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Transcript95 lines
- [00:02]
Charlie Edcity
Now.
- [00:02]
Rick Julius
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Joseph Cordell
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- [00:29]
Charlie Edcity
Ctmobile.com I'm Rick Julius, a partner at Cordell and Cordell. Divorce is more than just a legal process. It's a life changing event that can impact your future finances and your relationship with your children. You've worked hard to build a life that you're proud of and you deserve a legal partner who will work just as hard to protect it. Schedule an appointment with one of our Missouri or Illinois attorneys. The choice of a lawyer is an important decision and should not be based solely upon advertisements. 600 Kelwood Parkway, Suite 310 Town and Country, MO 63017 Joseph Cordell Licensed in Missouri and Illinois only Cordell cordell.com It's February 2024. A winter storm has just blown clean through Arizona, blanketing the ground with snow from Phoenix all the way up to Flagstaff. But in the reservation town of Loop, that hasn't stopped people from piling into their local town hall. Thank you everyone. I see more folks are coming in and joining us. I really love it. I love a packed house. If you haven't signed in already, please do so. There are there are around 30 people in this hall, most in winter boots and big overcoats, and they sit under some really harsh fluorescent lighting in rows of yellow chairs facing a small platform. They're mostly older, but there are some younger faces too. We'll talk more about that as we get through the slides, but I do want to start the meeting. Everyone is here to talk about Navajo water rights. I'd like to say that we've been on a Navajo water rights tour. We've hit several communities already. We started in Winder Rock and went to Ganado. After that, we were in Chinle. Up on the platform, two men in suits are getting ready to speak. They're lawyers working for the Navajo Nation, and they're here to tell the crowd about the work that they've been doing to secure water rights for the Navajo People. My clan is sen, and I'm born for the Hawaiian people, so it's fun to think of a Hawaiian in the Navajo finding. Is your mic on? Let me try. Hello. I'm not used to using a mic, but thank you. So my father came out here. For decades, the Navajo tribe has been pursuing two avenues to get water rights. The first is litigation. The tribe started filing lawsuits a long time ago, the first one back in the 1970s, to assert their rights and to force the states to recognize those rights. The second avenue is settlement, where the tribe states the federal government and other parties mutually agree on how much water the tribe should get. Reaching a settlement would not only avoid a lengthy court battle. It also comes with some funding for infrastructure. But it does have a cost. Any agreement will come with conditions and compromise from the tribe. The tribe is pursuing both options at the same time. Two tracks that both lead to water rights in very different ways. Both litigation and settlement are a far cry from where the tribe started without a seat at the table at all. Other tribes were given water rights years ago. We were left out. We asked the federal government stand up for us, and they did not. So we need to stand up for ourselves. The lawyers are here now because they are trying to work out a settlement deal in the state of Arizona. The negotiations have been going on for years. The people who have battled the weather to hear what these lawyers have to say. Many of them are walking in already angry. Their anger is directed at the federal government and the states around them, too. But it's also directed at the lawyers right in front of them. There have been three significant attempts at settlement in the past few decades. The Navajo people have seen proposed settlements come and go and gotten no closer to having the access to water that the rest of the country enjoys. Each of these previous deals has bred even deeper mistrust among the citizens of the Navajo Nation. They're skeptical of the tribal government's ability to represent their interests and are wary of even their own lawyers. In this episode of the Lifeblood of Navajo Nation, the tribe takes huge steps to secure their own future, but are still battling the ghosts of the past. This is episode three, the People vs. Navajo Nation. There's something you have to know about the process of settling water claims. It takes a long time. That's because to settle, all the water users in a state have to come to an agreement on how much water the tribe is entitled to. And the tribe has to make a deal in each of its neighboring states individually. Since the Navajo reservation borders four states, that makes the entire process piecemeal and frustratingly slow. That means the stakes of a deal going through or not are high. And the conversations around these deals are often tense. We're going to talk about three proposed settlement deals in this episode. Each one reveals how the water rights process leaves some Navajo citizens feeling marginalized, sometimes by their own leadership. Let's start with settlement number one. In 2005, the tribe was offered a deal to settle their claims on the San Juan river, but only by the state of New Mexico. The river also runs through Utah, but that deal would be separate. Still, that settlement offered the Navajo rights to develop farms on the New Mexico side of the reservation. But there were conditions.
