In the last several years, the Pacific Northwest has been bombarded with first coal and oil export proposals. Thanks to the hard organizing work around the state, most of those proposals have been stopped. But more dirty proposals have emerged: fracked gas and petrochemicals, which deepen our dependence on fossil fuels.
Last year, the Lummi Nation prevailed in its fight to block the largest coal port ever proposed in North America. The proposed Cherry Point coal terminal would have sat on the ancestral lands of the Lummi Nation known as Xwe’chi’eXen. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the agency reviewing permits ruled that the project would be an unacceptable infringement on Lummi treaty fishing rights.
We’ve made progress, but also face a long road to protecting what we love. To draw attention to that this year, members of the Lummi Community will embark on a six-city tour, Kwel’Hoy, We Draw the Line!, to celebrate victories, commemorate alliances, and prepare for the coming battles.
A totem pole, created by Master Carver Jewell James of the Lummi Nation House of Tears carvers, will join the journey to remind us of our place within nature, our responsibility to future generations, and our connections to each other and to our communities.
At the ceremony, the totem pole will be blessed by tribal elders, by community leaders and YOU! The Lummi ask for blessing and protection of sacred lands and waters of the greater Salish Sea bioregion. Our ultimate success in the Northwest will be the inspiring story and legacy for other communities. At the heart of that is the importance of grassroots, cross-cultural and community-based communication, cooperation, and collaboration to protect the health, well-being, and the spirit of the places we call home.
This year’s journey will go cross country, ending at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh where it will inaugurate an international gathering at the conference “Humanity in the Age of the Anthropocene. “ The totem pole and the totem pole journeys exhibit will be at the Museum for 5 months and seen by at least 200,000 people.
This journey will connect us all to the local fights we face, with information about how to get involved. Presenters and performers will thread together our hearts and minds because what moves us is also what motivates us.
So please join us in this unique, indigenous event that demonstrates we all stand together in the fight against fossil fuels and that we share the responsibility to protect the land, the waters, and the peoples of the Northwest.
For more information call: 206-378-0114 x 320 or email victoria.leistman@sierraclub.org
The House of Tears Carvers of the Lummi Nation will travel again across the western United States and Canada with a totem pole to bring attention to proposed fossil fuel terminals, pipelines, and other facilities and the threat they pose to tribes and local communities.
Join this unique, indigenous event that will connect us all to the local fights we face, like the Kinder Morgan Transmountain Pipeline, with information about how to get involved. Presenters and performers will thread together our hearts and minds because what moves us is also what motivates us.
FB event page: www.facebook.com/events/669790246562755/
