|
|
|
|
|
 |
International Indian Treaty Council CONSEJO INTERNACIONAL DE TRATADOS INDIOS |
|||||||
|
|
For Immediate Release Contact: Mark LeBeau 916.801.4422; James Hayward 530.410.2875; Morning Star Gali 510.827.6719; Radley Davis 530.917.6064; Chris Peters 707.825.7640; Jimbo Simmons 415.641.4482; Tom Goldtooth 218.751.4967
Action Alert for Native Rights and Environmental Justice
Native Peoples & Environmental
Justice Allies to Protest at Bureau of Land Management Office in
Alturas Against Proposed Power Plant at Sacred & Natural Medicine
Lake near Mt. Shasta *Tribal Members to Speak on the Situation*
Tuesday, February 20, 2007 Protest at High Noon at BLM Office 708 W. 12th St., Alturas
Alturas, CA – Native peoples and their supporters from across the country will gather at the BLM Office on February 20, 2007 at high noon to protest the agency’s plans to appeal the 9th Circuit Court ruling on Medicine Lake to the Supreme Court. The 9th Circuit reversed a lower court decision indicating that the federal agencies neglected their fiduciary responsibilities to the Pit River Nation by violating the National Environmental Protection and the National Historic Preservation Acts and that the agencies never took the requisite “hard look” at whether the Highlands should be developed for energy at all. In spite of this ruling and although the federal government promised not to appeal the case, agency officials have recently indicated they will make this attempt. This notice came as no surprise to many Native peoples who are used to government policies and statements shifting like the wind.
Tragically, BLM, California Energy Commission, and Calpine Energy company do not care about preserving the natural and sacred Highlands, as they have been trying to build geothermal power plants there since the 1980’s. These partners want to build geothermal power plants that would: require drilling to 9000 feet beneath the surface; require injection and extraction of large amounts of toxins that can cause cancer or birth defects such as arsenic, mercury, and hydrogen sulfide; create a situation for accidental releases of acids and chemicals into the shallow water table or maintenance-related pipeline ruptures and explosions; replace the natural surface environment with toxic slump ponds, roads, pipelines, and cooling towers; have the potential to cause earthquakes, volcanic eruptions or avalanches; desecrate this sacred and traditionally important area; likely cause irreversible contamination of the air, water, plants, and wildlife in the region; harness this energy and peddle it as “green energy”; not simply trap steam or mine hot water from natural geysers; and threaten the underlying aquifer – which is California’s largest pure spring system and flows into the Fall River and joins the Pit River and winds into the Sacramento River and San Francisco Bay.
Native peoples, lawmakers, homeowners, ranchers, fishing enthusiasts, environmentalists and other citizens and surrounding towns have consistently opposed this project. Make no mistake about it; we will nonviolently defend Medicine Lake from any attempts to build power plants in this sacred and natural area. The federal government must ban such development out of respect for American Indian religious and traditional use rights and to fulfill its fiduciary responsibility to the tribal governments of the area and act in their best interests.
Sponsors of the event include Advocates for the Protection of Sacred Sites, Seventh Generation Fund, International Indian Treaty Council, Indigenous Environmental Network, Citizens of the Pitt River Nation, and Redding Rancheria Cultural Department. # # # #
|
|
||||
|
|
 |
|
|
