Manoomin, Mining and Treaty Rights

2014, Protect Our Manoomin

Protect Our Manoomin

Established February 2011; State-Level non-profit; 10 member council; Decisions by majority vote; Grassroots representatives from Red Lake, Fond du Lac Bois Forte, Leech Lake, White Earth, Mille Lacs, and Sandy Lake Bands of Ojibwe; Currently 1444 supporters.

Organization Structure

Organized rallies at the State Capitol and Duluth; Testimony at Minnesota State Legislature, Minnesota Indian

Affairs Council, and St. Louis County Board of Commissioners; Signatory to the Lake Superior Water Quality Agreement, and

the Mother Earth Accord; Submitted reports/statements to U.N. Rapporteur on Extractive

Resource and Indigenous Peoples, and the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.

Highlights

The Importance Of ManoominManoomin is rooted in our prophecies, origin stories and traditional stories. It is a special gift given to the Anishinaabe by the Creator. Manoomin not only provides food and an economic base, it also provides a spiritual and ceremonial connection. Manoomin is a living being that has been an inherent part of Anishinaabe culture for hundreds of years.Manoomin is a barometer of an ecosystem. The manoomin ecosystem supports microscopic life, vegetation, flora, fish, waterfowl and wildlife. The loss of manoomin directly impacts the ecosystem and affects all of us both Native and non-Native alike.

1855Ceded Land

Area

1854Ceded LandArea

There are over 64,000 acreage of manoomin in Minnesota. The combined total of 48,000 manoomin acreage is located within the 1854 and 1855 Ceded Lands.

Minnesota Wild Rice/SulfateWater Quality Standard

197310 mg/L Sulfate

Recognized by the EPA

May 2011 - Minnesota legislature attempted to raise the Wild Rice/Sulfate Standard to 50 mg/l. On the morning of the vote, the two legislator authors received a letter from the EPA informing them raising the standard would violate the EPAs Clean Water Act and would result in court action by the EPA. The bill was withdrawn. In December 2010, the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce, on behalf of mining industry members, filed a lawsuit in district court to prevent the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) from applying Minnesota's wild rice sulfate standard to protect natural stands of wild rice from sulfate pollution, including discharge from mine waste rock piles and tailings basins.In May 2012, Ramsey County District Court upheld the Wild Rice/Sulfate standard of 10 mg/L. In December 2012, the Minnesota Court of Appeals upheld the dismissal of the lawsuit.In 2011, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency initiated a wild rice study. This two-year study was funded by the State legislature to determine if the current 10 mg/L standard was applicable. In January and February 2014, MPCA staff analyzed the data and integrated the information gained from each study component to inform recommendations regarding whether a revision of the wild rice sulfate standard was warranted. According to the scientific studies that accompany the report, the standard will be maintained.

The rule will apply to waters where wild rice grows or has grown, or could grow.A second process will determine which and how many lakes, rivers and wetlands will be defined, and then protected, as a wild rice water.

Milestones

The Manoomin Dead Zone is the result high concentrations of sulfatefrom taconite mining. Sulfate mining will compound the problem of sulfates. Approximately 1,800 acres of manoomin will be affected in the Hoyt Lakes areawhere the PolyMet mine will be located.

PolyMet Water Flow

PolyMet

PolyMet Faults and Inferred Faults

Mechanical water treatment 200 years at the Mine Siteand 500 years at the Plant SiteSulfate and other toxins will be collected in solidified form and stored at waste pit.

PolyMet Reverse Osmosis Machine

PolyMet (Canada) / Glencore (Switzerland) Twin Metals (Canada) / Antofagasta (Chile) Teck Resources (Canada) Encampment Minerals (Private) Duluth Metals (Canada) / Antofagasta (Chile) Franconia Minerals (Canada) Agate Lake Resources (Private) Cardero Resource (Canada) Beaver Bay Joint Venture (Private) Vermillion Gold (Private) Lehmann Exploration Management (Canada) Kennecott (U.S.) / Rio Tinto (United Kingdom)

Proposed Mining DistrictsIn Minnesota

Article 5.The privilege of hunting, fishing, and gathering the wild rice, upon the lands, the rivers and the lakes included in the territory ceded, is guaranteed to the Indians, during the pleasure of the President of the United States.Signatories included Leech Lake, Gull Lake and Swan River, St. Croix River, Lake Courteoville, Lac De Flambeau, La Pointe, Mille Lac, Sandy Lake, Snake River, Fond du Lac, Red Cedar Lake, and Red Lake.

1837 TreatyTreaty with the Chippewa July 29,

1837

U.S. v. Winyans - 1905Winyans established the fact that treaties were not a grant of

rights to Native but rather a grant of right from them.Winters v. United States - 1908

Court Case involving Fort Belknap and establishment of Reservation Water Rights

Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Lake Superior Indians v. Voigt v. United States - 1983 (The Voigt Decision)

Affirmation of the Usufructuary Rights of the signatories of the 1854 Treaty.

