Sorted by date Results 51 - 75 of 182
RESTON, Va.-In December, the US Board on Geographic Names voted to re-name Colorado's Squaw Mountain that sits between Evergreen and Idaho Springs off Highway 103, also known as Squaw Pass Road. The federal government has already made changes online and is preparing to change maps and road signs to Mestaa'ėhehe Mountain. (Pronounced Mes-ta-heh.) The change comes after filings from the Northern Cheyenne Tribe's objections and hearings in the Colorado Geographic Naming Advisory...
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act recently passed by Congress will deliver $550 billion in new federal investments across the country in the span of five years for bridges, roads, broadband connections, water, and new energy systems, a step the Navajo and other nations are applauding. "Indian Country will get over $11 billion in new infrastructure projects to begin construction on broadband internet lines, roadways, bridges, and water...
WINNIPEG, Man.-Indian Life Ministries is holding their first "Let's Talk About Reconciliation" conference. "At Indian Life Ministries, we want to take reconciliation from a big picture idea to a personal one," explain the directors, Todd and Krystal Wawryniak. "We want to help people answer the questions: 'What part do I play in reconciliation?' and 'What can I do?'" The event will be held at Camp Chestermere, west of Calgary, Alberta, on December 10–11, 2021. The c...
BRENTWOOD BAY, B.C.—The Department of Canadian Heritage has recently invested $6.86 million in First Nations language programs through the First Peoples’ Cultural Council (FPCC). That brings the total investment from the federal government to $14.6 million this year. The funding from the federal government makes up for provincial funding that was not renewed. Starting in 2018, the B.C. government set aside $50 million to spend on language revitalizaiton projects. However, when funding was reviewed in 2021, the line item was...
PHOENIX-When the Phoenix Indian School was established in 1891, the top federal administrator considered it a budgetary win to send Native American children to boarding schools to enforce assimilation into white society. "It's cheaper to educate Indians than to kill them," Indian Commissioner Thomas Morgan said at the opening of the school. The true cost of Indigenous boarding schools in the United States and Canada, and the abuses Native Americans endured in them, continues...
VICTORIA, B.C.-As another year of long-burning, uncontrolled wildfires decimates portions of the U.S. and Canada-even threatening the world's oldest trees, located in California-one expert says North American authorities need to take some guidance and advise from Native Americans. "We're not burning anywhere near as much as we should," fire ecologist and noted burn boss Bob Gray, from Chilliwack, B.C., told The Canadian Press. Gray consults for local, provincial, state and...
OTTAWA—On September 30, 2021 Canadians recognized the first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. The day honors the lost children and survivors of residential schools, their families and communities. Public commemoration of the tragic and painful history and ongoing impacts of residential schools is a vital component of the reconciliation process. Parliament passed bills to create this federal statutory holiday through legislative amendments. On June 3, 2021, Bill C...
WASHINGTON-Tribal police have the authority to detain non-Natives traveling through reservation land if the officer has a reasonable belief that the suspect violated state or federal law, the Supreme Court ruled in June. The unanimous ruling overturned lower courts that said a Crow police officer should not have held a nontribal member who was found to have drugs and weapons in his truck. The Supreme Court said that the lower courts' rulings would "make it difficult for...
OTTAWA-Inuk leader and former ambassador Mary Simon has been chosen as the next governor general. She is the first Indigenous person ever to be appointed to the role. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that the Queen has accepted his recommendation to appoint Simon-a past president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, the national Inuit organization-as the 30th governor general. Simon is an Inuk from Kuujjuaq, a village in northeastern Quebec. Her mother was Inuk and her father was a w...
Browning, Mont.-May 18, 2021 was a great day for hundreds of Alberta citizens as they crossed the border for a free COVID-19 vaccination. The mobile clinic was set up on the U.S. side of the border and was sponsored by the Blackfeet Tribe in Montana. The idea for the endeavor started because the The Aamskapi'Piikuni Blackfeet Nation in Browning, Montana, had an abundance of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines left after inoculating most of its members. vaccine. Rather than letting...
Ottawa, Ont.-If you're an Indigenous person in Canada, you may be 30 percent more likely to die after surgery than a non-Indigenous person. That's one of the findings of a new study that has been published: "Postoperative outcomes for Indigenous Peoples in Canada: a systemic review" Recently published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, this is the first study to analyze all available surgical outcome data for the Indigenous populations. The study looked at 28...
IQALUIT, Nunavut-To better understand the needs and priorities of Northernors in the Arctic Regions of Canada, the Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the Canadian Coast Guard are launching a departmental Arctic Youth Council. Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the Canadian Coast Guard want to hear directly from young people and are recruiting passionate Inuit, First Nations, and Métis leaders aged 18-30 to become leaders on their team. The Arctic Youth Council will help young...
DALLAS-Researchers already knew that American Indians had the highest risk of atrial fibrillation, which is an irregular heartbeat ("arrhythmia") that can increase the risk of blood clots and stroke. But a new study by the American Heart Association found that Native Americans, categorized as American Indians, had a 47% higher risk of having a non-bleeding stroke compared to people from all other racial and ethnic groups in the United States. American Indian people with...
