HomeMy WebLinkAbout071026 email - Protection Island and___The issue is a letter of support for proposed legislation for a Land Transfer into Trust with the BIA for the JST of two National Wildlife Refuges_ and nowALERT: BE CAUTIOUS This email originated outside the organization. Do not open attachments or click on links if you are not expecting them.
The issue is a letter of support for proposed legislation for a Land Transfer into Trust with the BIA for the JST of two National Wildlife Refuges, and now also apparently a third property
in Sequim Bay.
It is hard to understand why such a transfer is desirable at all, with a very recent and applauded Co-Stewardship in place. (Note that this particular co-stewardship was highlighted
as one of only two refuges in the 23 exemplars cited as big successes in Secretary Deb Haaland’s Dec 24, 2024 Department of the Interior Third annual Report on Tribal Co-Stewardship).
The tribe has offered many promises, but a reading of the proposed text does not fulfill them. The tribe promises that the protections to the former refuges would be the same as before.
So why repeal the refuge legislation to put them into trust instead? Reinventing the foundational structure opens the door to untested loopholes and unintended(?) consequences.
We already know that this is the toehold for other tribes to take over more refuges within the Salish Sea, leaving the exquisite overarching coordination with state and federal agencies
in tatters.
And behind the scenes, in Washington DC, ITARA, The Indian Trust Asset Management Demonstration Project has just been extended for another ten years. It allows tribes to supersede NEPA,
allows them to suggest other federal regulations that should not pertain to trust lands, and once their management plan is approved by the Secretary, to move ahead with implementations
and modifications without further oversight.
The biggest flaw of ITARA, according to the tribes, is BIA’s narrow interpretation of trust assets to forestry and surface leases only, which are specifically and repeatedly named.
Categorically not included because they are outside the scope of the law, according to BIA’s interpretation, are shorelines, water rights, fisheries, tidelands and shellfish beds.
To circumvent that deliberate limitation, Rep Randall has already co-sponsored an amendment to that same ITARA (HR5515) currently in committee in the US House of Representatives (co-sponsored
with Rep Jeff Hurd, the chairman of the subcommittee that not so coincidentally recommends action to the House.) It makes ITARA permanent, broadens the scope to ANY trust assets including
the above, broadens regulations that could be superseded and further reduces oversight so that the tribe is allowed to: carry out any transaction or activity…without approval of the
Secretary regardless of whether the trust asset management transaction would require such an approval under otherwise applicable law (including regulations)… And, at the discretion
of the tribe, their asset management plan may authorize them to “manage any assets and any activities and the Secretary shall defer to any such discretionary trust asset management
decision…”
There are far-reaching consequences to your actions. I most emphatically urge the Board to NOT issue a letter of support, AND instead issue a letter of non-support, or better yet,
a letter of opposition, stating that the present co-stewardship, along with the proven protections already in place, is preferable.
Sincerely,
Laura Walker
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