Spiritual Encampments Planned Along
Proposed Route
With the release
of a U.S. State Department environmental impact study of the
controversial Keystone XL pipeline that reported no significant
impact, tribes and environmental groups across the Northern Plains
rallied against the project’s advancement.
Over the next 90 days, during which,
the federal government begins its final review process for approval
of the pipeline, an alliance of Lakota, Dakota and Nakota tribes in
South Dakota and Nebraska – known as the Oceti Sakowin (Seven
Council Fires), analogous to the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe – have
gone on a defensive campaign against TransCanada, the company
responsible for the proposed pipeline.
Of those tribal nations dissenting,
the Rosebud Sioux Tribe has taken the lead in opposing the pipeline
approval process. It launched an initiative called Oyate Wahacanka
Woecun (“Shield the People”) through its Tribal Historic
Preservation Office, that is calling for action from all corners of
the political world beginning with environmental activists all the
way up to the White House. One of the project’s direct actions in
opposing the pipeline will be to set up a series of tipi encampments
along the proposed route in South Dakota and Nebraska, beginning at
the end of March and going throughout the summer.
According to a video produced by the
project, and featuring tribal officials and spiritual leaders,
including Leonard Crow Dog, Sr., a set of tipi sites will be erected
to, “provide awareness on the need for cultural preservation based
on the existing treaties with the United States government and to
shine a light on the root cause of the XL Pipeline … greed.”
Project public relations coordinator
Aldo Seoane highlighted consultation by the State Department as the
impetus for the tribes’ resistance to the Keystone XL project. “We’re
oposing the pipeline for several reasons. The main is the
programmatic agreement, we weren’t approached to be a part of [it].
And even the land survey and site survey they did wasn’t done
properly.”
He continued by detailing what the
tribes believes were missteps in the company’s research
methodologies. “The Tribal Historic Preservation Office was not
contacted – [TransCanada] actually went with the Yankton Sioux
Tribe … [it] did not do an on-the-ground survey. We don’t think
[Yankton] was aware that that was what they were going to use the
information for. But when you look at the EIS report, it doesn’t show
any culturally-significant areas. When we went and did our study of
just one section of the pipeline route, we found cultural marking.
THPO found a turtle effigy on the pipeline route, right where the
pipe is going through, south of Colome.”
While the tribes have been largely
silent to media on the issues, Seoane explained they saw it as an
internal political matter to be handled at the top federal levels.
“They’ve been fighting since Keystone 1 was put in the ground, six
years ago. A lot of the tribes initially took the stance of silence,
like we’re not going to acknowledge it because it fell under treaty
responsibilities: it’s the Department of Interior’s treaty
responsibility and trust responsibility to look after our resources.”
However, with the federal government’s
most recent EIS report, the tribes have taken a new approach to
making their case against the pipeline. “When we saw that those
responsibilities weren’t being held by them, that’s when we began to
act. We saw this work that’s being done by TransCanada and this
report that’s being generated, we knew we had to take a stand. So we
created [Shield the People] through THPO.”
The fight against the pipeline began
in earnest in October when Rosebud started utilizing its tribal
officials to lobby the Obama administration at every level. Included
in that strategy were multiple partnerships with activist
organizations such as the Sierra Club, 350.org and Bold Nebraska. The
latter organization, an alliance of landowners in Nebraska, had been
primarily focused on fighting the use of eminent domain by
TransCanada to clear the pipeline’s path.
On Feb. 19, Lancaster County Judge
Stephanie Stacy ruled that a 2012 state law that allowed Nebraska
Gov. Dave Heineman to employ eminent domain against landowners
overreached his authority. The ruling allowed the process to be
handled by the state’s Public Service Commission. TransCanada said it
disagreed with the decision but remained silent on whether or not it
would appeal the decision at the state level.
In addition to legal avenues by
allies, the tribes have started their own political pressure on the
Obama administration. A small delegation from the Rosebud Sioux Tribe
traveled to Washington, D.C. in late February to confront officials
in the Department of Interior and the Environmental Protection
Agency. According to the tribe, the errors in the programmatic
agreement and the EIS were glaring and required correction. Tribal
President Cyril Scott, Council Representatives Russell Eagle Bear,
Gabriel Medicine Eagle and Ben Rhodd, a tribal archaeologist, met
with administration officials but received no immediate word on
whether or not their objections would be weighed in the final
decision. “We haven’t gotten anything back from them and it’s
really disheartening. We’re really disappointed that they take their
responsibilities so lightly. We hope that we have the opportunity to
meet with the president and that he would weigh the concerns of the
people along with his own guidelines on consultation,” Seoane said.
