe said was significant financial losses during his tenure, did not return a call for comment Thursday. Tribal attorney Norberto Cisneros said the tribe doesn’t believe that Mockta or other tribal officials knew of the alleged scheme at the time.

Among other claims is that the Wachovia advisers lied to Hopi officials in monthly statements and performance reviews—at times sent from personal e-mail addresses—by overstating the value of the tribe’s assets to keep the Hopis as a client, and overcharged for advisory services on tribal accounts that weren’t subject to management fees. One of the investments was structured so that losses were locked in from the date of purchase regardless of how the financial market performed, the tribe alleges.

Some of the investments related to bonds known as collateralized debt obligations, or CDOs. The value of the CDOs plummeted after the housing market peaked in 2007, sparking panic that caused the global credit system to seize up.

During that period, Wachovia charged other clients, including the Zuni Tribe of New Mexico, 70 percent more for CDO investments than the bank believed they were worth, the Securities and Exchange Commission has said. Wells Fargo settled a case in 2011 that claimed Wachovia Capital Markets LLC misled investors to sell the mortgage bonds to the Zuni Tribe without admitting to or denying the allegations.

Cisneros said that regardless of how the financial market behaved at the time, the Hopi Tribe should not have lost its money.

“These are investments the tribe never should have been in to begin with, particularly in a volatile market,” he said. “Even when they did good investments for the tribe, they took the money from the tribe by marking them up.”

Cisneros said the Hopi Tribe realized its losses within the past six to nine months after thoroughly examining its investments. The Wachovia accounts now are with Raymond James & Associates, but they’re no longer in the hands of the advisers who went to work for Raymond James after Wells Fargo acquired Wachovia, Cisneros said.

Source: CurrentArgus

New Food Regulations Should Not Proceed Without Tribal Consultation

Raymond Foxworth, Indian Country Today Media Network

There is a thriving movement in Indian country focused on food sovereignty and increased control of local food systems. Like other assets in Indian country, Native food systems have been colonized, altered and, in some cases, destroyed. Today, many Native communities have taken an active role in reclaiming control of their local food system, taking a deeper examination of where food in their community comes from, looking at dollars that leave the reservation on food products, attempting to increase access to fresh and healthy foods, increase agricultural economic development activities for communities and individuals, and develop tribal policies that promote Native food sovereignty. Despite this thriving movement, however, a new federal law may potentially stall the progress of food systems work occurring in Indian country.

The Food Safety and Modernization Act (FSMA) was signed into law in January 2011 and is the most sweeping reform in U.S. food safety laws in more than 70 years. The Act will shift federal regulation from simply responding to food contamination to a more concentrated effort at prevention of food contamination in the U.S. food chain. No doubt this well-intentioned law is aimed at limiting instances of food-borne illnesses and disease and also is connected to domestic national security concerns.

For more than two years, the FDA has delayed implementation of this act, extending public comment on numerous occasions, with the most recent extension until September 16, 2013. While they have extended public comment, they have yet to engage or consult Native nations or communities.

The proposed federal regulations should raise concerns for Native nations that have developed agricultural enterprises and supportive infrastructure to support tribal individuals engaged in agricultural activities. The developing regulations of the law, albeit still vague and murky, signal increasing importance on labeling, traceability and food-handling standards, and also increased emphasis on potentially costly licensing and inspection. Language of the law also signals funding to increase the capacity of state regulatory agencies, but does not include capacity development language for tribes. Moreover, the law also calls for increased monitoring, inspection and regulation from state agencies, potentially infringing on tribal sovereignty for those Native nations engaged in agriculture production and distribution.

While the FDA has heard from some small scale farmers and producers, Indian Country has been virtually ignored in the development of these regulations. There is no doubt that food safety is an issue of concern for all Americans, including First Americans. But the creation of such sweeping federal legislation while bypassing normal channels of tribal consultation and input raises numerous concerns for tribes, organizations and individuals doing important work related to food sovereignty and food system control in Indian Country.

It is important that Native communities begin to examine the FSMA and analyze the potential implications and costs for Native communities, businesses and producers. Moreover, tribes should also begin to provide public comment on the Act and also demand tribal consultation.

