Standing Rock Chair thanks federal regulators

FT. YATES, N.D. – Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chair Mike Faith spoke for many when he thanked federal regulators Oct. 23 for granting Oceti Sakowin requests to extend the scoping period for public comment and government-to-government consultation on the Dakota Access Pipeline environmental impact statement.

His tribe, followed by the Cheyenne River, Yankton, and Oglala Sioux tribes, successfully sued the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to obtain a court order March 25 for elaboration of the environmental impact statement.

Time was running out for input during the scoping period set to end Oct. 26 when Omaha Army Corps District Commander Col. Mark Himes advised Faith of the extension until Nov. 26.

“We thank Col. Himes for granting this extension, as it very important for the tribe to have input at this early stage of the process,” Faith said. “We thank everyone who continues to support us in this ongoing effort,” he added.

In the Native-led effort to prevent construction of the hazardous materials line across the Missouri River just upstream from the tribal drinking water intake, tens of thousands of grassroots supporters from around the world rallied at encampments on unceded 1851 Ft. Laramie Treaty lands here in 2016-2017 to support tribal government opposition.

Nonetheless, the Corp of Engineers permitted the crossing with only an environmental assessment, which is a document that requires less public consultation than an impact statement.

The tribal lawsuits to obtain an expanded process attracted legal support from the Great Plains Tribal Chairmen’s Association (GPTCA), the Native American Rights Fund (NARF), and the National Congress of American Indians Fund (NCAI Fund).

“The decision ensures that the treaty-reserved rights of the plaintiff tribes – the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, the Yankton Sioux Tribe, and the Oglala Sioux Tribe – are adequately addressed, along with any other land and natural resource considerations, in a full-fledged and well-documented environmental review process,” they said after the legal coup.

It was March 25 when U.S. District of Columbia Judge James Boasberg ruled the Army Corps broke the National Environmental Protection Act by permitting an easement without executing the impact statement required.

The recent extension of the scoping period for comment gives the public until Nov. 26 to submit testimony.

At a live online public scoping meeting conducted from Omaha, Nebraska, on Oct. 16, all commenters in the hourlong event expressed doubts and opposition to permitting the easement in the same terms as before.

Participant Meryl Tihanyi reminded the Corps of the ongoing Superfund cleanup in Michigan state created by the 2010 Kalamazoo River oil pipeline spill, considered to be the largest inland oil spill in U.S. history.

A Michigan resident, DAPL encampment chef Matthew Shawn Borke, sued Energy Transfer and its Rover Pipeline contractor Leighton Security on Oct 13. Leighton subcontracted with the controversial private counterintelligence firm TigerSwan LLC during the Dakota Access Pipeline resistance at Standing Rock.

Borke, a participant in Michigan Residents Against the Rover Pipeline, accused defendants of illegally hiring sheriffs’ officers to act as private security for the Rover and for depriving him of his constitutional rights in the process of his advocacy for environmental protection from it.

The civil rights case, which requests payment for damages, names Energy Transfer Chair and CEO Kelcy Warren, a Dallas billionaire who is one of the top donors to U.S. President Donald Trump’s 2019-2020 re-election campaign.

Trump had $500,000 to $1 million invested in Energy Transfer before becoming President, and as soon as he took office ordered the Army Corps to facilitate DAPL’s Missouri River crossing easement permit. It had been denied under the previous administration of President Barack Obama. Trump’s campaign pledged to jump start the stranded project.

This August, Warren donated $10,000 to the America First Action super political action committee, which backs Trump’s reelection, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a campaign funding watchdog organization. Energy Transfer has joined as a defendant on the side of the Corps in the tribes’ DAPL lawsuits.

At the Oct. 16 scoping meeting, Army Corps staff explained that the impact statement offers options, one of which is Alternative 3, providing that the: “Corps would grant the requested easement with the same conditions as the vacated easement.”

Alternative 1 provides that the: “Corps would not grant an easement and would require restoration of Corps-administered federal lands to pre-pipeline construction conditions.”

For access to the details, see the Corps’ presentation or visit go.usa.gov/xG2Pt. Scoping comments can be submitted there or via email at NWO-DAPL-EIS@usace.army.mil Postal delivery can be addressed to U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Omaha District1 / ATTN: CENWO-PMA-C (DAPL NOI) / 1616 Capitol Avenue / Omaha, NE 68102

The other hazardous materials pipeline construction project looming large over unceded Lakota treaty territory, TC Energy Corp.’s Keystone XL, was due for a conditional use permit hearing in Holt County, Nebraska on Oct. 29.

The Canadian company wants the Nebraska Board of Adjustment to overturn the county commissioners’ denial of a construction permit to build the tar-sands crude pipeline through Holt County and the Ogallala Aquifer.

That segment is part of nearly 1,200 miles of private line that TC Energy would need in Nebraska, South Dakota, and Montana to finish its infrastructure from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.

After trying for 10 years, the transnational (formerly named TransCanada Corp.) has yet to receive federal approval for the project as a whole, since Montana U.S. District Judge Brian Morris revoked the Corps of Engineers’ Nationwide Permit 12 for the proposed route across some 700 Missouri River Basin waterways on April 15.

The ruling responded to a lawsuit that the non-profit Northern Plains Resource Council filed against the Corps for permitting easements in violation of the Endangered Species Act. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the ruling on July 6.

Other litigants opposing the construction in the same court venue are the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, Assiniboine and Gros Ventre tribes of the Ft. Belknap Community, Indigenous Environmental Network, North Coast Rivers Alliance, Bold Alliance, Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Earth, Natural Resources Defense Council, and Sierra Club.

Like the tribal governments, the organizations express concern for treaty rights and the potential of water and air pollution. Grassroots pipeline opponents, note that man-camps for energy extraction megaproject construction like this are proven threats, resulting in MMIW (missing and murdered indigenous women).

Bold Alliance offered to submit written testimony at the Oct. 29 Nebraska Board of Adjustment meeting in O’Neill, for people who cannot attend in person. Submissions can be delivered here.

Unlike Bold Alliance and the other plaintiffs, a partnership of First Nation tribal elected leaders recently agreed to pursuing an equity agreement promising them participation in the Keystone XL Project.

TC Energy Corp. says a final agreement with the Native partners of Natural Law Energy (NLE) is expected in the current fourth quarter of the fiscal year.

The development is “a testament to what we can accomplish when industry and Indigenous groups work together,” NLE President Chief Alvin Francis said. “This historic agreement is an important step for our Peoples and future generations to share in the energy wealth coming from our lands and traditional territories.”

NLE CEO Travis Meguinis added, “This very substantial and historic agreement has been reached through the practice of traditional protocols involving our grassroot Chiefs and leaders. All the Chiefs, NLE and TC Energy worked hard to develop a path for all First Nations and industry to follow.

“This partnership is historic and one of the largest ever of its kind in Canada and around Turtle Island (North America).”

Support for the initiative comes from elected leaders of First Nations in tar-sands territory: the Ermineskin Cree Nation, Montana First Nation, and Louis Bull Tribe, which make up the Maskwacis Nations in Alberta; the Saddle Lake Cree Nation in Alberta, and the Nekaneet First Nation in Saskatchewan.

 

(Contact Talli Nauman at talli.nauman@gmail.com)

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