The effort to fight the Obama
administration on the pipeline was made even more poignant when
tribal activists on MSNBC’s “The Ed Show” called on the president
to honor treaty obligations, by invoking his adopted Apsaalooke
(Crow) family name. In 2008, Obama was adopted into the tribe by
Hartford and Mary Black Eagle and given the name, “One Who Helps
People Throughout the Land.” Gary Dorr, Nez Perce, said, “I would
ask him to look at his own initiative on consultation and these
tribes that are all along from Montana all the way down to Texas. We
deserve that consultation, we enjoy a special relationship with the
United States as a nation-to-nation government.”
Another point at issue for tribes in
the Oceti Sakowin is the mixed messages sent by the administration.
In 2011, the Interior Department launched its Tribal Consultation
Policy, which advocates say was left largely ignored throughout the
Keystone XL approval process.
“The major concern we have is
obviously the effect that it could have on the natural resources, on
the people, on the sacred sites. And the fact that the tribe has not
been consulted, multiple tribes have not been consulted, as part of
this process, which is required under Section 106 of the National
Historic Preservation Act and it’s also required by the Presidential
Initiative on Tribal Consultation,” Dorr said. According to a press
release, the tribes were invited to sign the programmatic agreement
as a concurring party and not as a signatory party, a distinction
that allows for the tribes to execute, amend or terminate any
memorandum of agreement on any tribal issue.
But for all the political posturing
and legal wrangling, the most alarming account of the interactions
between the company and tribes was, according to Seoane, when tribal
representatives sought out an interaction with a company
representative, known only as Mr. Anderson. “We met with them –
it wasn’t because they asked us – we actually heard they were going
to be in a neighboring community of Winner. So we went out there to
give them a copy of our resolution against TransCanada and we had
previous resolutions drafted and various talking points. But this one
is very specific to us not acknowledging the pipeline and our intent
to stop them,” Seoane said.
An overwhelming issue for tribes in
the path of the Keystone XL pipeline is the potential for sexual
violence, stemming from the work camps which could be made up of up
to 600 men. Given reports of sexual violence in North Dakota’s Bakken
oil fields, the tribes are not eager to expose their citizens to more
potential for sexual violence. “We asked their representatives
various questions they couldn’t answer. Our biggest concern – along
with the water and treaty violations – was what happens to our
women and children because of the jurisdictional issues that are
associated with having non-Native men so close to Native women? And
that was something they hadn’t considered and they couldn’t give us a
response,” Seoane said.
With the statistical realities that
one in three Native women have been exposed to violence and of those,
86 percent of those crimes reported are perpetrated by non-Natives,
the tribes are mindful of the potential risks in exposing their
communities to situations like those in North Dakota.
“There was a situation that occurred
in North Dakota where a young boy was passed around for three months,
between trailers before people found out. And like, how are you going
stop that? How are you going to stop women from being taken,
abducted, or how are you going to stop all the violence that occurs?
And we even asked them, ‘what are your background check requirements?
Do you have pedophiles in your organization, working for you?’ And
[Anderson] couldn’t respond – he said, ‘well that’s the
responsibility of the subcontractor but we stress upon them … ‘”
Although education and advocacy remain
the first weapons for the tribes in fighting the pipeline, they
remain realistic about expectations. “The tribes would continue to
object to it because there’s no way TransCanada can meet any or all
of those terms. We’re talking about the fact that the pipeline is the
entire length of the state, it falls under the 1868 [Ft. Laramie]
Treaty, so they have to consult with all of the bands and all of the
bands have to agree that they can go through that land,” Seoane
said.
“We’re going to stand our ground. A
lot of the pipeline route – we don’t acknowledge the act after the
Ft. Laramie Treaties – a lot of the route is going through treaty
land and it’s right next to allotted land. Even with their easement,
maybe their easement isn’t on directly on property land but they have
to have 150-foot easement on either side to bring the machinery in –
their easements are on our property, too. So we will take a stand, we
will have our spiritual camps on the route. We will try to come from
a peaceful place in the hope that the government will not turn their
back on their responsibilities.”
