Tag: native americans

B.C. Supreme Court recognizes Aboriginal title over most of Richmond

The British Columbia Supreme Court quietly issued its long-awaited decision in Cowichan Tribes v. Canada on Thursday.

In a decision that is sure to ruffle feathers, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Barbara Young declared the Cowichan Tribes have established Aboriginal title to roughly 800 acres in Richmond.

A B.C. Supreme Court judge has recognized the Cowichan Nation’s Aboriginal title to parts of Lulu Island and the Fraser River’s south arm, concluding a five-year, 513-day trial — described as the longest in Canadian history.

The plaintiffs, including five tribes and several individuals, sought declarations of Aboriginal title over approximately 1,846 acres on Lulu Island, which now forms part of Richmond, home to B.C.’s largest airport.

“I agree that Aboriginal title is a prior and senior right to land,” Young writes in the ruling.

“The question of what remains of Aboriginal title after the granting of fee simple title to the same lands should be reversed. The proper question is: what remains of fee simple title after Aboriginal title is recognized in the same lands?”

Six defendants opposed the claim: the federal and provincial governments, the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority, the City of Richmond, and two other First Nations groups.

The 863-page judgment will have wide-reaching legal implications.

The court confirmed the Cowichan Nation has legal ownership, known as Aboriginal title, over specific lands on Lulu Island and parts of the Fraser River’s south arm.

The court found that when the government issued private land ownership (fee simple) and transferred certain highway lands in Cowichan territory, it wrongly interfered with the Cowichan Nation’s Aboriginal title.

Subsequently, except for lands tied to the Vancouver Airport Fuel Delivery Project, the court ruled that land titles held by Canada and the City of Richmond in Cowichan territory are legally flawed and invalid.

It instructs the federal government to negotiate a fair agreement with the Cowichan Nation that respects their Aboriginal title.

The provincial government must also negotiate “in good faith” with the Cowichan Nation to resolve conflicts over private land titles and highway lands in their territory, ensuring the process honours the Crown’s duty to act fairly.

The judgment is likely to be appealed given its potentially broad implications, but the immediate effect is the legal recognition of Cowichan title over specific lands.

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Nuking The Redskins’ Name Did Nothing To Help American Indians, And Nobody’s Surprised

Rumor’s out that the owners of the Washington Commanders are feeling the heat to reverse the 2020 decision by former owner Daniel Snyder to drop the team’s beloved Redskins name.

The reason? President Donald Trump’s recent threats regarding the team’s $3.7 billion plan to return the team’s stadium to the District of Columbia from its decades-long sojourn in Maryland. “I may put a restriction on them that if they don’t change the name back to the original ‘Washington Redskins,’ and get rid of the ridiculous moniker, ‘Washington Commanders,’” Trump posted, “I won’t make a deal for them to build a Stadium in Washington.”

Certainly, this lifelong Redskins fan wouldn’t mind Trump fighting on behalf of the fanbase of a storied franchise who still feels betrayed by a decision that had more to do with woke mob outrage in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death than with the purported social justice reasons given for why the team needed to alter its name and mascot.

“Redskins is racist,” asserted pundits across left-wing corporate media, a claim that finally gained traction when American corporations kowtowed to every woke activist in 2020 by claiming they would take whatever steps would appease the mob and its accusatory chants of “systemic racism.” Yet five years on, one might ask, what has the name change actually accomplished?

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Meet the Indian Slugger Liberals Insulted When They Forced the Cleveland Indians to Be Renamed

When the Cleveland Indians changed their name to the “Guardians” in 2021, it was supposed to be progress.

But for many Native Americans like me, it felt like something else entirely: being canceled.

On the Sunday of this past week, President Donald Trump stood up for us when he called on the team in Ohio to bring back its iconic name.

“Cleveland should do the same with the Cleveland Indians,” Trump wrote on Truth Social after calling for the Washington Redskins name to also be restored. “The Owner of the Cleveland Baseball Team, Matt Dolan, who is very political, has lost three Elections in a row because of that ridiculous name change. What he doesn’t understand is that if he changed the name back to the Cleveland Indians, he might actually win an Election.”

“Indians are being treated very unfairly,” Trump added. “MAKE INDIANS GREAT AGAIN (MIGA)!”

The original name wasn’t just a catchy title. It actually had meaning.

It was linked to Louis Sockalexis, a Native American outfielder who played for the then-Cleveland Spiders in the late 1890s.

Sockalexis, a member of the Penobscot Nation, was the first Native American widely recognized in professional baseball. In 1897, he hit .338 with an .845 OPS in 66 games, according to MLB.com.

