The Midwest Mining Rush and Conflicts over Tribal Sovereignty: the Mole Lake and Bad River Ojibwe of Lake Superior

• Al Gedicks

• Dept. of Sociology

• University of Wisconsin-La Crosse

There are over a dozen new mining projects underway in the Lake Superior region affecting the Ojibwe people.

Many of these projects are within the ceded territory of the Lake Superior Ojibwe in Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota where the Ojibwe have reserved rights for hunting, fishing and gathering under the treaties of 1837,1842 and 1854.

On September 14, 2011, Judge Paula Manderfield refused a request by the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community to delay underground work at Kennecott’s nickel sulfide underground mine at Eagle Rock in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula

• Eagle Rock, the portal to Kennecott’s sulfide mine, is sacred to the Anishinaabe people, who call it Migi zii wa sin.

• It is linked to ancient ceremonial sites in Wisconsin and Montana according to oral history.

• The state of Michigan says that Eagle Rock is not a sacred site because there is no building and no mention of it in the written record.

In late September 2011, Kennecott Eagle Minerals, a subsidiary of Rio Tinto of London, began blasting at this sacred site where Fran Van Zile, an elder and keeper of the water from the Mole Lake Ojibwe of Wisconsin conducted a water ceremony in

August 2009.

In Wisconsin, the Gogebic Taconite company has leases for 22,000 acres of the Penokee-Gogebic Range, covering 22 miles in Ashland and Iron Counties, one of the largest undeveloped low-grade iron (taconite) resources in the U.S.

The proposed open pit mine would initially be 4 miles long, 1/3 mile wide and 900 feet deep. The overburden (waste rock) would be dumped in massive tailings piles at the headwaters of the Bad River watershed. It would be the largest mine ever seen in Wisconsin. It would generate approximately 560 million tons of tailings and 350 million tons of waste rock during Phase I.

Wetlands in areas of special natural resource interest (ASNRI wetlands) are defined as either within the boundary of or having a direct connection to areas and waterways with a special designation, including trout streams and Lake Superior.

Under current law, wetlands in areas of special natural resource interest (ASNR) cannot be mitigated to offset damage done by development. The mining bill, written by Gtac, would allow them to be filled or removed for iron mining.

The water that flows off the Penokee Hills currently feeds the Penokee aquifer and the Bad River watershed. When sulfide minerals in the tailings are exposed to air and water, acid mine drainage can release toxic metals into the watershed through the Kakagon Sloughs, a 16,000-acre complex of wetlands, woodlands and sand dune ecosystems

Bad River Ojibwe tribal chair Mike Wiggins is concerned that this mine could discharge polluted water to the Bad River watershed and the tribe’s wild rice beds in the Kakagon Sloughs.

• The Kakagon Sloughs is one of the largest undeveloped freshwater estuaries in the world, biologically important to waterfowl, shorebirds, songbirds, and several species of fish.

• Wild rice from the sloughs is important forage for wildlife and highly valued as a food source and sacred plant by the Ojibwe people.

• Wild rice is very sensitive to water contaminants and fluctuations in water level.

Mining pollution from Minnesota’s Mesabi Iron Range has resulted in fish consumption advisories and a 100-mile-long wild rice “dead zone” in the St. Louis River.

• Minnesota DNR studies show a spike in sulfates in the St. Louis River below the iron mines.

• Iron mining involves the removal of overlying rocks which contain heavy metals and sulfides.

• Len Anderson, a retired science teacher and expert on wild rice, says sulfates interfere with root development.

• Minnesota is considering a loosening of a 40 year old standard for protecting wild rice beds as new metallic sulfide mines are proposed.

Taconite ore processing uses large amounts of energy and water, and liberate mercury. Air emissions from taconite plants are the largest source of mercury in the Lake Superior basin. Great Lakes Indian Fish & Wildlife Commission, “Iron Mining in the Lake Superior Basin” October 2011

• “Air deposition of PCBs, mercury and other toxics on water and land is perhaps the most important single source of risks.”

• “Fish and game have bioaccumulated these toxic chemicals..to levels posing substantial health, ecological, and cultural risks to a Native American population that relies heavily on local fish and game for subsistence.”

“Hydrological fluctuations in a very sensitive area – the Sloughs at Bad River and the Bay will have huge and catastrophic repercussions for my tribe, for my people. Don’t tell me my people aren’t going to die from this.” Mike Wiggins Jr., Tribal Chair, Bad River Ojibwe

• In his “State of the Tribes” address to the Wisconsin Assembly (April,

2011), Mike Wiggins said the Bad River Ojibwe would not tolerate an open pit mine in their watershed district.

• In September 2010, the Bad River Ojibwe, along with representatives of Wisconsin’s other 10 tribes, met with Governor Walker to discuss their opposition to the mine and to complain that the tribe has been left out of all discussions about the mine.

“We must demonstrate that we’ll be able to comply with these very strict standards, or we will not receive our permits and there will be no project.” Matthew Fifield, managing director for Gogebic Taconite. January 19, 2011 at the Northern Great Lakes Visitor Center in Ashland, WI.