- [06:43]
Andrew Curley
We said, we will waive certain kinds of claims. We will not use water in certain kinds of activities. We will have a limit on municipal and industrial usage.
- [06:53]
Charlie Edcity
Andrew Curley is a social studies professor at the University of Arizona. His research focuses on these kinds of relationships between tribes and their neighboring state governments. He says he's seen a pattern emerging in these settlements. Tribes get too little, and they give up too much. The 2005 settlement limited the tribe's chance to claim any more water in the future. What they agreed to would be it forever.
- [07:21]
Andrew Curley
So I was there. Actually, I was in the council gallery when the first settlement was passed through the Navajo council. And it was a quick decision. It was very surprising for me that we were making that kind of, like, long, forever claims to water, like, very quickly, like, you know, through just a roll call of a vote. And it seemed like a question with such gravity that we needed to have a better conversation around it, but we didn't.
- [07:47]
Charlie Edcity
Nonetheless, the Navajo Nation voted yes. The tribe's 2005 deal with the state of New Mexico gave them rights to 600,000 acre feet of water. And because they went down the settlement route rather than litigation, it also came with funding for a pipeline project. So that's settlement attempt number one. And it was huge. But it barely scratched the surface of the water the tribe needed. And they'd had to make compromises that stung. Also, the Navajo Nation still had no water rights in the state, where the majority of its land is Arizona. So in 2010, the Navajo Nation began settlement attempt number two with Arizona.
- [08:32]
Andrew Curley
It was an agreement for both the Little Colorado river and the Colorado River. Like anything that hits the reservation, from the Little Colorado river, you can do whatever you want with it. You get rights to the aquifer and the sea aquifer.
- [08:47]
Charlie Edcity
These aquifers are huge deposits of water that sit in the rock formations deep underground. They take thousands of years to refill, and it's actually impossible to know exactly how much water is in them. Still, they were part of the package that the Navajo Nation worked out with water users in Arizona. John Kyle, Arizona's former Republican senator, was a big part of these negotiations. Senator Kyle says he saw his role as a facilitator, and he hoped that the parties involved would be able to work out a deal that he could take to Congress for approval. And eventually they did. The parties agreed the Navajo Nation would get a small portion of the Colorado River, a good amount from the Little Colorado river, and mostly unlimited access to the aquifers. The Navajo Nation Council voted on it, and it passed. But there was a hitch at that.
- [09:46]
Andrew Curley
Time that passed the Navajo Council, and then it passed the Hopi tribe. So those are the two main actors. And then it was never brought into Congress because the price tag was too expensive. Expensive.
- [09:58]
Charlie Edcity
That price tag, by the way, was $800 million.
- [10:03]
Andrew Curley
He was like, no, we can't. I can't agree to this because it's too expensive and serves too few people, as he put it. You know, it's not like serving a big metropolis like Phoenix. You know, it's so like. It was kind of like a. It felt little dog whistly, you know, like, oh, it deserves Native people.
- [10:23]
Charlie Edcity
Kyle told ABC News population density was a factor in deciding which infrastructure projects were included in the funding, but denies that there was any racism or secret bias against the tribe. He also maintains that he and the other negotiating parties acted in good faith. In any case, the terms of the deal had changed, so now the settlement had to go back to the negotiating table to be rehashed. That's how settlement attempt number two failed and settlement number three emerged. And this is the big one, the one that's still fresh in many people's minds to this day, because in many ways, settlement number three had very similar terms to settlement number two, only this time there was a price tag. Senator Kyle felt he could actually take to Congress for approval. $300 million. Kyle told ABC News that the reduction in the amount was a suggestion he made reluctantly after trying to feel out the response from other senators. He said he thought the tribe would be able to get more money later through another bill, which he said he would support. After months of renegotiating with the Navajo tribe, Senator Kyl introduced the proposed settlement number three into Congress in February 2012. Kyle was almost 70 and was on his third term as Arizona senator. He had gray hair and small glasses and read carefully from the piece of paper in front of him.
- [11:58]
Andrew Curley
On behalf of Senator McCain and myself.