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7,000-year-old Village Sites Reveal Thriving Life on Remote Alaskan Island

Archaeological discoveries on Shuyak Island in Alaska’s Kodiak Archipelago have unveiled a remarkable chapter in Native American history, with the identification of what may be the island’s oldest known settlement dating back approximately 7,000 years.

The groundbreaking findings, announced by the Alutiiq Museum’s archaeology team, have dramatically expanded our understanding of ancient Indigenous settlement patterns across Alaska’s rugged coastal landscape. Led by Patrick Saltonstall, the museum’s curator of archaeology, the multi-year survey has uncovered dozens of previously undocumented village sites, particularly on the island’s lesser-studied eastern shores, reports Alaska Public Media.

Shuyak Island, known in the Alutiiq language as Suu’aq meaning “rising out of the water,” has long been considered sparsely populated throughout its history. Today, the island is largely encompassed by Shuyak Island State Park, attracting kayakers and wildlife enthusiasts to its pristine wilderness. However, the recent archaeological evidence tells a different story.

“Shuyak Island has always sort of been a place where I think it seems like there were fewer people up there,” Saltonstall explained. “But finding that, you know what your preconceptions are and what you actually find often don’t match” reported Archaeology Magazine.

The survey identified one remarkable village site featuring 11 house pits that researchers believe housed between 200 and 300 people approximately 300 years ago. Even more surprising was the discovery of the 7,000-year-old settlement, which represents the earliest evidence of human habitation ever found on the island.

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New Cal State policy bans professors from showing Native American artifacts in class

The California State University system has rolled out a new policy that prohibits professors from using Native American “cultural items” in class – unless they obtain permission from the tribe.

The policy, announced last week, drew criticism from a California anthropologist who described it as an “attack” on the preservation of knowledge. However, a campus free speech attorney praised CSU for dropping a section of the policy that restricted free speech.

The 23-campus system has been working on the revised policy for several years in connection to the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, or NAGPRA, and California’s state version. The laws require government and public entities to restore human remains and “cultural items” to their direct descendants.

The policy, published July 1, outlines the method by which universities must identify and repatriate these items to Native American tribes.

“All CSU campuses must implement processes that ensure timely, lawful repatriation of Human Remains and Cultural Items, including respectful treatment and handling while in CSU custody,” the policy states.

It also requires campuses to “respect Native American traditional knowledge and cultural protocols, ensuring that no decisions are made without meaningful Tribal consultation.”

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Minnesota Tribe Opens State’s First Recreational Marijuana Store Off Reservation Lands, As Cities Plan Government-Run Dispensaries

A Native American tribe over the weekend opened Minnesota’s first-ever legal recreational marijuana store outside of a reservation. The new shop, in Moorhead, will be followed next month by another location in St. Cloud that will also be operated by the White Earth Nation.

Meanwhile, as Minnesota’s adult-use cannabis market gets up and running, more than a dozen cities and counties are seeking to open their own, government-run stores.

“This has never been done before, being the first to be able to open an off-reservation dispensary, let alone just the first dispensary in the state,” Zach Wilson, CEO of White Earth Nation’s cannabis business, Waabigwan Mashkiki, told Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) about the Moorhead store.

The launch of the new shop comes after Gov. Tim Walz (DFL) signed of a landmark agreement earlier this month to allow the tribe to operate up to eight retail marijuana stores across the state.

Everything the store sells “is all completely vertical, seed to sale,” with products grown, processed and packaged by Waabigwan Mashkiki—which means flower medicine in Ojibway—Wilson said. “The only thing we don’t manufacture is our beverages, but everything else absolutely, completely in house.”

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Minnesota Signs First-Of-Its-Kind Agreement Allowing Indian Tribe To Sell Legal Marijuana Outside Reservation

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (DFL) has signed a landmark agreement with the White Earth Nation that will allow the tribe to operate up to eight retail marijuana stores across the state. Already the tribe is preparing to open storefronts in Moorhead and St. Cloud.

Walz signed the new compact on Tuesday, making White Earth Nation—also known as the White Earth Band of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe—the first tribal entity in the state to reach an agreement with the state on selling legal cannabis outside of tribal land.

Notably, Minnesota’s 2023 cannabis legalization law allows tribes within the state to open marijuana businesses before state licensing of businesses begins. Following the law’s enactment, a number of tribal governments, including White Earth Nation, the Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians and the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe, made early moves to enter the market.

Minnesota officials said the next compact with another tribe could be signed within a few weeks.

The new agreement with White Earth will allow the storefronts to be located off tribal land but still be regulated by tribal authorities. It also requires at least some distance between the storefronts, with the tribe limited to no more than one retail location per city and three per county.

Under the compact, White Earth will also be able to open marijuana cultivation and manufacturing facilities off of tribal land and engage in wholesale transactions, transportation and delivery of cannabis.

