Good morning, NUNAverse:
Earlier this week, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops announced Indigenous leaders will visit the Vatican between December 17 and 20 to meet with Pope Francis. Leading the Indigenous delegation will be Manitoba Metis Federation President David Chartrand, who told The Canadian Press on Tuesday he will be leading a delegation of Metis leaders during a private one-hour session with the pope to ask him to come to Canada to express his apologies and his sorrow for what took place in residential schools and to begin the healing process.
Meanwhile, unmarked graves have been discovered at another Canadian residential school for Indigenous children. The Lower Kootenay Band of the Ktunaxa Nation announced yesterday that 182 unmarked graves were discovered using ground-penetrating radar near the former St. Eugene’s Mission School in Cranbrook, British Columbia. The process was conducted in 2020 and reports of the findings were just presented to the Lower Kootenay Band, according to a press release.
Indigenous out-of-state students whose tribes have historical ties to Colorado will pay in-state college tuition rates starting in the fall. SB21-209, which Governor Jared Polis signed into law Monday, acknowledges that tribes were forced out of Colorado and requires higher education institutions to give in-state tuition rates to students who are members of the 48 known Indigenous tribes that were in Colorado. Colorado has only two federally recognized tribes still in the state, the Southern Ute Tribe and the Ute Mountain Tribe. Democratic leadership in both chambers of the Legislature sponsored the bill, and it received bipartisan support.
The Muscogee Nation signed a contract in early June to purchase the former Cancer Treatment Centers of America facility in Tulsa, Oklahoma, which will be used as a new public hospital and increase treatment capacity in the area for high-demand situations like the COVID-19 pandemic. Sean Terry, the Health Secretary of the Muscogee Nation, said that the Nation’s hospitals transfer about 60 percent of their patients to Tulsa hospitals when they require a higher level of care. He said this new hospital would help meet demand in a situation like the COVID-19 pandemic, when all of the hospitals in Tulsa were full.
Keep reading for a full news update.
Boarding Schools:
No Apology Yet; Pope Francis To Meet With Canadian Indigenous Leaders In December
Native News Online, Levi Rickert, June 30
Whether or not Pope Francis will apologize to the Indigenous people of Canada for recently discovered graves that contain the remains of children who attended residential schools that were operated by the Catholic church will remain a mystery until at least December. On Tuesday, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops announced Indigenous leaders will visit the Vatican between Dec. 17 and 20 to meet with Pope Francis. They said the meeting will “foster meaningful encounters of dialogue and healing.” Leading the Indigenous delegation will be Manitoba Metis Federation President David Chartrand. He told The Canadian Press on Tuesday he will be leading a delegation of Metis leaders during a private one-hour session with the pope to ask him to come to Canada to express his apologies and his sorrow for what took place in residential schools and to begin the healing process.
182 Unmarked Graves Found At Another Residential School In Canada
Native News Online, Levi Rickert, June 30
For the third time in less than two months, unmarked graves have been discovered at another Canadian residential school for Indigenous children. The Lower Kootenay Band of the Ktunaxa Nation announced Wednesday that 182 unmarked graves were discovered using ground-penetrating radar near the former St. Eugene’s Mission School in Cranbrook, British Columbia. The process was conducted in 2020 and reports of the findings were just presented to the Lower Kootenay Band, according to a press release. The findings released today revealed that 182 unmarked graves were discovered. Some of the human remains were buried in shallow graves only three to four feet deep.
Searching Canada’s Oldest Residential School
APTN News, Charlotte Morritt-Jacobs, June 29
Janis Monture has heard the stories and testimonials by survivors who attended the former Mohawk Institute Residential School in Brantford, Ont. — and she knows of the probable deaths and burials that are unmarked. Monture is an intergenerational survivor of residential schools and the executive director of the Woodland Cultural Centre, a cultural and heritage museum housed on the grounds of the former institute, also known as the Mush Hole, located near Six Nations of the Grand River Territory. While the institute operated for over 140 years, Monture, who has been with the cultural centre since 2003, has yet to see complete records to account for some 15,000 children who attended. However, on June 15, First Nations leaders gathered on Treaty 3 territory while the announcement was made that $10 million would go to identify residential burial sites in the province. No set dollar amount was allocated specifically for work to be done on the grounds of the former Mohawk Institute, however.
