Spilyay Tymoo, Warm Springs, Oregon
June 1, 2022
Page 7
Federal government finally commits to fish sites improvements
Inadequate sewer and power sys-
tems, unsuitable housing or shelter,
increasing crime, lack of internet
or cell phone service, drinking wa-
ter wells that are easily contami-
nated, and abandoned vehicles and
boats—those are just some of the
problems that have stacked up for
managers of the 31 ‘in-lieu’ and
treaty fishing access sites along the
Columbia River.
The federal government
created the sites in Oregon and
Washington after the construction
of dams on the river flooded tribal
villages and fishing sites and dis-
placed citizens of the four Colum-
bia River treaty tribes whose ances-
tors had lived along the river and
relied on its salmon for thousands
of years.
But now, after the four treaty
tribes have fought for years to be
compensated for the loss of the
land, the federal government says
it’s serious about finally addressing
the sites’ infrastructure deficiencies.
During a tour of three sites ear-
lier this month, the top federal of-
ficial overseeing tribal affairs in the
U.S. announced that the government
would provide $880,000 to allow
for the development of a plan to
upgrade infrastructure at three of
some of the neediest tribal treaty
fishing sites. The money will also be
used to tackle immediate problems
like fixing shower and bathroom
facilities and removing hundreds of
abandoned vehicles and boats.
“This is a down payment,” De-
partment of the Interior Assistant
Secretary for Indian Affairs Bryan
Newland said while visiting the
Cooks Landing in-lieu site on the
Washington side of the river. “We’re
trying to get the infrastructure here
up to a place that’s fit for the people
who’ve always called this place
home.”
Part of larger allocation
The money is part of larger
project funding announcements
that Newland made during his visit.
In May, Newland announced a
$10.65 million package to repair
and upgrade Bureau of Indian Af-
fairs-owned water systems that had
experienced contamination, Envi-
ronmental Protection Agency vio-
lations, or were at risk of failing.
More than $8.7 million will be
used to address unsafe arsenic lev-
els in drinking water on the Hopi
Tribe’s reservation in Arizona, in
addition to $1.05 million to replace
a deficient and deteriorated water
distribution system for the Pacific
Northwest’s Nez Perce Tribe.
The following day, Newland an-
nounced nearly $10 million to aug-
ment or start six irrigation projects
across Indian Country, including a
$3.74 million project on the Yakama
Indian Reservation in Washington.
Newland was also scheduled that
day to attend a day-long event
hosted by the Yakama Nation to
hear from tribal leaders and com-
munity members about the missing
and murdered Indigenous person
epidemic and the need for more
urgent federal actions in central
Washington to stem the crisis.
The allocations that Newland an-
nounced come from a $13 billion
pool of money set aside for tribal
communities and Indian Country
projects in the $1.2 trillion infra-
structure bill signed by President Joe
Biden last year.
‘Historic lack of investment’
The construction of dams on the
Columbia River, starting in the
1930s, led to millions of jobs, eco-
nomic development for the region
and cheap hydroelectric power. But
the dams also meant the loss of fish-
ing sites and villages where tribal
members lived and fished for sus-
tenance and their livelihoods,
which, according to tribal leaders,
has contributed to chronic poverty
and unhealthy and unsafe living
conditions for tribal members liv-
ing along the river today.
To compensate the tribes for the
Chris Aadland/Underscore.news and Indian Country Today
Cooks Landing in-lieu site on the Washington side of the Columbia.
loss of those traditional places, the
federal government began acquir-
ing and developing a series of in-
lieu and treaty access fishing sites
to enable tribal citizens to again
exercise treaty-guaranteed fishing
rights in “usual and accustomed
places.” Development of the last
site was completed in 2011.
The sites were designed to al-
low tribal members to access the
river on a temporary basis. But,
with a lack of affordable housing
nearby, many tribal citizens began
living at the sites, which were far
from the four tribal nations’ res-
ervations and the services, like
health care, located there. With
the combination of overcrowding
from unintended habitation and
the federal government not pro-
viding adequate services at the
sites, people at many of the sites
now live in distressed, unsafe and
unhealthy conditions.
When it was acquired in the late
1950s, Cooks Landing where
Newland made his announcement
was one of the first in-lieu sites to
be developed. Between 20 and 25
Indigenous people live there year-
round, a number that grows to 45
or so during the fishing season,
according to the Columbia River
Inter-Tribal Fish Commission,
which manages the 31 treaty sites.
“Access to clean water is a fun-
damental human right. For de-
cades, tribal fishers have struggled
trying to meet this need,” said Aja
DeCoteau, CRITFC’s executive
director. “The water system im-
provements this funding will make
possible will improve the health
and dignity of tribal fishers and
their families along the Columbia
River.”
The four Columbia River treaty
tribes—the Confederated Tribes
of Warm Springs, the Nez Perce
Tribe, the Confederated Tribes of
the Umatilla Indian Reservation
and the Confederated Tribes and
Bands of the Yakama Nation—
formed CRITFC in 1977 to help
them advance their policy and
management interests in the Co-
lumbia River Basin. While the
Portland-based treaty rights
organization’s goal centers around
protecting and restoring salmon
populations, it has grown to oper-
ate a police department that is re-
sponsible for public safety at the
in-lieu and treaty fishing access
sites. The organization also pro-
vides basic services and manage-
ment at the sites.
