Indian Time - A Voice from the Eastern Door

Washington. February 13, 2019. The Bureau of Land Management and Department of the Interior held its final public hearing on oil and gas leasing on the Arctic Refuge coastal plain in Washington, D.C. Key voices in the efforts to protect the Arctic Refuge presented public testimony directly to BLM and DOI officials. The Trump administration chose to schedule only a single hearing in the lower 48 with less than two weeks’ notice, making it clear that it would rather discourage public attendance than provide a fair opportunity to demonstrate public support for America’s largest national wildlife refuge and the people and wildlife that depend on it.

Several Gwich’in environmental and tribal representatives attended the hearing, including, Bernadette Demientieff, Executive Director of the Gwich’in Steering Committee.

Demientieff stated, “The only chance for the American public outside of Alaska to comment on Arctic Refuge leasing comes today in Washington, D.C. I have been here more times than I can count, sometimes alone, sometimes with my Gwich’in family, most recently with Indigenous leaders from across the country. Today I am here to say the Gwich’in matter. We are real people. We are mothers, fathers. We have jobs. We are not asking for anything but to hold on to our identity. We want to keep our environment healthy for future generations. The Arctic Refuge is not just a piece of land with oil underneath. It is the heart of our people, our food and our way of life. Our survival depends on its protection.”

 Charleen Fisher, Executive Director, Council of Athabascan Tribal Governments added,

“The Council of Athabascan Tribal Governments recently reaffirmed through resolution our commitment to protecting our sacred places. The Chiefs’ Council, consisting of ten-member tribes, continues to insist on government to government consultation with the BLM through this process and the appropriate ANILCA 810 evaluation of subsistence impacts to be conducted. We encourage the BLM to respect the traditional knowledge of Alaska Indigenous people, including the Gwich’in. The BLM draft EIS has excluded the fact that our member tribes will be impacted by the proposed development of the Arctic Refuge coastal plain, the Gwich’in sacred place known as “Iizhik Gwats’an Gwandaii Goodlit” (The Sacred Place Where Life Begins).”

Lennox Yearwood, Jr., President and CEO of the Hip Hop Caucus stated at the hearing, “We stand in solidarity with the Gwich’in people who have lived on the land for thousands of years and the vast majority of American voters who oppose drilling there. The current administration’s unlawful tactics are truly shameful and fit into their continued pattern of putting polluter profits over people and the planet. Together we are united with a broad coalition in opposition to their plans and will continue fighting for those impacted first and worst by fossil fuel production and the impacts of climate change, the poor, Indigenous peoples, and communities of color.”

Other testimonies included: 

Michael Wald, Owner, Arctic Wild, “My family and I are traveling from Alaska to D.C. because we want to show decision-makers that not all Alaskans think that the Arctic Refuge should be part of North America’s largest oil field. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t at least try to express to the government how important the Refuge is to my family. I have traveled nearly every river in the Refuge, and spend weeks out of every year there for decades. It is where my heart lives. I have read the EIS closely and the federal government itself concludes that industrial development will cause irreparable harm to polar bears, caribou, and Native Alaskan’s subsistence way of life. We need to make sure there will be no oil development in the Arctic Refuge.”

Anna Jane Joyner, Co-host of “No Place Like Home”, worked at the intersection of faith, conservation, and justice for more than a decade, “As an evangelical preacher’s daughter, I’m blessed to share the Episcopal tradition with many of my Gwich’in brothers and sisters. The central tenants of Christianity are to love God and protect our neighbors. We’re called on to cherish and protect this miraculous gift of life that God so lovingly created and the earth that us. To destroy the Arctic Refuge would show callous disrespect to the Creator and harms some of our most vulnerable neighbors. As Christians, we must oppose these efforts. I hope and pray you’ll join me and the Gwich’in in doing so.”

Amanda Robinson, Creation Justice Ministries, “Such harm to this special part of God’s creation has no moral justification. The question posed today is whether in 2019 the United States government will make the same grave errors it did in previous centuries towards indigenous people. From Creation Justice Ministries, the Episcopal Church, and the millions of people we represent, we urge you not to inflict such horrors again. Church communities ave become more aware and forceful about our moral responsibility to protect the Gwich’in peoples’ ability to culturally, spiritually and physically rely on the bounty of the Arctic Refuge as they have from more than 10,000 years. We seek to rectify injustices toward indigenous communities, and we refuse to allow perpetuation of this historical trauma.”