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RICHARD,
One of President Obama’s last acts as president was to designate the 1.35 million-acre Bears Ears National Monument in southeastern Utah. This monument status protects one of the most significant cultural landscapes in the United States, with thousands of sacred Indigenous cultural sites and important areas of spiritual significance.
A year later, President Trump unlawfully attempted to decrease the designated land protected by monument status by 85%. In response, the five Tribal Nations of the Bears Ears Commission (BEC) -- Navajo Nation, Hopi Tribe, Ute Indian Tribe, Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, and the Zuni Tribe -- sued to stop the Trump administration. They began developing a comprehensive management plan for the entire monument as originally planned.
We supported their efforts and helped win the reinstatement of protections under President Biden, who restored the original designation and re-established the BEC as collaborative managers of this sacred landscape.
Working directly with the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest Service, the BEC have released a draft resource management plan for the monument that signifies a pivotal shift in federal-Tribal relations and the approach to Tribally-informed management. This could set a new standard for sustainable stewardship of public lands that would affirm Indigenous sovereignty across Turtle Island.
Now, to get the plan implemented we must show massive public support, including submitting official comments during the public comment period. Please click here and sign on to our official comment before the deadline.
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If the draft resource management plan is approved, specifically with the Tribes’ preferred Alternative E, it would represent a sustainable collaboration that:
- Upholds the sovereignty of the Tribes and honors Indigenous peoples’ personal, traditional, and cultural connections to the land.
- Reflects time-tested best practices for land management passed down over centuries from the original, and ongoing, stewards of this land.
- Protects the habitat, wildlife, and resource biodiversity.
- Responsibly manages access and use of the Monument in a way that allows current and future visitors to recreate, hunt, and fish, while also responding to the needs and health of the land.
Now we just need to get it across the finish line. Please take a moment and sign on to our public comment here.
Hawwih (thank you) for taking action to advance Tribal sovereignty and protect sacred places.
Judith LeBlanc (Caddo)
Executive Director
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