House votes climate change aid to native villages on Olympic Peninsula
Seventeen Native American tribal communities have made ancestral homes along the 3,000 miles of Washington's marine coastline. Such villages as the Taholah and La Push on the Washington Coast are confronting climate change with rising ocean levels and tsunami dangers.
The U.S. House of Representatives, on Tuesday, passed a bill package including the Tribal Coastal Resiliency Act, designed to get resources for tribes in coastal areas to deal with climate change and relocate to higher ground.
"This bill will make available to tribes grant money for the protection and preservation of Tribal coastal zones and areas . . . I urge the Senate to immediately pass this important legislation," said Quinault tribal president Fawn Sharp. Sharp is also president of the National Congress of American Indians.
Rep. Derek Kilmer, D-Wash., whose district includes the Olympic Peninsula, argued that help is needed -- now.
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