User:Oceanflynn/sandbox/Bears Ears National Monument Controversy

Bears Ears National Monument Controversy

Ute's and Paiute's descendants of Pueblo forced off BEML leave Utah for reservations? Navajo from Canada?

Voting Rights Act of 1965, signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson during the the Civil Rights Movement on August 6, 1965, prohibited racial discrimination in voting. It has been amended five times by the Congress to expand its protections. early 1980s "In the early 1980s, San Juan County ["San Juan County, a roughly 7,800-square-mile (20, 200-square-kilometre ) county that touches Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona] used an at-large voting system, as many state and local governments have done throughout American history. The County also had a substantial Native American population, but seemed never to elect Native American representatives."

1983 "In 1983, the Department of Justice sued the County in this court, arguing that the existing system of at-large elections denied Native American citizens in the County "an equal opportunity to participate in the County political process and to elect candidates of their choice to the San Juan County Board of Commissioners." " “should an alternative form of government consisting of single member districts be approved […] any stagger or overlap in the terms of County Commission seats shall not delay beyond November 1986 an election in the district containing the largest number of minorities.” "San Juan County offers only one interest in support of its redistricting scheme: “the binding nature of the Consent Decree”—which the court takes to mean compliance with the Consent Decree the County entered with the Department of Justice in 1983, and the Settlement and Order entered by Judge Winder in 1984."

1980s "The U.S. Department of Justice "accused San Juan County of denying American Indians an equal opportunity to participate in the political process."The current [July 20, 2017] "system of electing commissioners from single-member districts was implemented following the 1980s U.S. Department of Justice finding.

1986 The San Juan County Commission changed the boundaries for San Juan Utah's voting District 3 "in the wake of a lawsuit brought against it by the United States Department of Justice." "San Juan County is geographically Utah’s largest county, occupying a “tremendous area” in the southeastern portion of the State. For most of the County’s history, voters elected each of the three commissioners through an at-large system of voting. Since 1986, however, the County’s voters have selected their commissioners from three single-member election districts. San Juan County is the only county in Utah with a commission elected by this method." "On November 6, 1984, voters in the County approved a “Final Adopted Optional Plan of General County (Modified) Form of County Government” (the Plan).29 On November 26 that same year, the three incumbent San Juan County Commissioners approved the Plan. 30 The Plan set proposed lines for three election districts, and stated that “[t]he Governing body of the County shall be a County Commission and shall be composed of three members, who shall be elected from individual districts.” Among the geographic lines specifically discussed in the boundaries of Districts Two and Three were those of the Navajo Indian Reservation.32 Though not expressed in the Plan, Native Americans at the time composed 88.77 percent of the population of District Three. Elections in 1986 were held based on these districts, and voters in District Three voted into office the first ever Native American member of the San Juan County Commission.35 Since that time, the commissioner elected from District Three has always been Native American.36 In this way, the County moved from a system that historically denied representation to a minority group to one that allowed that group greater participation in the political process...District Three invariably returned a Native American commissioner, and Districts One and Two invariably returned a white commissioner.38

Escalante National Monument led to a drop in student numbers and the closing of a school. Concerns that BENM repeat that process.

2009 BLM and FBI raid Cerberus. Commissioner was more concerned about

2011 "Notwithstanding any belief that the 1986 Plan election district lines were permanent, two events placed pressure on the County to revisit them after the 2010 census. First, in October 2011, a Navajo Nation representative urged the County to explore redistricting based on demographic shifts in the County since the lines were first drawn twenty-five years earlier...Second, on review, County officials came to believe that the Commission election districts had now become malapportioned in population.48 Specifically, Districts One and Two appeared to present an unacceptable deviation from an ideal population distribution, jeopardizing compliance with the Supreme Court’s one-person, one-vote rule.49 A process soon began that had been dormant for a quarter century...Rather, when redistricting was discussed beginning in 2011, Commissioner and thenChairman Bruce Adams stated with regard to District Three “that the County is bound by a 1983 Consent Decree from the United Stated District Court for Utah and that the County would not change the basic Commission District configuration without the Judge’s agreement.”50 In later testimony, Commissioner Adams said that he thought the Consent Decree “[g]uaranteed that there would be one Native American that would absolutely be elected,” with another seat safe for a white candidate...Commissioner Phil Lyman expressed a similar lack of familiarity with the Consent Decree, noting that he did not “know what the consent decree was addressing.”5" The 2011 redestricting of District 3 in San Juan County "disenfranchised American Indians." In 2016, the Navajo Nation alleged that a "2011 redistricting disenfranchised American Indians." "In February, 2016, U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby ruled in another election-related suit that San Juan County must redraw its County Commission boundaries."

