Navajo Nation President Asks Congress To Honor Its Ban On Uranium Mining In Navajo Country

[troubleinwinter]

Posted by Bobbieo, DU's own blogger 'Native Unity' for Native American news and issues-

Original message
Navajo Nation President Asks Congress To Honor Its Ban On Uranium Mining In Navajo Country

No More Divide And Conquer!!!!!

http://nativeunity.blogspot.com

Navajo President, Joe Shirley Jr., On Uranium Mining - No More Divide And Conquer!
By Kathy Helms
Dine Bureau
WINDOW ROCK – Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley Jr., testifying Wednesday in Washington, asked members of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee to respect the Nation's tragic experience with uranium mining and to honor its ban on uranium mining within Navajo Indian Country.

“I will not allow dividing and conquering the Navajo people to remain a profitable strategy,” he told the committee chaired by U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., and co-chaired by ranking Republican U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici as it heard testimony on abandoned mines, hardrock mining and reform of the 1872 mining law.

The hearing coincided with a lawsuit filed Wednesday by the public interest law firm Earthjustice, representing groups in New Mexico, Nevada, Illinois and Idaho, which seeks to close a loophole currently allowing mining companies and other polluting industries to skip out on costly cleanups by declaring bankruptcy. http://nativeunity.blogspot.com

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=138907&mesg_id=138954 :

From 1944 to 1986, 3.9 million tons of uranium ore were dug and blasted from Navajo soil, nearly all of it for America's atomic arsenal. Navajos inhaled radioactive dust, drank contaminated water and built homes using rock from the mines and mills. Many of the dangers persist to this day. This four-part series examines the legacy of uranium mining on the Navajo reservation.

BLIGHTED HOMELAND: Four-part Los Angeles Times series, November 2006:

A peril that dwelt among the Navajos

During the Cold War, uranium mines left contaminated waste scattered around the Indians. Homes built with the material silently pulsed with radiation. People developed cancer. And the U.S. did little to help.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-navajo19nov19,0,1645689.story

Oases in Navajo desert contained 'a witch's brew'

Rain-filled uranium pits provided drinking water for people and animals. Then a mysterious wasting illness emerged.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-navajo20nov20,0,6106722.story

Navajos' desert cleanup no more than a mirage

Through a federal program, decontamination seemed possible. But delays and disputes thwarted the effort.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-navajo21nov21,0,6565476.story

Mining firms again eyeing Navajo land

Demand for uranium is soaring. But the tribe vows a 'knockdown, drag-out legal battle.'

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-navajo22nov22,0,7024230.story

Do check the multimedia photo galleries for each section here: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-navajo-series,0,4515615.special

A few followup articles:

Still no toxic cleanup plan for Navajos
The EPA plans to resume long-stalled testing for uranium mine hazards, but a coordinated federal strategy is still lacking, lawmakers told. http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-navajo7dec07,0,252171.story

Navajos seek funds to clear uranium contamination
Tribal officials ask Congress for $500 million to deal with wastes left by mining for bombs, nuclear power plants. http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-navajo24oct24,0,4730461.story

Enron prosecutor takes on Navajo uranium cleanup
The tribe hires John C. Hueston to press the U.S. to remove toxic material from its land.

I know many of the people profiled and quoted in the article. I spend time in their homes and villages/towns. Each family must drive over dirt roads long distances EVERY DAY to draw water for thier flocks and themselves from a deep well at the trading post because their own wells, ponds and streams are poisoned.

We complain about the price of gas. One woman said to me, "We feel the gas prices before anyone else. When gas goes up, the tourists don't come so we have less income, and we still have to go far for our water."

I know a very old woman who is a widow of a uranium miner who died of uranium poisoning. The government admits that she is due compensation. She has waited more than 30 years to get through the red-tape. She wants the money before she dies so she can have a deep well drilled for her community so they can have good water. She is 95 now.

Rep. Tom Udall (D-New Mexico) is now running for U.S. Senate, and has a deep understanding of the issue and has worked closely with the Navajo on Uranium cleanup. http://www.udallforusall.com/index.php

Howard Shanker is running for Congressman in District 1 of Arizona that encompasses the AZ portion of the Navajo reservation. He is an attorney who has worked with the Navajo (accompanying them to Washington DC for testimony at Rep. Waxman's hearings) on this issue and other environmental issues.