To learn more about the FMSA and potential implications for Native communities and producers, you can access a recorded webinar hosted by First Nations Development Institute at FirstNations.org/fnk. To learn more about the FSMA, you can visit Fda.gov/FSMA.

Raymond Foxworth, Navajo, is Senior Program Officer at First Nations Development Institute. Raymond oversees the Native Agriculture and Food Systems Initiative (NAFSI), a program that works with Native nations and organizations on issues related to increasing Native food system control.

Low-tide walks are making a splash

Now comes our season of daylight low tides, and the pleasure of beach walks. Volunteer naturalists with the Seattle Aquarium have kicked off a season of naturalist-led walks on beaches all over Puget Sound, beginning over Memorial Day weekend.

A -3.3 low tide draws beach explorers to Constellation Park in West Seattle on Saturday for one of the lowest of the year.Enlarge this photoAlan Berner / The Seattle TimesA -3.3 low tide draws beach explorers to Constellation Park in West Seattle on Saturday for one of the lowest of the year. — Alan Berner / The Seattle Times
A -3.3 low tide draws beach explorers to Constellation Park in West Seattle on Saturday for one of the lowest of the year.

By Lynda V. Mapes, Seattle Times staff reporter

As spring waxes to summer, our season of daylight low tides is under way, revealing wonders of Puget Sound right at our feet.

Volunteer naturalists from the Seattle Aquarium over the Memorial Day weekend kicked off a series of low-tide beach walks offered all over the Puget Sound area. The walks will continue through July, and some of the best low tides are yet to come.

On Sunday, the Sound waters slid down the clean, gray sand at the aquatic reserve at the Constellation Park Marine Reserve at Alki. Clams jetted their silvery squirts, and jet-black crows strutted the tide flats, probing for tasty morsels. The pearly light and hush-shush of the tide made this stretch of beach feel far away from the bustle of Alki’s commercial strip, just around the point.

The signature scent of low tide — tangy saltwater and algae — and a cooling breeze off the water beckoned visitors to come under the spell of another world: the intertidal zone, usually out of our reach, but right there to explore during a -3.6 low tide.

Sea stars clung fiercely to the rocks, their soda-pop purple color contrasting with the bright-red shells of rock crabs. Their diminutive size belies pincer power 10 times the might of Dungeness crabs.

The smooth, curved gray collars of moon snail shell egg casings lay amid jade-green eel grass and heaps of nubby, bronze algae aptly named Turkish towel for its pot-scrubber texture.

Everywhere was the sound of children’s laughter as they peeked under rocks and into tide pools. Oliver Straley’s eyes got big as Craig “Mac” MacGowan, a retired Seattle teacher, put a nudibranch in Straley’s wetted palm.

He gently touched the shell-less mollusk with a wetted finger, then carefully replaced it on the clean, gray sand. “It was sort of slimy,” said Straley, 9. “Gooey and soft. It was cool!”

His sister Georgia, 10, was just as enthralled. “We saw sun stars and clam shells and moon snails,” she said. “I like finding different stuff that I wouldn’t normally see.”

That went for the adults, too.

“This place is so rich in life,” MacGowan said. “And we didn’t even touch a fraction of it. This is a rocky beach. But there’s also sand, mud, all of it’s different. There are more different types of animals on these beaches than there are people in Seattle. No matter where you go, it’s all good, you just have to get out and look at it.”

Volunteer naturalist Rebecca Gamboa said she has been leading walks on Seattle beaches for years, partly just to make sure she gets outside herself.

“We’ve had people come on walks say they’ve lived here 25 years and didn’t even know this existed,” Gamboa said. “I’ve met third- and fourth-graders who say it’s their first time at the beach.

“It’s a huge opportunity to see a whole new world.”

Low-tide walks with naturalists

Free beach walks occur during low tides throughout June and July at Richmond Beach Park, Carkeek Park, Golden Gardens Park, Constellation Park/South Alki, Lincoln Park, Seahurst Park and Des Moines Beach Park, and even Blake Island.

Look for trained, volunteer beach naturalists courtesy of the Seattle Aquarium in red hats at the beaches.

For complete lists of dates and hours and driving directions to the beaches, go online: www.seattleaquarium.org/beach-naturalist