November 14, 2011 "On November 14, 2011, San Juan County altered its election districts for the first time since the 1986 elections. 56 The 2011 redistricting plan moved two voting precincts from District One to District Two, but otherwise left the boundaries of those districts undisturbed.57 The County made no changes to the boundaries of District Three, which remain identical to those drawn in 1986...The election districts established in 2011 are the subject of Navajo Nation’s challenge. The parties disagree about the exact demographics of the County, in part because of a dispute over how to determine which County residents should be considered Native American. Undoubtedly, however, the County is roughly half Native American.61 District One and District Two both have an approximately thirty percent...Native American population.62 District Three has a 92.81 percent Native American population.63 Based on this pattern, roughly sixty percent of Native Americans in the County live in District Three. The remaining forty percent live in Districts One and Two, along with approximately ninety-five percent of the non-Native American population....Demographic evidence further supports that the County realized its goal of concentrating Native American voters: roughly three-fifths of the Native American population of the County lies within District Three, and its composition is over ninety percent Native American. Indeed, District Three is difficult to explain with reference to any consideration other than race. Crucially, District One and District Two do not bear the same characteristics: neither has a concentration of Native American or white voters approaching such a proportion...The dramatic concentration of Native Americans in District Three is not an accident–it is the County Commission’s direct intention. Because racial considerations predominated for District Three, the court must apply strict scrutiny"

In "2013 Congressman Rob Bishop (later joined by Congressman Jason Chaffetz) introduced a Public Lands Initiative (PLI) for eastern Utah." "Lands Council membership included interests representing minerals, cultural resources, recreation, Native American concerns, travel management, livestock grazing, wildlife and wilderness." "" diminishes the Coalition’s voice in management of the reduced Bears Ears NCA by creating a 10-member advisory committee with only one tribal representative; promotes motorized recreation in this archaeologically rich region; allows grazing in currently closed areas like Grand Gulch, Fish, Owl, and Arch Canyons; and prohibits the agency from protecting hundreds of thousands of acres of wilderness.""

- SUWA Chairman of Friends of Cedar Mesa, Vaughn Hadenfeldt, and members of the Board Mark Maryboy, Utah Diné Bikéyah, Heidi Redd Owner, Indian Creek Cattle Company, Jennifer Davila Owner, La Posada Pintada moteil in Bluff attended meetings on the PLI for three years. They left in 2016. Hadenfeldt, who lives in Bluff, Utah which is the "gateway to Cedar Mesa, a 70-mile-long plateau that's home to one the largest collections of pre-Columbian ruins in the country." Hadenfeldt runs Far Out Expeditions providing "archaeological, natural and cultural histories of southeastern Utah" in the Cedar Mesa including Comb Ridge or Grand Gulch. They opposed oil and gas development in the PLI.

In 2014 "In 2014, San Juan county closed all polling locations and required residents to send in their ballots by mail. That made it difficult for reservation residents to vote due to limited mail service and for those whose primary language is Navajo, an unwritten language."

San Juan County Commissioner Phil Lyman, from Blanding comes from a long line of Mormon settlers who founded towns across the state. Lyman, like many conservatives, resents restrictions imposed by federal institutions. Lyman was one of the key local people engaged in the PLI.