From candidate Shanker's site:

Uranium Contamination
Many of you have read about the testimony in recent Congressional hearings presented to Rep. Henry Waxman, Chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, regarding the legacy of uranium contamination on Navajo land. For decades, the Navajo Nation and many grass roots organizations have been trying to address this human tragedy in real terms -- with only marginal success.

Hopefully, one of the defining moments of this struggle took place last week. As one of the attorneys representing the Navajo Nation on the uranium contamination issue, I had the privilege of working with the Navajo delegation to help prepare them for this hearing. I was also honored to attend the hearing in Washington, D.C. and to monitor the testimony and questions first hand. In spite of ongoing discussions with the Bureau of Indian Affairs ("BIA"), the Department of Energy ("DOE"), and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency ("EPA"), and limited clean up of specific areas, this was the first sense I had that something meaningful may actually be accomplished – that this tragic legacy of contamination may eventually be addressed on a large scale.

An L.A. Times article from November 2006 first alerted Chairman Waxman to the plight of the Navajo - not the fact that the federal government had utterly failed to address this mess for decades. As outlined in the L.A. Times article, "from 1944 to 1986, 3.9 million tons of uranium ore were chiseled and blasted from the mountains and plains. The mines provided uranium for the Manhattan project, the top-secret effort to develop an atomic bomb . . . private companies operated the mines, but the U.S. government was the sole customer. . . . As the Cold War threat gradually diminished over the next two decades, more than 1,000 mines and four processing mills on tribal land shut down." The radioactive waste and debris from these operations, however, largely remains. People live in and around uranium-contaminated areas. Livestock grazes and children play amongst radioactive waste and debris. There is a palpable threat of radioactive contamination to the ground water in many areas.

At the hearing, Edith Hood, while choking back tears, talked about the mining waste near her home in the Church Rock area, and the sickness and illnesses that plagued her and her family. These sentiments were echoed by Larry King and Ray Manygoats. Phil Harrison, although a Navajo Nation Council Delegate, testified as to his personal experience with uranium contamination. George Arthur, also a Council Delegate, testified in his capacity as the Chairman of the Navajo Natural Resources Committee. Mr. Arthur made it clear to the Committee that enough study has been done. It was now time for the federal government to take action to address this ongoing human tragedy. Stephen Etsity, the head of the Navajo EPA, managed to bring Navajo soil (from the Tuba City area) into the hearing chambers, where he used a device to demonstrate the existence of gamma radiation. http://www.howardshankerforcongress.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=107&Itemid=53

[0007]

1. Does the Navajo Nation President reside in Arizona or Utah?

I know Window Rock is in Arizona. I lived in Tucson for eithteen years and took many trip to the north of the state. Canyon de Chelly is my favorite.

[troubleinwinter]

3. I do not know where President Shirley resides.

Window Rock, Arizona is the administrative Capitol of the Navajo Nation. The Navajo Nation is situated in FOUR states (over the 'Four Corners' area), Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah, which sometimes complicates political matters.

[lonestarnot]

9. Ganado?

Beats me, but I know a Shirley there. K & R!

[troubleinwinter]

10. Oh! Ganado! My favorite style of rugs. Red, grey, black.

[lonestarnot]

17. I made two blankets that color, one for the Mom's and the other for the Pappa.

[flyarm]

2. K&R..my hubby and son are American Inidian..please save their land!! thx TIW

[troubleinwinter]

4. Thanks, fly! Just wait til the gamblers find out that the drinking water from the Colorado River

that feeds Las Vegas (and Los Angeles) is being POLLUTED with URANIUM from the old gov't mining on Indian lands and the government will do nothing to clean it up and wants to return to uranium mining!

They sure as shit don't care about the 220,000 Navajos who are sickened and dying from this poison due to the mining, but maybe they'll care about the effect on Las Vegas tourism.