Quebec City-First Nations citizens in Quebec received a boost recently when the Quebec government announced plans to spend $19.2 million to give Indigenous communities better access to the justice system and support services for crime victims. Ian Lafrenière, the minister responsible for Indigenous affairs, described the funding as a direct response to recommendations in the report from the Viens Commission, an inquiry that examined Quebec's relations with Indigenous...
PHOENIX-Land, and specifically what to do with land, has been among the most divisive topics in U.S. history since the arrival of European settlers. More than 500 years later, little has changed. On Jan. 20, the Biden administration ordered a 60-day pause on new oil and gas leases on federal lands and waters after environmental activists sent a letter urging the administration to issue a permanent ban rather than a temporary one. The order prompted an array of reactions, with...
WINNIPEG, Man.-On the first day of his U.S. presidency, Joe Biden used an executive order to cancel the permit former president Donald Trump had approved to build the Keystone XL pipeline, which would have connected Alberta's bitumen to Nebraska and then to the gulf states further south. The Keystone XL pipeline is an international project years in the making. Without support from the U.S. government, it's effectively halted. The pipeline is meant to expand critical oil...
WASHINGTON, D.C.-In October 2018 the Cleveland, Ohio, baseball team retired the caricature logo known as Chief Wahoo, and now, two years later the team has retired their name as the Cleveland "Indians." The Chief Wahoo logo had been in use since 1947 and the Indians name had been in use since 1915. The Indians compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Central division. The announcement came on the heels of teams reporting that they...
WINNIPEG, Man.-As the number of active COVID-19 cases in First Nations continues to rise, Indigenous Services Canada is investing $1.2 billion in additional support to address ongoing public health responses in Indigenous communities. As of mid January, 5,442 active cases were reported in First Nations. "First Nations, Inuit, and Métis have worked diligently to prevent, respond and control the spread of the virus in their communities. We acknowledge their strength and resilien...
NEW YORK-For the first time in its 94-year history, the 2020 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade featured a land acknowledgement and blessing to honor the Wampanoag and Lenape people. This broadcast took place on Thursday, November 26, Thanksgiving Day 2020 in the United States. Ryan Opalanietet Pierce (Lenape) and Joan Henry (Tsalagi/'Nde/Arawaka) acknowledged the Lenape territory of Manahattan, where the parade takes place annually. Mashpee Wampanoag tribal members and language...
WINNEPEG, MB-Almost 175 First Nations communities across Canada have received kits including personal protective equipment (PPE), Bibles and other support supplies from a coalition of Canadian Christian ministries led by Northern Youth Programs, Native Evangelical Fellowship of Canada and Samaritan's Purse. The coronavirus can strike anywhere, even in Canada's remote First Nations communities. Many health care staff and emergency first responders in these places have had...
WASHINGTON, D.C.-On election day 2020 in the United States, a record number of six indigenous people were elected to positions in the U.S. House and Senate. The U.S. House expanded by two on Election Day: Yvette Herrell, who is Cherokee and prevailed in New Mexico's 2nd Congressional District, and Kai Kahele, a Native Hawaiian who won that state's 2nd District. They will join four Native Americans who won reelection: Reps. Deb Haaland of New Mexico, who's Laguna; Sharice...
PHOENIX-In March, Tawny Jodie was preparing to travel to Israel for her first trip overseas. By July, she was masked and delivering food boxes in rural New Mexico amid a deadly pandemic. A full-blooded Navajo, the 20-year-old said she was compelled into service when COVID-19 started ravaging her community and others across the Navajo Nation. With the virus dispropor-tionately affecting tribal nations due to health disparities, poor infrastructure and chronic under-funding to f...
PHOENIX-Before COVID-19, Joshuaa Allison-Burbank spent his days traversing the Navajo Nation, stopping at homes, libraries and schools to provide speech therapy and reading support for children with developmental disabilities. Now he sits at a computer in Waterflow, New Mexico, grappling with how to keep helping kids whose families may have no internet or laptops or iPhones-or, if they do, are coping with far more than a telehealth appointment that may or may not go off as...
OTTAWA, Ont.-In early September, the Honorable Carolyn Bennett, Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations, together with the Honorable Greg Rickford, Minister of Indigenous Affairs Ontario, and Chief Jason Henry, Chief of Chippewas of Kettle & Stony Point First Nation, announced the addition of lands to Chippewas of Kettle & Stony Point First Nation. A federal Ministerial Order sets apart 45.992 hectares (113.629 acres) of land as an addition to reserve to Chippewas of Kettle & S...
Washington, DC-On July 13, the Washington National Football League team retired their infamous team name: The Washington Redskins. The interim name for the 2020 season, while they choose a new moniker and logo, is the Washington Football Team. The Redskins name first came to be in 1933 when co-owner George Preston Marshall changed the name from the Braves to the Redskins while the team was sharing a playing field with the Boston Braves baseball team. Some sources say he...