When Lyman organized the Recapture Canyon protest held on Saturday May 10, 2014 to protest the 2007 BLM ban of all-terrain vehicles and to call for the legalization of the all-terrain vehicle trail, the Friends of the Mesa began to lose faith in the PLI. ATVS were banned because of damage to the Ancient Pueblo peoples sites built between 1150 and 1300 AD. Tribal people pleaded with Lyman to not go ahead with the protest.

August 23, 2015 - "Two formal complaints were filled with the San Juan County, Utah ... filled against San Juan County Commissioner Bruce Adams, Greg Adams," "Sep 4, 2015 - KUTV A complaint filed against two San Juan County officials ... Bruce Adams, the county commissioner, disputes the allegations ... The complaint was also filed with the San Juan County Attorney's Office as well as the Utah ... "San Juan County Commissioner Bruce Adams brings attention to the fact that "we're a mineral county. We've survived on the mineral extraction industry in this ..." Friends of Cedar Mesa were appalled when San Juan County Commissioner Bruce Adams, a fourth generation Mormon rancher, claimed that his "ancestors were the first to settle in San Juan County."

Jonah Yellowman is a spiritual leader of the Navajo who is calling for protection of Bears Ears.

On October 15, 2015 Hatch, Lee, Bishop, & Chaffetz presented a Joint Statement on Proposal from The Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition.

March 2016 "The Navajo Nation Human Rights Commission and several members of the Navajo Nation" sued San Juan County in "Navajo Nation Human Rights Commission v. San Juan County" "for making it harder to exercise their voting rights."

April 2016 "Six of the seven Navajo Nation chapters—a political division within the Navajo Nation that is similar to a county within a state—in Utah support the proposed Bears Ears National Monument in order to protect 1.9 million acres of sacred and ancestral sites." But Rebecca Benally, a tribal member who is the only Native American serving on the commission in San Juan County, doesn't want to see the federal government step in." The Kayenta Chapter encompasses land in both Utah and Arizona in Navajo County, Arizona and San Juan County, Utah. The population was 5,189 in 2010. It is located 25 mi south of Monument Valley. Kayenta Township is the only municipal-style government on the Navajo Nation. It is regarded as a political sub-division of the Navajo Nation. It is managed by a five-member elected town board, which hires the township manager. The Navajo Nation's census figures for Kayenta Chapter are significantly different from those of Kayenta proper. Nearby communities such as Kaibeto and Oljato attend Kayenta Town meetings in affairs related to the Navajo Nation. Monument Valley, is located in the Four Corners area on the Utah-Arizona border in the Colorado Plateau. Monument Valley lies within the range of the Navajo Nation Reservation and is accessible from U.S. Highway 163.

On June 9, 2016 The Utah Tribal Leaders association (UTL) met in Cedar City, Utah and seven of Utah’s eight Tribes vote in favor of supporting the Bears Ears National Monument. In a Bears Ears Coalition June 10, 2016 statement, 23rd Navajo Nation Council Delegate Davis Filfred, said, "I stand with my people in full support of Bears Ears National Monument. Bears Ears National Monument is the path toward healing the past and protecting Chief Manuelito’s birthplace and descendants of Kaayelii lands for future generations."

In July 2016 a hearing was held in Bluff with federal officials including Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell.

At the July 18 hearing with Jewell, "San Juan County Commissioner Bruce Adams drew raucous laughter from some monument proponents when he said "nobody really had settled here" before his own white ancestors." When he told the same family history of ranching starting with the first Mormons in Bluff, the audience honored him. Mormon ancestral families grazing rights. Darryl Redd held the original rights who gave it to his sons who sold the rights to 60-year-old Adams. Adams claims that ranchers and cattlemen are environmentalists whose cattle need plants to graze on so they do not overgraze. He cited the The Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument which reduced AUMs, closed roads and .... He warned that watersheds for Monticello and Blanding are in the BENM. That would devastate Monticello and Blanding.