[flyarm]

6. I am sorry to say .nothing surprises me anymore..nothing!!

and where is ole Nancy Pelosi on this ..oh i know... trying to throw an election!! She can't seem to put anything on the table...but Obama...and his pastor who says.. GD America..well they sure are damning it aren't they?????..starting with the first rightful owners..they are poisoning them!
but i won't hold my breath waiting for Nancy to give a shit!

fly ..shaking head here..

[SpiralHawk]

5. Uranium = Cledge, the Yellow Monster

Odyssey of the 8th Fire

"In another part of the Navajo creation story, the people were warned not to touch a yellow substance that they called ‘cledge,’ a substance now known as uranium or yellowcake. The early people were instructed to leave cledge in the ground, for digging it up it would cause it to become a monster – nayee -- something which gets in the way of a successful life.

"The Navajo were given a choice of substances. They could choose yellow corn pollen, which is a blessing, a beauty way that enhances the positive elements of life. Or they could choose cledge – yellowcake – a heavy material substance which, if dug up, would summon a life-annihilating serpent, who would bring death and suffering into the world.

"Through songs and stories, it is said, the people had a choice between the corn pollen way or the yellowcake way. The Navajo chose corn pollen, the beauty way."
http://www.8thfire.net/Day_162.html

[troubleinwinter]

8. The Navajo were regarded an anomaly, as 1st half of this century they had ZERO cancer rate.

"...there essentially was no cancer on the Navajo Nation before uranium mining", Rep. Tom Udall said.

Since the uranium mining, many are dead of horrid cancers. Homes are polluted and cannot be lived in. Young women die of peculiar reproductive cancers. Children born blind and deformed. Young men dead and dying of cancers.

The people cannot water their flocks in ponds and streams. The sheep die of poisoned water, and the meat is poison to eat.

Many cannot grow corn anymore, as the water is poison.

[troubleinwinter]

7. UN calls for US to apply UN 'Declaration on Rights of Indigenous Peoples', concern about racism

Thursday, March 13, 2008
Grand Canyon Drilling - UN Expresses Concern About Racism in U.S.

A trio of environmental organizations, Sierra Club, Grand Canyon Trust and Center For Biological Diversity, filed suit on March 12th to block uranium exploration near the edge of Grand Canyon National Park claiming the US Forest Service violated federal law when permits were issued.

UN Expresses Concern About Racism In The U.S.
INTERNATIONAL INDIAN TREATY COUNCIL PRESS RELEASE

March 7th, 2008: United Nations Body Expresses Concerns about Racism in the United States, Calls for the US to apply the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
.........

The ICERD is a legally-binding international instrument to which all State (Country) Parties, including the US, are accountable. Periodic reports are required to be filed by all State Parties to the ICERD. The CERD's recommendations to the US reinforce the position of Indigenous Peoples and a range of international legal experts that the provisions in the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, adopted by the UN General Assembly on September 13th 2007, apply to all UN Member states, even the four States including the US which voted against it.
........

The CERD also voiced strong concerns regarding environmental racism and the environmental degradation of Indigenous areas of Spiritual and Cultural significance, without regard to whether they are on "recognized" reservation lands, noting the negative impact of development activities such as nuclear testing, toxic and dangerous waste storage, mining and logging. http://nativeunity.blogspot.com/2008/03/grand-canyon-drilling-un-expresses.html#links

Via Native Unity http://nativeunity.blogspot.com/

[fooj]

11. This is absolute bullshit. The Navajos deserve clean drinking water.

Thanks for the thread, TIW. KandR!

[L. Coyote]

12. REC. Thanks for authoring this. Here is a Navajoland deskpicture

The Navajo inhabit a unique and spectacular landscape,
inspiring respect from all those who perceive beauty.


(w/ permission)

Download the 1280 pixel deskpicture.
http://jqjacobs.net/southwest/betatakin.html

[Irishonly]

13. K&R

I taught in Bloomfield in the early 80s and many of my students rode the bus a few hours each day to attend school. The government was screwing with them then.

[knitter4democracy]

14. Still no clean-up?! What the heck are they waiting for?!

I was there for a month for a teaching field experience in 1997, and they were trying to get help then. This is flat-out disgusting.