- [12:02]
Charlie Edcity
I am pleased today to introduce the Navajo Hopi Little Colorado River Water Rights settlement Act of 2012. It was the centennial year of Arizona's founding, and Kyle said that settling the water claims would be a great birthday gift for the state. He gestured towards a large photo perched on an easel behind him on the Senate floor. In the picture, a group of Navajo people is crowded around a well with a wagon and some horses. While this picture of conditions near Dilcon.
- [12:33]
Andrew Curley
On the Navajo reservation could be confused.
- [12:37]
Charlie Edcity
As a depiction of conditions at the time Arizona became a State in 1912 and president. This photograph was taken in just August of last year. For the record, the picture does not look like it's from 1912. It's a color photograph, and one of the men in the picture is wearing a polo shirt. But that's politics for you. With the picture behind him, Kyle spelled out what the settlement contains. The Navajo Nation and Hopi tribe would.
- [13:06]
Andrew Curley
Receive critical drinking water infrastructure.
- [13:08]
Charlie Edcity
The three groundwater projects contemplated by this actual would deliver much needed drinking water supplies to the impoverished areas of the Navajo and Hopi reservations. The new proposal sounded generous, but this wasn't a gift. To get the funding for these infrastructure projects, the tribe would have to offer something in return. Settlement comes with conditions and compromise. And once people found out what was at stake, some were furious. Melanie Yazi, now an assistant professor of Indian studies at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, was a student at the time.
- [13:49]
Melanie Yazi
So I was in my fourth year as a PhD student at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, and I was on Facebook because Facebook was a thing. In 2012, I saw these posts from Navajo people that I was friends with about this water settlement. It was called the Little Colorado River. The Navajo Hopi Little Colorado River Water Settlement. Sorry, that's a mouthful.
- [14:12]
Charlie Edcity
Something about this settlement made Melanie sit up and take notice. From Facebook, she learned that the settlement hadn't yet been voted on and that the Navajo Nation were holding public information meetings across the reservation to educate the public on what the settlement contained.
- [14:28]
Melanie Yazi
So I went to a lot of those meetings, and instead of taking my comprehensive exams, which I pushed off into the fall of 2012, I wrote a paper on what I saw.
- [14:40]
Charlie Edcity
No one had asked her to write this paper, but Melanie poured her energy into it. She talked about how legal precedents should have protected the tribe's water rights and how this settlement seemed to undermine those protections. Sure, it was a distraction from her PhD, but she saw it as a more than Worthy side project.
- [15:04]
Melanie Yazi
It was later published in an academic journal because someone saw it actually, and they were like, this is awesome. We need to publish this. And I was like, cool. But I never wrote it for an academic journal. I actually wrote it for the tribal council because I was essentially trying to convince them to not accept the terms of the 2012 water settlement because it really just felt like we were getting ripped off, honestly.
- [15:28]
Charlie Edcity
Like Professor Andrew Curley, Melanie saw something worrying about the way that these settlements were being made. This deal in 2012 was the result of months of negotiations. But by the time the public information sessions were happening, many people felt that their opinions were not being heard, that the decisions were already made above their heads. And once the deal was signed, there was no going back.
- [15:54]
Melanie Yazi
The way that the law works around water settlements for indigenous nations, tribal water rights, once you sign on that dotted line that settlement acts in perpetuity, meaning you can never again renegotiate any other amount or access to that water from that point forward, that is incredibly alarming. First of all, once you make that decision in 2012, let's say 2020, you know, 2052 comes along and there's no water left, you know, for you to be able to feed your sheep or to like stay in your house on the reservation, you, there's. There are no, there's no recourse for that because that's how water settlement works.
- [16:37]
Charlie Edcity
Melanie had an academic interest in how the settlements would work, but this was also personal. Melanie is Dane. To her, these attempts at settlement were about something much larger than water. They were existential.
- [16:52]
Melanie Yazi
What I just found through my research and also doing interviews with Navajo people when I was out on the res at the town hall meetings and then just listening to these kind of like water rights technicians who are working on behalf of the Navajo Nation, was a very clear picture and a history of dispossession. And so I think often when people think of colonial dispositions, possession, they think of land. Super important, right? But colonial dispossession also happens through water. The dispossession of land and water helps to facilitate this larger project of colonialism, which is essentially to drive native people off of their lands, to liquidate and to disappear their status as nations, to essentially dissolve and assimilate their people.
