For the last six years, the new totem poles have focused on issues relating to the fossil fuel industry. The newest carving emphasizes risks to the Salish Sea (off northwest Washington and southwest British Columbia) and its dwindling population of orcas, or killer whales, if proposed industry initiatives are not stopped. This month, the new…
It took more than eight years but the Samish Nation has finally secured approval of a land-into-trust application in Washington state.And though the decision is for a relatively small parcel of 6.70 acres, the tribe is celebrating the historic action. In the past 22 years, the Bureau of Indian Affairs has only ever approved one…
Faith Action Network of Washington is putting forward the call to faith communities to oppose DHS Docket No. USCIS-2010-0012, RIN 1615-AA22, Comments in Response to Proposed Rulemaking: Inadmissibility on Public Charge Grounds. This proposed change could impact over 533,000 people, including 205,000 children, in Washington State alone. Faith leaders urge all people of faith, whose diverse…
Climate change’s effects – among them, increasing wildfires, disease outbreak and drought – are taking a toll on the Northwest, and what’s to come will threaten and transform our way of life from the salmon streams to ski slopes, according to a new federal climate assessment released Friday. The 1,000-plus-page report, produced by the U.S. Global…
Opposition to the Trans Mountain pipeline from Coast Salish Tribes on both sides of the U.S.-Canada border continued today with indigenous people of the Salish Sea region testifying before the Canadian National Energy Board. Four U.S. Coast Salish Tribes — the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, Tulalip Tribes, Lummi Nation, and Suquamish Tribe — shared their…
