Siletz tribe has hunting & fishing rights restored under long-sought court ruling

LINCOLN CITY, Ore. (AP) — Drumming made the floor vibrate and singing filled the conference room of the Chinook Winds Casino Resort in Lincoln City, on the Oregon coast, as hundreds in tribal regalia danced in a circle.

For the last 47 years, the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians have held an annual powwow to celebrate regaining federal recognition. This month's event, however, was especially significant: It came just two weeks after a federal court lifted restrictions on the tribe's rights to hunt, fish and gather — restrictions tribal leaders had opposed for decades.

"We're back to the way we were before," Siletz Chairman Delores Pigsley said. "It feels really good."

The Siletz is a confederation of over two dozen bands and tribes whose traditional homelands spanned a large swath of what is now western Oregon. The federal government in the 1850s forced them onto a reservation on the Oregon coast, where they were confederated together as a single, federally recognized tribe despite their different backgrounds and languages.

In the 1950s and '60s, Congress revoked recognition of over 100 tribes, including the Siletz, under a policy known as "termination." Affected tribes lost millions of acres of land as well as federal funding and services.

"The goal was to try and assimilate Native people, get them moved into cities," said Matthew Campbell, deputy director of the Native American Rights Fund. "But also I think there was certainly a financial aspect to it. I think the United States was trying to see how it could limit its costs in terms of providing for tribal nations."

Losing their lands and self-governance was painful, and the tribes fought for decades to regain federal recognition. In 1977, the Siletz became the second tribe to succeed, following the restoration of the Menominee Tribe in Wisconsin in 1973.

But to get a fraction of its land back — roughly 3,600 acres (1,457 hectares) of the 1.1-million-acre (445,000-hectare) reservation established for the tribe in 1855 — the Siletz tribe had to agree to a federal court order that restricted their hunting, fishing and gathering rights. It was only one of two tribes in the country, along with Oregon's Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, compelled to do so to regain tribal land.

The settlement limited where tribal members could fish, hunt and gather for ceremonial and subsistence purposes, and it imposed caps on how many salmon, elk and deer could be harvested in a year. It was devastating, tribal chair Pigsley recalled: The tribe was forced to buy salmon for ceremonies because it couldn't provide for itself, and people were arrested for hunting and fishing violations.

"Giving up those rights was a terrible thing," Pigsley, who has led the tribe for 36 years, told The Associated Press earlier this year. "It was unfair at the time, and we've lived with it all these years."

Decades later, Oregon and the U.S. came to recognize that the agreement subjecting the tribe to state hunting and fishing rules was biased, and they agreed to join the tribe in recommending to the court that the restrictions be lifted.

"The Governor of Oregon and Oregon's congressional representatives have since acknowledged that the 1980 Agreement and Consent Decree were a product of their times and represented a biased and distorted position on tribal sovereignty, tribal traditions, and the Siletz Tribe's ability and authority to manage and sustain wildlife populations it traditionally used for tribal ceremonial and subsistence purposes," attorneys for the U.S., state and tribe wrote in a joint court filing.

Late last month, the tribe finally succeeded in having the court order vacated by a federal judge. A separate agreement with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife has given the tribe a greater role in regulating tribal hunting and fishing.

As Pigsley reflected on those who passed away before seeing the tribe regain its rights, she expressed hope about the next generation carrying on essential traditions.

"There's a lot of youth out there that are learning tribal ways and culture," she said. "It's important today because we are trying to raise healthy families, meaning we need to get back to our natural foods."

Among those celebrating and praying at the powwow was Tiffany Stuart, donning a basket cap her ancestors were known for weaving, and her 3-year-old daughter Kwestaani Chuski, whose name means "six butterflies" in the regional Athabaskan language from southwestern Oregon and northwestern California.

Given the restoration of rights, Stuart said, it was "very powerful for my kids to dance."

"You dance for the people that can't dance anymore," she said.