- [17:40]
Charlie Edcity
Melanie kept attending the public information meetings, finding like minded people that also shared her concerns.
- [17:47]
Melanie Yazi
At the Fort Defiance one, there were hundreds of people at that town hall meeting. And yeah, they were, they were grilling the people who were presenting. And I remember a very prominent water Activist in the Navajo Nation. Her name is Nicole Horseherder. She comes from Black Mesa. And she held a little meeting for interested, like Navajo people in Albuquerque to kind of give us the lowdown on what was going on with the settlement and why people were opposing it.
- [18:19]
Nicole Horseherder
And it just looked like a bad, bad water settlement.
- [18:24]
Charlie Edcity
This is Nicole Horse Herder, the activist who made an impression on Melanie at that Fort Defiance town hall. Nicole raised an issue with a part of the 2012 settlement, settlement number three, that talked about coal mining in the area where she and her family live. Nicole is from a high altitude plateau called Black Mesa. It's right in the middle of the reservation, far away from the Colorado River.
- [18:49]
Nicole Horseherder
We don't have surface water so much here, but we do have springs and seeps that were once abundant across Black mesa. And about 20 years ago, we noticed that many of our springs and seeps had disappeared.
- [19:05]
Charlie Edcity
The springs and seeps that used to bubble up around Black Mesa came from the N aquifer. Nicole believes that the mining affected them.
- [19:16]
Nicole Horseherder
We realized, we found out that the coal mining was depressurizing. Not only depressurizing, but also drawing down the water from the aquifers.
- [19:27]
Charlie Edcity
The water that had sustained Nicole's family for generations now failed to bubble to the surface. The mines were operated by Peabody Western Coal company, the largest coal mining company in the United States. The Navajo Nation sits on top of vast reserves of coal. But these natural resources haven't made them rich. Instead, generations of Navajo have seen resource extraction companies mine their land for coal, but also oil and natural gas, and seen what some say is too little profit in return. As for Peabody coal, they told ABC News that the aquifer has been studied for over 50 years, privately and publicly to ensure it is protected and managed. They say that the aquifer is, quote, healthy and robust. They've also ceased pumping for their slurry line, reducing their water usage, and closed the mine entirely in 2020 19. But it seems for a while they did have a preferential arrangement to use the N aquifer. According to their lease agreement from 1966, they promised to pay the Navajo $5 per acre foot of water. This was at a time where, According to the US Geological Survey, rates per acre foot were over $80.
- [20:51]
Nicole Horseherder
It was cheap for them. They were able to negotiate a deal with the Navajo Nation and buy the water at ar cheap, cheap rate. They were able to buy pristine ice age drinking water at an industrial rate.
- [21:10]
Charlie Edcity
But the coal company didn't need the water for drinking. The company dug out the coal and mixed it with pristine aquifer water, then sent it along a pipeline hundreds of miles away. The coal slurry was used to fuel a power plant in Nevada. Water Nicole's family had survived on now kept the lights on elsewhere.
- [21:35]
Nicole Horseherder
It's Navajo water that was used and exploited for mining purposes to grow communities far away from here. Those people out there have no clue where their prosperity came from. It came from here.
- [21:58]
Charlie Edcity
Since the Colorado River Compact was signed, the citizens of the Navajo Nation have watched as the states around them grew richer and more comfortable. They fought so hard for sovereignty to determine their own fate and instead watched their tribal government continue to make deals that benefited outsiders more than their own people. For their part, Navajo Nation's government has an impossible choice. Do they allow these outsiders to damage their land and hoard profits from the tribe's mineral wealth in return for slim opportunities for jobs for their people? This is how water rights settlements discussions became about more than just water. Because in the 2012 negotiation negotiations, the tribe's government had agreed to a swap. In return for some of their water rights, they had agreed to a renewal of the coal mine leases for another 30 years. That's why Nicole was organizing these grassroots protest meetings, trying to alert people to what their own government was signing them up for. And soon word of that grassroots opposition would reach Senator John Kyle himself.
- [23:20]
Rick Julius
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- [23:48]
Charlie Edcity
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- [24:24]
Earl Tooley
You get your podcasts.