Documentary About Indigenous Catholics Short On Accuracy, Long On Spin
Indian Country Today, Mary Annette Pember, June 30
The release of the documentary, “Enduring Faith: The Story of Native American Catholicism,” has unfortunate timing. According to its press and marketing materials, the film created by the Knights of Columbus “examines the spiritual and cultural gifts of Native American Catholics, the wrongs inflicted upon them by the unjust policies of the British and American governments, and how Native American Catholics today continue to live out their faith in fully enculturated ways.” It’s release, however, comes on the heels of stories about discoveries of hundreds of unmarked graves at Indian residential schools run by the Catholic Church in Canada that has set off a wave of demands from Indigenous people and allies for accountability and transparency about the church’s role in operating schools both in Canada and the U.S.
MMIW:
‘Just the Beginning’: Curyung Tribe’s MMIP Response Plan Looks To Serve As Model For Alaska Native Villages
Native News Online, Andrew Kennard, June 30
After the Department of Justice unveiled a new pilot project in Alaska last summer that would work with tribes to tackle the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons (MMIP) crisis in their communities, tribal administrator Courtenay Carty was quick to let them know that the Curyung Tribe wanted in. The pilot program is part of the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) national Missing and Murdered Persons (MMIP) Initiative and has been implemented in Alaska, Oklahoma, Montana, Minnesota, Michigan and Oregon. Under the program, local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies band together to create guidelines that help tribes craft Tribal Community Response Plans (TCRPs). These plans coordinate the response to a report of a missing person in a way that is “individualized and tailored to the needs, resources, and culture of each local community.”
Law:
Colorado To Give In-State College Tuition To Members Of American Indian Tribes Starting In The Fall
The Denver Post, June 30
Indigenous out-of-state students whose tribes have historical ties to Colorado will get in-state college tuition starting in the fall. SB21-209, which Gov. Jared Polis signed into law Monday, acknowledges that American Indian tribes were forced out of Colorado and requires higher education institutions to give in-state tuition rates to students who are members of the 48 known Indigenous tribes that were in Colorado. Colorado has only two federally recognized tribes still in the state, the Southern Ute Tribe and the Ute Mountain Tribe. Democratic leadership in both chambers of the Legislature sponsored the bill, and it received bipartisan support.
Other:
Muscogee Nation To Purchase Former Cancer Treatment Facility To Prepare For Future Pandemics, Increase Health Care
Native News Online, Andrew Kennard, June 30
The Muscogee Nation signed a contract on June 14 to purchase the former Cancer Treatment Centers of America facility in Tulsa, Okla. The tribal nation’s new public hospital will increase treatment capacity in the area for high-demand situations like the COVID-19 pandemic. Sean Terry, the Health Secretary of the Muscogee Nation, said that the nation’s hospitals transfer about 60 percent of their patients to Tulsa hospitals when they require a higher level of care. He said this new hospital would help meet demand in a situation like the COVID-19 pandemic, when all of the hospitals in Tulsa were full.
NASA Looks At Louisiana Delta System, Eyes Global Forecasts
AP News, Anet McConnaughey, June 29
Erosion, sinking land and sea rise from climate change have killed the Louisiana woods where a 41-year-old Native American chief played as a child. NASA is using high-tech airborne systems along with boats and mud-slogging work on islands for a $15 million, five-year study of these adjacent areas of Louisiana. One is hitched to a river and growing; the other is disconnected and dying. Scientists from NASA and a half-dozen universities from Boston to California aim to create computer models that can be used with satellite data to let countries around the world learn which parts of their dwindling deltas can be shored up and which are past hope. The adjacent Terrebonne Basin is shrinking so rapidly that the government is paying to move the Isle de Jean Charles band of Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw Indians from a vanishing island to higher ground. That band isn’t the only Native American group losing ground.
Harvard Repatriates Pipe Tomahawk To Ponca Tribe Of Nebraska
Native News Online, Jenna Kunze, June 30
The Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology at Harvard University has agreed to repatriate a pipe tomahawk once belonging to Chief Standing Bear of the Ponca Tribe of Nebraska, after 142 years away. A joint agreement between the Peabody Museum, the Ponca Tribe of Nebraska, and the Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma—a smaller southern tribe split across state borders for generations due to federal government displacement—is being drawn up, said museum director Jane Pickering. Chairman Oliver Little Cook of the southern tribe told Native News Online that the tomahawk will go to the Ponca Tribe of Nebraska due to his tribe’s lack of museum infrastructure to appropriately house the tomahawk.