On July 27, 2016 Senator Lee facilitated an oversight hearing with about 1,000 in the San Juan High School auditorium. Governor Gary Herbert, Congressman Rob Bishop, San Juan County Commissioner Bruce Adams, and local residents Chester Johnson and Lewis Singer spoke. "Afterwards, several dozen local residents were able to voice their concerns at a town hall meeting format. The hearing was in marked contrast to a July 16 hearing with federal officials in Bluff, which included Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell. At the Bluff meeting, the crowd was roughly equal for or against the national monument. Large groups of people from outside of the area attended the hearing to support the monument, including several large busloads from surrounding states. In Blanding, primarily local residents made a strong voice against the proposed National Monument, with messages written on cars and on signs along the sidewalks. Nearly half of the large crowd were Native American. They presented a united front of local residents opposed to the creation of a national monument." This is listed on the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources (ENR) website as an oversight hearing on "Potential Impacts of Large-Scale Monument Designations."

In his testimony, Utah Governor, Gary R. Herbert (R) spoke of the need for legislative action on Bears Ears. He reminded the audience of The Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument designation in 1996 "that was done to the people of Utah". He spoke of Congressman Bishop who hosted 1,200 meetings over the last 3 years with the Public Lands Initiative.

"Chester Johnson, a social worker from Aneth, said that he believes in protection of the Bears Ears area. He supports the PLI, and opposes the Bears Ears National Monument. Johnson said that Native Americans go to the Bears Ears to be peaceful and renew and said that the national monument does not include local Native Americans. Johnson outlined a series of concerns and issues that he said shows the Navajo Nation does not serve local Navajos."

Commissioner Phil Lyman said, "The PLI draft is horrendous for San Juan County. This is not a good proposal. Every time it comes back, it looks more and more like it was written by the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance." The San Juan County recommendation for the PLI has been significantly changed in the most recent version of the bill, particularly when compared to the recommendations from the six other counties that are part of the PLI."

"Lewis Singer, a career educator and foster parent to 57 Navajo children, discussed the impact of a national monument designation, ranging from firewood to access to over-visitation." He claimed access will be denied and fees will be charged as this has happened in Arizona.

""The Grand Staircase-Escalante, for example, only has one law enforcement ranger to patrol its 1.9 million acres. Nationwide the BLM only has a total of 200 rangers to patrol 245 million acres. That is one ranger per 1.2 million acres, on average...In 2015, the Grand Staircase-Escalante had 1,400 reported cases of vandalism. According to the BLM, there have only been 25 cases of vandalism reported in the Bears Ears region since 2011. That means the Grand Staircase, with its monument designation, currently experiences 140 times the rate of vandalism as does Bears Ears region...The BLM currently has two full-time officers assigned to patrol and protect the entire Bears Ears region...Meanwhile, the entire budget for BLM National Conservation Lands system nationwide, which is responsible for 50,000 square miles protected lands, was only $64 million.""

- Utah Governor, Gary R. Herbert July 27, 2016

Concerns are raised about ranching or wood collection.

""The Bears Ears National Monument is the 12th national monument managed by the Forest Service; it is the fifth to be managed jointly by the Forest Service and BLM. Monuments generally preserve current uses of the land, including tribal access for traditional plant and firewood gathering and for ceremonial purposes, off-highway recreation on existing routes, grazing, hunting and fishing and water and utility infrastructure.""

- Bear Ears National Monument Questions & Answers

Concerns raised include road closures. Private land owners do not want to lost their homes.

"Utah Senator Mike Lee met with local Native Americans at the Bears Ears on July 27, 2016. They include Byron Clarke, Shawn Begaye, Boyd Silversmith and Clayton Long. Afterwards, he held a brief press conference about the proposed Bears Ears National Monument and the Public Lands Initiative, which is legislation before Congress that Lee is sponsoring in the Senate." "When you look at the PLI over the seven counties in eastern Utah, the proposals for the other six counties are largely intact. San Juan County fears that their proposal, their input, has been overshadowed by the Bears Ears process. The PLI recommendation has changed more in San Juan County than in other areas."