[troubleinwinter]

15. I spoke to a 10 year old Navajo boy and asked if his ride to school was long.

He said, "No, not too long." His mother told me his ride was an hour and a half each way, each day.

64% of the highschool students in the area I visit have no electricity at home.

[knitter4democracy]

18. We couldn't give homework because of that.

They also had some snow while we were there in January that then melted. We had several mud days after the couldn't get a bus out of the mud--stuck in all the way to the axles.

[troubleinwinter]

19. I read that a wide area around Black Mesa had that very problem in late Feb.

It wasn't so much the snow as the mud. Hundreds of people were stranded for days and days, some elders in need of medical treatment. The Tribal leadership sent out helicopters to drop hay for the animals, but many people were stuck without any way to obtain supplies or the water they need to haul every day, or access to cooking and heating fuel. The vehicles for assistance and rescue could not get through the mud or over broken bridges and washed out roads. They finally called for the National Guard because of their specialized high vehicles. You know where the NG and their vehicles are these days. Not at Black Mesa.

Here is one article: http://www.gallupindependent.com/2008/February/022708kh_blkmsamd.html

[knitter4democracy]

22. I believe it. I was amazed at the mud.

People were stranded that winter, too, and it was dangerous. Of course, when I was there, we weren't in a quagmire using up our NG resources.

[troubleinwinter]

20. Many children must tend the sheep flocks after school, too.

Daylight must be used to tend to the things that support and feed the family.

[knitter4democracy]

21. That's what my students told me.

It was hard. Some lived in town and wanted to go to college, so they had the time for homework and needed to be pushed more. Many kids just couldn't do the homework, though, so we couldn't require it.

[troubleinwinter]

23. Wonderful children aren't they!? So many parents don't speak English, but the youger people

have excellent English vocabulary and structure. The young translate for others as gracefully as breathing.

I was with a youngish woman friend standing on a high mesa. She pointed and said, "Nobody goes into that valley. There are miniature cows there."

I questioned that she meant the word "miniature". She said "Yes! Tiny cows! From the uranium!" I underestimated the vocabulary. Maybe better than mine.

So many of the young people are bilingual, speaking all Navajo at home, and excellent English elesewhere, and so many of the middle aged and elders do not speak English at all. The young are fully bilingual.

When I go to the reservation, the walls of stores and gas stations are PLASTERED with military recruitment flyers, and that's where many of them go. These young people have a sense of community and personal responsibility, but few opportunities. The young people that I have met are well educated (thanks to those like knitter4democracy!), but lack opportunities.

I met a young woman who was training to be a nurse at NAU

The American Indian Program provides residents of the Navajo, Hopi, or other American Indian Nations the opportunity to pursue a nursing career. Located in the Navajo Nation in Arizona, this program is the first bachelor of science in nursing program located within an American Indian Nation in the United States.

Her sparkling pride, enthusiasm and knowlege that this new program was a wonderful opportunity were obvious. They have so few opportunities. But I also attended a Warrior Honor ceremony for a young woman of the same age who was to leave to Iraq in two weeks.

[knitter4democracy]

24. Their English is interesting.

They make the same mistakes native speakers make, but then they make mistakes that only English-as-a-foreign-language speakers make. I ended up spending most of my time there on grammar, since my cooperating teacher didn't like to teach it, and I do. It was fascinating to me to hear the differences and try to figure out why they make some of the diction and syntax errors that they do. I sure hope someone somewhere is studying that.

[troubleinwinter]

26. I'm not a teacher at all.

I notice an excellent vocabulary, and pronunciation. A little difference in sentence structure (a little simpler).

I notice a melodious, soft, rather even, unhurried cadence.

That's the best I can express it.

I had a conversation with a friend (the mother of the boy I spoke of) about swearing. She told me that there were no swear words in Navajo. I found this hard to believe and asked about it. She said something to the effect that the words/language out of the mouth were a gift given to us by the spirit/s and it would not be possible to utter such things in the language, (the spoken language is an expression of this gift), and such words do not exist in Dine' language.