Minnesota v. Mille Lac Band of Chippewa Indians - 1999Affirmation of Usufructuary Rights of Anishinaabeg

signatories of the 1855 Treaty.

Boldt ruled that Washington State virtually had no authority over tribal fishing; in fact, it was the tribes that ceded to non-Indian settlers the rights to fish -- not the other way around. The decision also would instate tribes as co-managers" with the state over Washington's salmon fisheries resources.

Boldt said the state and tribes should co-manage fishing resources off the reservations. Further readings of the case established that the state has an obligation to protect fish habitat, to ensure the tribes rights to fish in perpetuity.

Bolt created a powerful legal incentive to protect the environment and include tribes in land-use decisions.

Boldt Decision 1974

tribes already have inherent control over their water quality based on their status as sovereign nations. The federal regulation in the Clean Water Act merely acknowledges a power that tribes already hold and helps establish programs to assist them in exercising their sovereignty over their natural resources. Accordingly, section 518, the Treatment As State (TAS) provision, exists to clarify tribal jurisdiction, not to create it.

Environmental Protection AgencyTreatment-As-State (TAS) Status

Under TAS, there are three EPA regulatory statutes address the tribal role specifically by authorizing EPA to treat tribes in a manner similar to that in which it treats states: The Clean Water Act (CWA), the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA), and the Clean Air Act (CAA). All three statutes specify that, in order to receive such treatment, a tribe must be federally recognized and possess a governing body carrying out substantial duties and powers. 39 tribes approved for Regulatory Status: Mole Lake, Lac du

Flambeau, Bad River, Fond du Lac, Grand Portage. Minnesota tribes that have submitted applications include: Red Lake, Bois Forte, Leech Lake, and Mille Lacs.

151 tribes approved for TAS Grant Status. Tribes in Minnesota include: Red Lake, Leech Lake, White Earth, Mille Lacs, and the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe.

In Ojibwe history, women are recognized as the caretakers of the water. It is the responsibility of the women in the Tribe to petition the Spirit for the health of Nibi on behalf of all living things; which not only includes the conventional mammal, fish, and plant life, but encompasses all living things considered to have a living spirit, such as a rock, or mineral. To pray, respect, and care for Nibi are the assurances needed for the Spirit to provide for the health and safety of all living things that partake and are sustained by the water; such as fish, wild rice, humans: all living things whether living in it, drinking it, traveling and working upon it, cleansing with it, or enjoying it. The responsibility of women as the caretakers of the water recognizes and honors the duality of women and water. If women are not cared for, human life is at risk; if water is not cared for, human life is at risk. As water is the life giving blood of our Mother the Earth; Women are those who carry the water which sustains human life during pregnancy, and ultimately brings forth human life during birthing. The lives of each are contingent upon their relationship

Excerpt from Bad River 2008 Application for TAS

Mesabe Widjiu or the Laurentian Divide is sacred and is part of Anishinaabe oral History and cosmology explaining the origin of the hills and the separation of waters along the divide.

Mesabe Widjiu

Mesabe Widjiu or the Laurentian Divide is sacred and is part of Anishinaabe oral history and cosmology explaining the origin of the hills and the separation of waters along the divide.Hundreds of plants and dozens of animals are used by Anishinaabe Bands for food, utilitarian, medicinal, and ceremonial purposes. Natural resources preserve connections to cultural identity through sharing and maintaining traditional knowledge and spiritual connections to the natural world.

The proposed project would primarily affect historic and cultural resources during construction and operations, through excavation, filling, earth-moving, and other activities that result in access restrictions, visual obstructions, noise, vibration, and dust.The Project area is located on land that was ceded to the United States by Bands under the 1854 Treaty. As part of the Treaty, the bands reserved the right to hunt, fish, and gather on these lands. Some resources such as fish, plant, and animal species may be affected by the project, the degree to which in a cultural resource context is unknown.

Polymet Response:

The Sugarbush that is not located within the project footprint area, which would not be affected;

A segment of the Mesabe Widjiu, regarded as a sacred place to the Ojibwe people, that occurs within the project area, which would be affected;

A segment of Beaver Bay to Vermillion Trail that occurs within the project footprint area, which would be affected;

Historical and Cultural Resources IdentifiedWithin or Near Project Site:

PolyMets SDEIS states: The Proposed Action would have effects of 1854 Treaty resources i.e., those areas and species that are traditionally or culturally important to the Bands [Fond du Lac, Grand Portage, Bois Forte]Without private landowner permission, there is minimal opportunity for the Bands to exercise usufructuary rights (hunting, fishing, and gathering) on this property.

An historic property of traditional and religious and cultural importance to Indian Tribes is nottied to continual or physical use of that place.If an area remains in the hearts and minds of tribal members then that place is significant.

Cultural Resources excerpt from PolyMet SDEIS Tribal Cooperating Agencies: Fond du Lac, Bois Forte, Grand Portage, Great Lake Fish & Wildlife Commission, and the 1854 Treaty Authority.

Ojibwe treaty rights are a device to help keep the land healthy.

~ Prof. Peter Erlinder

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