December 29, 2016 "Reactions to Utah's new Bears Ears National Monument, from scathing to celebratory"

December 29, 2016 Anger and celebration in Utah’s Four Corners area over Bears Ears National Monument

""Every week or so, Navajo elder Jonah Yellowman comes to Bears Ears to collect medicinal herbs, but he always finds more than just the sage he's looking for. He holds up a shard of what looks like clay. "You see this?" he says. "It's all over the place here. So be careful where you step." Yellowman displays slivers of what he says are pottery and tools from the Indigenous people who lived in the area many generations ago. Bears Ears has thousands of ancient burial grounds, cultural sites and rock art that date back millennia...Jonah Yellowman shows an ancient example of the traditional Navajo dwelling called a hogan. He says being part of a national monument will help preserve Indigenous culture.""

- CBC 2017

March 2017 [Stewards of San Juan (SOS) in Partnership with Sutherland Institute stated that in 2016, President Obama ""gave in to pressure from corporate interests, extreme environmental groups and out-of-state tribal leaders by designating the 1.35-million-acre Bears Ears National Monument. This decision was not about sensible land management policy or the well-being of locals whose culture and livelihood depend on public lands. Instead, it was a narrow-minded and unilateral decision that ignored grassroots Native American groups, local and state elected representatives, and the people of San Juan County. They deserve better. We invite you to stand with locals in opposition and call on the Trump Administration to rescind this designation." The Sutherland Institute claimed "Obama ignored the locals and now locals are asking Trump to #RescindBearsEars. #utpol Their website hosts a video Rescind Bears Ears. The organization says it stands "in solidarity with local Native Americans and San Juan County." Stewards of San Juan @SOSJUT

April 17, 2017 CBC

April 17, 2017 In Ryan E. Benally, "Vice Chairman of the Stewards of San Juan County and a lifelong Native American resident of San Juan County, Utah" wrote an oped for the Deseret News, describing how his grandmother Betty Jones, an elder, cautioned him about trusting the federal government. "Over-reliance on federal management caused many intergenerational problems Native Americans still have to this day." His grandmother was experienced first hand the "government relocation from the Glen Canyon Dam area". He said that "As a result, nearly all of San Juan County’s natives sat in a Senate’s Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing in Blanding, Utah." He was referring to Lee's July 27, 2016 hearing at the High School with about 900 to 1000 people in attendance. About half (450+) were Native Americans. Benally claimed that there are already federal protections for the land and National Monument status is not needed. Benally reminded readers that when "out-of-state business organizations and radical environmental groups tried to implement a 'wilderness area' — the legislative equivalent to a national monument. The boundary proposal was suspiciously the exact dimensions as what Bears Ears National Monument is today" years ago, "former San Juan County Commissioner Mark Maryboy" "venomously disagreed with such a horrid proposal. So much to even say, “I oppose any wilderness designation. Wilderness designation just creates another National Park Service and the BLM is just another BIA (Bureau of Indian Affairs)." He criticized Maryboy for supported the BENM. Benally claimed that local Native Americans are "distrustful of any wilderness-monument type designation because it creates another oppressive controlling systemic government-run entity, like the BIA." He criticized "out-of-state organizations, such as the outdoor retail industry" for supporting BENM and for its dramatic "exit of the Outdoor Retailer show". He praised Gov. Gary Herbert for signing the resolution for "our disenfranchised native people who were scared to enter the monument for wood gathering." Benally said that he, like Secretary Ryan Zinke, served in "the war in Iraq in 2003 and 2005 with the U.S. Marines."

In February 2016 the Navajo Human Rights Commission and seven members of the Navajo Nation [including Leonard Gorman, executive director of the commission] filed a law suit which claimed that San Juan County had "violated the federal Voting Rights Act by closing polling places [in District 3] ahead of the 2014 election and moving toward a mail-only voting system, hindering access to the ballot box." One of the organizations representing the plaintiffs is American Civil Liberties Union of Utah, whose director is John Mejia. "In February, U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby ruled in another election-related suit that San Juan County must redraw its County Commission boundaries. The Navajo Nation alleged a 2011 redistricting disenfranchised American Indians."