The interim director of the Minnesota’s Office of Cannabis Management (OCM), Eric Taubel, described the state’s new deal with White Earth Nation to local reporters as a “nation-leading approach to cannabis compacting.”

“We’ll be the first state where not only are tribes operating cannabis businesses off tribal land, but they’re also doing so under tribal regulatory authority,” he told The Minnesota Star-Tribune, adding that Minnesota cannabis regulators will still be permitted to conduct an annual facility inspection and can take further steps if they believe stores are selling risky products.

Taubel also said that while the White Earth compact allows up to eight dispensary locations, he doubts that any of the 11 recognized tribal nations in Minnesota will actually open that many.

“Candidly, I don’t suspect any tribe will get past about three to four stores for the next two years just because of the actual cost in setting up these stores,” Taubel said.

Zach Wilson, CEO of Waabigwan Mashkiki—White Earth Nation’s cannabis business—told the Star-Tribune that the first off-reservation store could open as soon as this weekend.

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One Out Of Four Indian Tribes In The U.S. Is Now Involved In Marijuana Or Hemp Programs, New Map Shows

A new infographic from an advocacy group representing Native American tribes in the legal cannabis industry shows that more than a fourth of Indigenous communities in the continental United States are now involved with marijuana or hemp programs.

The map, created by the Indigenous Cannabis Industry Association (ICIA) in collaboration with the law firm Vicente, shows the locations of more than 100 tribal marijuana and hemp programs across the country.

Overall, approximately 26 percent of the 358 federally recognized Indigenous communities in the continental U.S. are now involved in some sort of cannabis program, the groups said.

The data, they said in a press release, “shows that the Indigenous cannabis industry is trending upward in terms of jobs, community development, and overall industry growth, with many Tribes currently scaling to meet demands for global cannabis distribution.”

“Since the first regulated Indigenous cannabis storefront opened almost 10 years ago in Washington State,” the groups said, “dozens of sovereign Indigenous communities have created their own unique regulatory systems to govern cannabis cultivation, production and sales.”

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22 More People, Entities Charged in Arizona Medicaid Fraud Scheme

An Arizona grand jury has indicted 22 individuals and entities linked to a massive Medicaid fraud scheme involving sober living homes.

The charges include money laundering, theft, conspiracy, fraudulent schemes, patient referral fraud, and forgery, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes announced Tuesday.

These indictments are part of an ongoing investigation into a $2.7 billion fraud that exploited Arizona’s health care system, particularly targeting Native Americans seeking treatment for drug and alcohol addiction.

According to the charge document, the 20 individuals indicted are associated with a church and a mental health organization called Happy House Behavioral Health. Prosecutors allege that Happy House was paid over $60 million for services that were either never rendered or only partially completed. Some of the billing, they say, was for clients who were deceased or incarcerated.

Prosecutors also allege that sober living facilities referred clients to Happy House, which in turn received funds from the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS), the state’s Medicaid agency. Happy House then allegedly paid the referring sober homes for those client placements, an arrangement at the center of the fraudulent scheme charges.

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A law that helped convert Indigenous people is now used to get churches near—and on—school grounds

Earlier this year, a small school district just north of Tucson made an unusual decision: It would allow the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to build a complex on public school district grounds where students could be released from class to worship.

But the project quickly unraveled. A few weeks later, the Vail Unified School District reversed course, saying the church canceled the contract after local media reports and secular groups criticized the plan. Still, the construction of religious buildings near schools for the temporary release of students to practice their faith has become a growing concern of church-state separation advocates, who argue it violates legal requirements that keep public schools secular.

In Arizona and several other states, ‘release time’ for religious instruction is not only legal—it’s common.

State law allows students to be excused from school during the day to participate in religious instruction off campus. In the case of LDS students, these classes often include lifestyle lessons. They are typically held in buildings just outside campus boundaries, sometimes only a few hundred feet away.

Religious conservatives have pushed to expand release-time programs nationwide, arguing there is no need to separate religion from daily education. Here, such programs are only growing more popular.

Arizona’s history with religious release time

More than a dozen states currently require school districts to adopt release-time policies.

Most recently, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, signed a bill in February mandating school districts create a release-time policy after two districts rescinded theirs. Previously, Ohio law didn’t require districts to offer the program. The new law, known as the Parents’ Bill of Rights, also bans discussions of sexuality or gender identity before fourth grade.

The Guardian reported that the Arizona-based Alliance Defending Freedom, designated an anti-LGBTQ+ hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, has helped draft model legislation for states to expand release-time programs. This gives parents more authority over their children’s ‘moral and religious’ upbringing, often limiting exposure to diverse communities and families.

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