• Four months later, Gogebic Taconite and the Wisconsin Mining Association release a 186 page bill, called the “Jobs for Generations Act” that would gut Wisconsin environmental regulations and create separate set of regulations for this mine.

• The Iron Mining Bill would prevent the public and the state’s Indian Nations from challenging industry’s “junk science” by excluding them from participation in the mine permitting process.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) is looking into whether Wisconsin violated treaty rights by not consulting with tribal governments that could be affected by a state mining bill. Wisconsin Public Radio, February 2, 2012.

• “The Mining bill does not contain any provisions requiring DNR to consult with Indian tribes when considering an iron or taconite mining application. Indeed, Indian tribes appear to be the only impacted stakeholder excluded under the sections of public information and notice and the distribution of permit applications.”

• Bad River Band of Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians – Position Statement on LRB-3520/1. December 13, 2011.

In October 2011, Bad River received “Treatment as a State” status from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency so they can set their own water quality standards to protect water entering the Kakagon Sloughs. Efforts to protect the water have brought together Indians, environmental and sportfishing groups in interethnic alliances for environmental protection.

• “From just north of the Penokee Mountain area to Lake Superior, our tribe is ready to stand up and protect Nibi (water) for all peoples and future generations.”

• “As a sovereign nation, the Bad River Tribal Government is committed to preserving and enhancing its natural resources for future generations and believes clean water should not be sacrificed for short-term speculative economics.”

• Tribal chairman Mike Wiggins, Jr.• Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, October 6, 2011

Gogebic Taconite’s proposed mine is the latest in an ongoing struggle to protect tribal resource rights. The most violent opposition to Ojibwe treaty rights conflict occurred in the aftermath of the Voigt Decision (1983) upholding the reserved rights of the Lake Superior Ojibwe.

While the Ojibwe defended their right to hunt, fish and gather in the ceded territory, Exxon Minerals was proposing a zinc-copper sulfide mine one mile upstream of the wild rice beds of the Mole Lake Ojibwe, five miles downwind of the Forest County Potawatomi and 40 miles upstream of the Menominee Nation.

Opposition to Exxon’s proposed Crandon mine brought together an unlikely coalition of Indians, environmental and sportfishing groups to protect the local environment and economy for Indians and non-Indians alike.

The Crandon mine conflict extended over 28 years (1976-2003). A turning point in the conflict occurred in 1995 when the Mole Lake Ojibwe received Treatment as State (TAS) status to regulate water quality on their reservation.

In 1998 this interethnic alliance successfully lobbied for the passage of the Mining Moratorium bill which prohibited the state from issuing a mine permit until the mining company could provide an example of where a metallic sulfide mine in the U.S. or Canada has not polluted surface and groundwaters during or after mining.This is also known as Wisconsin’s “Prove It First” law.

On October 28, 2003 the 28 year fight to stop the Crandon mine came to an end. Not only had opponents defeated the controversial project, but the Mole Lake Ojibwe and Forest County Potawatomi ended up owning and controlling the mine site itself.

While the Mole Lake Ojibwe were fighting the Crandon project, on the Bad River reservation, members of Anishinaabe Ogitchida (Protectors of the People) began a protest that halted train shipments of sulfuric acid bound for Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. The Copper Range Co. wanted to use the acid to extract ore from the White Pine copper mine. July 1996.

• The project would have poured 550 million gallons of acid into underground tunnels only five miles from Lake Superior.

• The only railroad tracks leading to the mine cut through the Bad River reservation, passing over crumbling trestles over wetlands.

• Walt Bresette, an Ogitchida, said “Sovereignty is not something you ask for. Sovereignty is the act.”

• The project was halted by the EPA.

On January 26, 2011, Republicans in the Wisconsin Assembly locked the public out and passed a version of a mining bill that did not consider the treaty rights of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa to co-manage the natural resources within the ceded territories – the northern third portion of the state – that affect their communities.

• “We are undergoing a paradigm shift from values based on money and political power to the new times where wealth is measured in clean water, fresh air and pristine wilderness. Anishinaabe have been given the responsibility to share the knowledge of how to live in harmony with creation.”

• Joe Rose Sr. – Bad River tribal elder and director of Native American Studies, Northland College, Ashland, WI. Opening statement to People’s Hearing on the Iron Mining Bill, State Capitol, January 26, 2011.

On March 6, 2012 the Wisconsin Senate voted 17-16 with Republican Senator Dale Schultz, joining all 16 Democrats in rejecting the Assembly mining bill.Within hours after the vote, Gogebic Taconite announced it was pulling out of Wisconsin.

Grassroots environmental groups are supporting the Bad River tribe and are counting on Ojibwe treaty rights as a way to protect the region from ecologically destructive mining projects.

• Mining industry executives have ranked Wisconsin at the bottom of the list of favorable places for mining investment.

• For more information:

• www.savethewatersedge.com

• www.wrpc.net

• www.conservationvoters.org

• www.cleanwisconsin.org

• www.wisconsin.sierraclub.org