February 19, 2016 U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby ruled that the Navajo Nation’s Motion for Summary Judgment was granted and that the San Juan County’s Motion for Summary Judgment was denied. "Keeping an election district in place for decades without regular reconsideration is unusual in any context. But when the asserted justification for this inertia is a racial classification, it offends basic democratic principles. Self-governance, even in a County with a unique geographic character and a small population, is not a project completed in one fell swoop. San Juan County is not frozen in time, and neither are the interests and attitudes of its citizens. Even if the two largest voting groups within the County may find their political interests at crosspurposes, voters within the County may pursue those interests on an ongoing basis, and should not have to do so within unnecessary racial lines." 1980s "The U.S. Department of Justice "accused San Juan County of denying American Indians an equal opportunity to participate in the political process."The current [July 20, 2017] "system of electing commissioners from single-member districts was implemented following the 1980s U.S. Department of Justice finding. "U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby ruled that they were unconstitutional...[July 19, 2017], Shelby ruled that the county's new maps are still unconstitutional and primarily drawn on race. Shelby said that county officials did not explain why they had a compelling government interest to draw districts mainly based on race at the expense of other considerations, such as compact areas and following political boundaries...To try to fix the districts, San Juan County created three county commission districts and five school board districts that produced an equal number of "safe" districts with majority white or majority Native American populations, while grouping remaining areas into "leftover" districts. One "leftover" district included two communities hundreds of miles apart that don't share infrastructure or common interests, Shelby noted. A second was shaped like a horseshoe around another district." "Navajo Nation Attorney General Ethel Branch said in a statement Wednesday that the voice of Native Americans has been suppressed when they are packed into gerrymandered districts."

"The county should use the same energy it puts into maintaining gerrymandered districts into crafting an equitable and fair remedy that gives all citizens of San Juan County an equal voice," Branch said. In April 2016, San Juan County, Clerk John David Nielson, and county Commissioners Phil Lyman, Bruce Adams and Rebecca Benally filed a counterclaim against the plaintiffs—Navajo Human Rights Commission and seven members of the Navajo Nation—in which the county said that, "the suit is based on fabricated claims and an attempt to control the election of the county commissioner from District 3, in the southeastern part of the county.

On September 15, 2017 "After recent rulings by a federal judge, a lawsuit that alleges San Juan County does not provide effective language assistance and equal voting opportunities to Navajos went go to trial."

In 2017 San Juan County, Clerk John David Nielson, and county Commissioners Phil Lyman, Bruce Adams and Rebecca Benally—who were the defendants in the February 2016 law suit filed by Navajo Human Rights Commission and seven members of the Navajo Nation— filed a counterclaim against the plaintiffs, "alleging the suit is based on fabricated claims and seeking a declaration that the voting procedures comply with the Voting Rights Act and the U.S. Constitution." The counterclaim had said "the mail-in-ballot process allows elderly residents who have no means of transportation to vote from their homes. It also said San Juan County adopted additional procedures for 2016 and future elections that included four in-person voting locations, three of them within the reservation, and Navajo language ballots in audio form at all four locations and on the county’s website."

July 2017 "A federal judge has ordered San Juan County to redraw political boundaries, following a lawsuit by the Navajo Nation alleging racial gerrymandering." "San Juan County is Utah's largest county, more than 7,000 square miles in size. The population is about 16,000 according to 2016 U.S. Census estimates. Native Americans make up about 50% of the population compared to 47% of whites."

In September 2017 U.S. District Judge Jill Parrish threw out the counterclaims made by defendants—San Juan County, Clerk John David Nielson, and county Commissioners Phil Lyman, Bruce Adams and Rebecca Benally—and "dismissed some claims by the Navajo Human Rights Commission and Navajo Nation members."