Biden's public lands director named to lead environmental group

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — A senior official in President Joe Biden's administration who oversaw its contentious efforts to address climate change by curbing oil drilling and coal mining on federal lands while expanding renewable power was named Tuesday as the next president of a prominent environmental group.

U.S. Bureau of Land Management Director Tracy Stone-Manning will become president of The Wilderness Society effective next February, the Washington, D.C.-based group announced.

The land bureau shifted sharply away from fossil fuel extraction during her tenure, including two decisions released Tuesday that end new federal coal sales from the nation's most productive reserves of the fuel along the Wyoming-Montana border.

Stone-Manning's 2021 nomination by Biden was bitterly opposed by Republicans who labeled her an "eco-terrorist" over her past ties with environmental extremists. Senate Democrats pushed through her confirmation on a party-line vote.

The land bureau has jurisdiction over almost a quarter-billion acres (100 million hectares) of land, primarily in western states, that is used for oil exploration, mining, livestock grazing, recreation and other purposes.

Under Stone-Manning the bureau sharply reduced oil and gas lease sales and raised royalty rates that companies must pay to extract the fuel. It also issued a rule elevating the importance of conservation, by making it a "use" of public lands on par with drilling or grazing.

That marked a sharp departure from the land bureau's longstanding reputation for favoring commercial development over environmental preservation.

The moves drew pushback from the energy, mining and ranching industries and Republican in Congress. They have vowed to undo actions taken by Stone-Manning when the GOP assumes control in Washington next year as a result of its 2024 election wins.

Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon said the decision to end coal leasing in the Powder River Basin area of northeast Wyoming and southeast Montana would have devastating economic effects. The Republican accused the Biden administration of a "crusade" against coal and said he would work with his state's congressional delegation to reverse it.

"This is not a balanced resource management strategy, but an anti-fossil fuel, politically-motivated action taken before the door slams on this administration," Gordon said in a statement.

The land bureau under Biden also approved new solar and wind power projects and opened more public lands to renewable energy development.

It is uncertain if the changes will last.

Rep. Raul Grijalva, a Democrat from Arizona, praised the work done by Stone-Manning on renewable energy, but added that it could be "completely undone" by the next administration.

"Whether it's through rock-bottom royalty rates, rigged rulemaking, or stripped environmental protections, our public lands will soon be a profit playground for the rich," said Grijalva, the ranking Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee.

President-elect Donald Trump has pledged to drop Biden's climate and energy policies in a bid to increase oil and gas production that is already at record levels. He has nominated North Dakota Republican Gov. Doug Burgum to lead the Interior Department, which includes the Bureau of Land Management. Oil industry representatives and Republicans from energy states cheered Burgum's nomination.

Before joining the administration, Stone-Manning worked as a senior aide to Montana Democrats U.S. Sen. Jon Tester and Gov. Steve Bullock. Her nomination by Biden sparked intense Republican opposition because of Stone-Manning's involvement in a 1989 environmental sabotage case.

As a 23-year-old graduate student at the University of Montana, Stone-Manning sent a letter to federal officials in 1989 saying spikes had been inserted into trees in an Idaho national forest, a tactic sometimes used to halt timber sales.

Two men were criminally charged, and Stone-Manning testified against them. She was given immunity and never charged with crimes, although an investigator later said she had stonewalled the probe.

After Tester and moderate Sen. Joe Manchin defended her, Stone-Manning was confirmed on a 50-45 vote.

The bureau's headquarters were relocated to Colorado under Trump and hundreds of employees resigned or retired before it was returned to Washington, D.C., under Biden.

Interior Secretary Deb Haaland's chief of staff, Rachael Taylor, said in a statement that Stone-Manning had reshaped the bureau after it was "damaged" by the relocation. Taylor said Stone-Manning also helped restore balance to public lands decisions and made sure Native American tribes have a role in managing their homelands.

Trump has not announced his nominee to lead the land bureau. During the Republican's first-term, it went without a Senate-confirmed director. Trump instead used acting directors who did not have to go before the Senate to advance his policies.