Tribal Panel to Discuss Return to Healthy Rivers

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact:
Stefani Schuette Lewis & Clark: Currents of Change 314.454.5753 sschuette@mohistory.org		Sammye Meadows Circle of Tribal Advisors 970.641.1355 or 970.596.6672 (cell) jermond@pcrs.net

A Return to Healthy Rivers
Tribal panel discussion about the Missouri and Columbia Rivers
for Lewis & Clark: Currents of Change

(SAINT LOUIS, MO, September 18, 2006):  On Sunday, September 24, 2006, the Circle of Tribal Advisors (COTA) of the Lewis & Clark Bicentennial will host a special tribal discussion about the Missouri and Columbia Rivers.  The forum will take place from 2:00 to 4:00 pm at the Children of the Middle Waters Stage on the St. Louis Riverfront during Lewis & Clark: Currents of Change, the final national bicentennial event. 

Construction of North Dakota’s Garrison Dam was completed in 1954.  The Missouri River backed up, creating Lake Sakakawea and flooding tribal communities and croplands that had for millennia supported a great Northern Plains trade center.  In March 1957, the gates of the new Dalles Dam were closed, choking back the downstream surge of the Columbia River.  Six hours later, the ancient Indian salmon fishery and trade center, Celilo Falls was under water, its thunderous roar silenced. 

The Missouri and Columbia River systems were the main travel arteries used by Lewis & Clark 200 years ago.  But the rivers themselves have a life force.  They were then, and are now, sacred to the American Indian peoples who have lived along their banks for millennia.  Now, both rivers and their peoples are severely impacted by dams, reservoirs, toxic waste, drought, and other manipulations.  On Sunday afternoon a tribal panel of leaders, elders and river experts will discuss issues such as species restoration, toxic contamination, impacts of the dams and reservoirs, water rights, fishing rights, loss of lands and communities.

The panel will feature speakers from a diversity of tribes along both rivers, including Antone Minthorn, Chairman of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation; Rebecca Miles, Chairman of the Nez Perce Tribe; Tillie Walker, Mandan-Hidatsa-Arikara elder; Tony Provost, Omaha Tribe Environmental Protection Officer and President of Mni Sose Intertribal Water Rights Coalition; Ladonna Brave Bull Allard, Tourism Director and past Cultural Resources Planner for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe; and Charles Hudson, Public Information Manager for the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission.  Hudson will also serve as the panel’s moderator.

We invite you to join us for a unique and urgent view of the great Missouri and Columbia Rivers.

Lewis & Clark: Currents of Changeis hosted by the National Council of the Lewis & Clark Bicentennial and the Osage Nation.  The final national event of the Lewis & Clark Bicentennial commemoration, it will begin with a symposium, The Stories We Tell, at the Millennium Hotel, September 20 & 21, and conclude with tours, programming, demonstrations, entertainment and fireworks on the St. Louis Riverfront, September 22-24.

For more information about Lewis & Clark: Currents of Change, please go to www.currentsofchange.org. 

For more information about the Mni Sose Intertribal Water Rights Coalition, go to www.mnisose.org.

For more information about the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, go to www.critfc.org.

For more information about the National Council of the Lewis & Clark Bicentennial, the Circle of Tribal Advisors and 2003-2006 bicentennial activities, please visit www.lewisandclark200.org.

For more information about the Osage Nation of Oklahoma, please visit www.osagetribe.com.

For more information about the National Park Service and the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, please visit www.nps.gov/jeff.