Reservoir Plans … On Native Ground!

Is the Kickapoo Tribe in Kansas facing Environmental Racism? In the 1970s, the Tribe began developing a plan to create a reservoir to provide clean water to its tribal members. In 2014, the plan remains a work in progress due to various reasons including a unanimous vote by the Nemaha-Brown Watershed District to reject the tribe’s request to exercise eminent domain. The tribe’s understanding of the 1994 Watershed Agreement is that the Watershed District would condemn properties on behalf of the tribe’s proposed Plum Creek Project. During the first phase of creating a plan to build the Plum Creek Reservoir, the Nemaha-Brown Watershed District’s commission agreed to assist the tribe in securing a small piece of land next to the reservation which was needed to build the reservoir.

As a Kickapoo Nation tribal member, it concerns me that my people are being treated in a inhumane manner. When the tribe was placed on the reservation by the Treaty of 1854, they were told that they would have the basics. Aside from air, clean water is as basic as it gets. I propose to answer these questions using primary resources documented in newspapers and interviews.

Environmental racism was first defined by the Environmental Justice Summit I in People of Color in 1991 in Washington DC as the “disproportionate impact of environmental hazards on people of color.” Environmental racism is caused by several factors, including intentional neglect, the alleged need for a receptacle for pollutants in urban areas and a lack of institutional power and low land values of people of color. According to the Green Action environmental advocacy group:

Environmental racism is the disproportionate impact of environmental hazards on people of color. Environmental justice is the movement’s response to environmental racism.

While the Kickapoo Nation Tribe in Kansas continues to find a solution to their water problem, the tribal members continue to use water that is deemed substandard by the Environmental Protection Agency. This is not acceptable! The powers that be are those that govern the Nemaha-Brown Watershed Joint District No. 7. In an agreement made in 1994, a portion of it reads: “Nemaha-Brown Watershed Joint District No. 7 and the Kickapoo Tribe of Kansas have the necessary authority to finance and install their portions of the planned project. This includes the right to …exercise the right of eminent domain. They have agreed to use these powers as needed and will be financially responsible for excess investigation and design costs resulting from their delay or failure to do so.”

In reading several newspaper articles on the subject, I’m fixed on one particular writing by Andy Marso that was published December 24, 2013 in the Topeka Capital Journal’s CJonline.com. He reports the ruling against the tribe’s law suit by U.S. Judge Carlos Murguia on December 20, 2013. This ruling favored the Watershed District by interpreting the 1994 Watershed Agreement between the tribe and the Nemaha-Brown Watershed Joint District No. 7. This lawsuit was filed on June 14, 2006 and challenged the Watershed District’s agreement to act on exercising eminent domain on behalf of the tribe. Early on the tribe and its attorneys interpreted this agreement to mean that in the case that the tribe needed assistance from the Watershed District that by agreement the tribe could count on them to use their power as needed to exercise eminent domain on behalf of the tribe.

What happened? In this case the judge determined that the wording in the agreement was unambiguous and that the Watershed District did not have an obligation to exercise eminent domain on the tribe’s behalf. My question is, since the tribe does not have the right to exercise eminent domain then the agreement could only have meant that it is the Watershed District that could act in this capacity.

Did the judge consider the fact that for several years the tribal members living on the reservation may have long-term health problems caused by water that is substandard? That the piece of land that the tribe needs to build the reservoir at one time was owned by the tribe? Perhaps, these questions are not relevant to the decision he made but it is all inclusive of humanity.

Then there are the many commentaries posted about the articles that create insight into what the surrounding communities feel about the tribe’s need for clean water. There are mixed sentiments. Here are a few comments:

Water denial says, “The same government that put the tribe there now denies it a reliable water resource. Now, after the state runs their casino out of business, they can go back to pintos and tepees. WOW!!!”

1jackson1234 Forked Tongue states, “When Columbus landed the Native Americas stated, “there goes the neighborhood”. The have been totally used, and abused ever since. The systematic genocide of these people continues.”

RollingStone comments, “How about interviewing the farmers whose land would be confiscated and put under water? They just might lend quite another viewpoint to the article. AND, let’s ask if it is not possible for the tribe, just like others in the watershed to PURCHASE water from other sources. Eminent Domain is confiscation of property from one owner and giving to others. It should be practiced ONLY if there is a clear public good involved and no other alternatives are possible.”

I believe that this is clearly an act of Environmental Racism based upon the issuance of authority that relies upon the Nemaha-Brown Watershed Joint District No. 7 to do what is right and that is to act on its’ provision in the Agreement of 1994 to exercise their power of eminent domain on behalf of the tribe’s people.