At Cooks Landing, the water
supply wasn’t meant to handle its
current level of use, and contami-
nated well water led to an EPA
violation levied against the BIA in
2019, according to CRITFC. A
new well has since been drilled.
In addition, the wastewater sys-
tem, which requires frequent and
costly pumping, also needs to be
upgraded, and there’s no nearby
fire hydrant to help extinguish
fires. The bathroom and showers
are also in need of improvements.
And despite clean-up attempts,
abandoned vehicles and other
types of discarded property
quickly accumulate among the
trailers, campers and small shacks
that site residents call home.
During his tour, Newland said
the condition of the site and the
well contamination weren’t the
fault of those who lived there, but
instead the “result of a historic
lack of investment in the basic in-
frastructure here.”
“You don’t have to spend a lot
of time here to see that infra-
structure is lacking, so I’m really
glad and excited that we’re able to
make this investment,” Newland,
a citizen of the Bay Mills Indian
Community, said.
Attempts to fix the problems
CRITFC employees on the tour
said conditions at the sites vary,
but the need for the federal gov-
ernment to address basic infra-
structure needs is apparent at all.
The $880,000 isn’t the first at-
tempt to address issues at the sites
in recent years.
In 2019, Biden signed a bill
spearheaded by Congressional
Democrats in the Pacific North-
west that dedicated $11 million to
begin addressing unmet federal
obligations to maintain the sites
through safety and infrastructure
projects like electric hookup im-
provements and the hiring of
more police officers.
The legislation also called for
the sites to be studied. CRITFC
recently started the assessment,
which will lead to recommendations
for improvements and determine
usage levels, current conditions and
deficiencies at the sites, as well as
cost estimates for improvements.
A final report is expected this sum-
mer.
When the need for basic services
became more glaring during the
Covid-19 pandemic, CRITFC be-
gan offering some basic healthcare
measures like administering vac-
cines and partnering with local
healthcare provider One Commu-
nity Health and the Oregon Com-
munity Foundation to buy and out-
fit a mobile medical van.
Another urgent need, according
to CRITFC, is affordable housing
that allows access to the sites and
gives residents a safe, adequate
place to live near the river. Instead,
many tribal members have used the
sites, including the one Newland
toured with an Indian Country To-
day and Underscore.news reporter,
as long-term or permanent hous-
ing in small plywood shacks, trail-
ers or campers. Neither the 2019
legislation nor the recent announce-
ments from Newland addressed
housing.
The Yakama Nation is working
on an affordable housing
development near the river on the
Washington side in Wishram
Heights. The U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers is also developing a plan
to build homes for tribal citizens
near The Dalles to replace homes
lost to flooding due to dam con-
struction.
The recent tour wasn’t the first
time high-ranking federal officials
and politicians have visited the sites;
Newland also toured some of the
sites last fall with Oregon’s two U.S.
senators.
Someday, DeCoteau envisions
well-kept sites with ample access to
amenities like fresh water, show-
ers, working toilets and electricity
hookups.
She
said
the
government’s fulfillment of its
promises would also include access
to affordable housing near the sites
so tribal citizens could live near the
river without inundating the treaty
fishing sites and overwhelming their
services.
DeCoteau, a citizen of the Con-
federated Tribes and Bands of the
Yakama Nation and a descendent
of the Cayuse, Nez Perce and
Turtle Mountain Band of
Chippewa Indians, said CRITFC is
discovering that conditions at many
sites make them unappealing to
many tribal members who might
otherwise take advantage of
them.
“People know these sites exist.
They don’t want to bring their kids
down here, though,” DeCoteau said.
“How do we teach our next gen-
eration of fishers if they don’t even
feel safe coming to these sites
where they can catch a treaty-re-
served fish?”
Jeremy Takala, who is a mem-
ber of both the Yakama Nation
Tribal Council and CRITFC gov-
erning board, said the hydroelec-
tric dams have led to advances for
the region, but that citizens of the
four Columbia River treaty tribes
and those who use the fishing sites
are “getting left further and further
back.” The severed connections to
the river resulting from the dam
construction and flooding, he said,
have contributed to the ongoing his-
torical trauma many Yakama and
other Indigenous people experi-
ence.
Still, Takala and DeCoteau said
they’re optimistic that the $880,000
infusion, along with the two recent
visits from government officials
and lawmakers, is a sign the gov-
ernment is committed to fulfilling
its promises.
“I know things don’t happen
overnight,” Takala said at the Cooks
Landing site. “But I hope that we
keep moving forward to the next
steps.”
Article by Chris Aadland,
underscore.news and Indian Countr y
Today. The stor y is co-published
by Underscore.news and Indian
Country Today, a news partnership
that covers Indigenous communities
in the Pacific Northwest. Funding
is provided in part by the Meyer
Memorial Trust.