I don't know... and wonder what the kids say behind the ol' hogan when gramma's out of earshot. I would think that cussing/foul words exist in all languages. I do not speak Navajo and don't know. I have read many personal historical accounts from Navajo people. I have read some slang words for body parts, but they don't have the dirty connotations that many of ours do. They seem just short-hand, casual words.

I also know that they LOVE to tell amazing "tall tales", jokes. They love to josh you and trick you. But NEVER let you walk away believing anything untrue. They always disclose the joke for grand fun and laughter all around. I've never known a Navajo to lie... only joke for awhile as social fun, entertainment and good humored commeraderie.

So, 'teach', is them kids swearin' afterall?

[knitter4democracy]

28. Some of my kids did.

Nothing like other schools I taught in, though. The thing that amazed me the most was how polite they were--even the "bad" kids who swore and defied authority and all. They were some of the best students I've ever had the honor of working with, frankly, and turning down that job was one of the hardest things I've ever done. If only Hubby hadn't been in med school at the time . . .

[troubleinwinter]

16. The elders are being disenfranchised in voting.

Voter ID was passed in Arizona in 2006 under Republican Sec. of State, under the BS guise of "keeping illegals from voting". It disenfranchised Navajo voters.

The Navajo are a powerful voting block. 95,000 voted 67% for Kerry in 2004. Navajo turnout in 2004 was 90%, vs. statewide in AZ, 64%.

Many Navajo cannot 'prove citizenship' or comply with ID requirements, having been born at home (no birth cirtificates), and having no mailing addresses (many live in remote areas without mail delivery or street numbers), ultility bills (many have no utilities at all).

[SpiralHawk]

25. Navajo Four Corners & Tibet unrest: a metaphsical point of view

Tibet is considered to be the place of the yang pole to the yin pole (Black Mesa) that lies here on Turtle Island (Amerikuua - North America) within the Four Sacred Mountains of the Southwest.

When the yang pole is off balance because of greed, anger, hate, fear and violence, and when the traditional keepers are assassinated and repressed, the yin pole also wobbles in profound distress, it's sacred uranium being gouged out of the Earth's breast and then used to make a vast number of nuclear WMDs and create poisonous, mutant waste that will last 10,000 years.

In a way, at least if one regards this situation through the Doctrine of Correspondence, this imbalance at the metaphysical yin-yang poles mirrors the imbalance and distress between men and women, and the out-of-control, off-balance, wanton destructiveness arising in particular from the yang aspect of force.

So for me - loving this land and this earth and our Sacred Mountains, and striving to be in right relationship with the people and all the plant and animal creatures -- caring for the people and land of Tibet is strong also. They, like all, are part of the Sacred Hoop. They occupy a highly sensitive physical and etheric node on the earth, a place that in our era of profound earth, ecological, social and financial distress, merits full respect and care-taking.

A snippet from the Internets -

A POLE APART FROM TIBET:

"Black Mesa is one of those places that can cause a person to think the world is upside down, for it embodies a diabolical loop of destruction."

Source: Day 177 - Odyssey of the 8th Fire
http://www.8thfire.net/Day_177.html

[troubleinwinter]

27. Thank you for bringing up Peabody coal mine company.

Peabody at Black Mesa was finally shut down December 2005. I went and looked at the mining facility in May 2006, and it was dormant. But the facilities remain, and it is always a concern that pressure will be applied to reopen the operations, just as uranium companies are now trying to resume operations.

The coal mine used 1.3 billion gallons of potable underground aquifer water from a dry land annually to send the coal slurrey 250 miles away to generate electricity to light up Las Vegas. ("The Navajo Aquifer is a main source of potable water for the Navajo and Hopi tribes which use the water for farming and livestock maintenance as well as drinking and other domestic uses. The tribes have alleged that the pumping of water by Peabody Energy has caused a severe decline in potable water and contamination of water sources.")

There is much pressure on the local people because of the need for work. The coal mine operations provided work for some. Coal and uranium mining have been major income producing options in the past.

There is much new interest in the area for individual and small community use and manufacture of alternative energy, particularly wind generated. Specializing in wind generated related industry manufacturing is something that is being looked at in order to provide much needed income, and an alternative to health- and environment-threatening mining.