- [24:27]
Charlie Edcity
The people had started to turn against settlement number three, and it wasn't long before they made their feelings known to the dealmakers. In April of 2012, two months after he introduced his bill to Congress, Senator Kyl called a meeting between him, Senator John McCain, who was also involved in the deal, and Navajo tribal leadership. It was set to take place in a reservation town called Tuba City. It was supposed to be a private meeting in a hotel restaurant, but word got out. Go on, Kyle. Kyle, help. I just like the town. In the parking lot, a large crowd of Navajo people had gathered. They didn't want the coal mine leases renewed. They didn't want to give up their future claims to water. They didn't want this settlement. A lot of people had shown up, many from grassroots environmental movements, to make their voices heard against the settlement. Around this time, Water is Life had become a rallying cry across Indigenous America. On Navajo Nation in 2012, it began to show up, painted on the sides of buildings and on signs by the road. Water is Life was also shouted at the Standing Rock protests in North Dakota a few years later. In Navajo, we say tro e na at e. But it's impossible to translate this to English exactly. Water is too important in our culture to fully express how significant this phrase is. Water is life is the best that we can do. The protesters at the rally wrote the phrase on signs and held them above their heads. There were around 100 people circling the entrance to the hotel. Recall Shelley. Recall Shelley, they chanted. Recall Shelley. Ben Shelley, the Navajo Nation president who was inside the meeting. He had helped craft the settlement. The protesters were disavowing their president. He had made promises they did not agree with. When the meeting was over, John Kyle and John McCain emerged from the building and then walked to their car, leaving Ben Shelley to face the crowd.
- [26:46]
Ben Shelley
No deal.
- [26:47]
Charlie Edcity
No deal. No deal. Shelly walked through the cluster of angry protesters. He tried to answer people's questions one by one. Then he climbed onto a stage to face them all. There was a microphone, and while people yelled things like traitor, he tried to speak to calm the crowd. He waved his arm around to get them to stop shouting long enough for him to explain himself. Listen. Listen, listen. The crowd could not be calm. The more Shelley spoke, the more he was shouted down.
- [27:26]
Ben Shelley
I'm not kidding that it'll go to the Navajo Nation. Council and army business need to approve it. If they approve it or it won't.
- [27:37]
Charlie Edcity
Go the Senate 2109 will not go Shelley said that if the council doesn't approve the deal, it won't happen. Then he said, if you care so much, come to the public meetings. Make your voice heard. Someone shouted, seven chapters isn't enough, referring to the areas that stood to benefit from the agreement out of 110 chapters. A few moments later, President Shelley gave back the microphone and left. It's important to remember this crowd doesn't represent everyone. There were lots of people who were pro settlement. The lawyer for the Navajo Nation at the time, Stanley Pollack, was one of them. He said that while the settlement wasn't perfect, if it wasn't passed, the Navajo's only option would be waiting for litigation. And others recognize that for all the problems the mining companies have caused, they also employed a lot of Navajo people. The Navajo council vote was on July 5, 2012. After debating for hours, the votes reflected just how much the protests and skepticism had swayed council members. It was six votes for and 15 against. The settlement was rejected. One of the council members who voted against it told the council that it marked a new beginning for the Navajo Nation. That, quote, we as natanis or leaders, decide what's best for us. Not outsiders, not our attorneys, not corporations. Senator Kyl told us that the reception of the crowd outside of the meeting was what convinced him that the pressure on the tribal government was too great for the legislation to have moved forward. Much to his regret, he felt that settlement number three was a good deal for all parties and that it was, quote, a great disappointment that we failed. Andrew Curley says he thinks that people within the tribe who were pro settlement knew in their hearts it wasn't right. He thinks that it was more about trying to pick the path most likely to succeed.
- [29:52]
Andrew Curley
So it was more out of political calculation than it was out of, like, a sense of, like, is this a really good deal? It never was. You know, we're never negotiating from a status of advantage or even parity. You know, going back to the treaty of 1868, it's always, we're under duress when we're negotiating, and then we have to agree to, like, bad conditions.
- [30:14]
Charlie Edcity
The tribe was, and still is at a disadvantage at the settlement negotiating table. The state of Arizona could walk away at any time. But for the Navajo, their entire future depends on a deal. When one party doesn't have running water, electricity, or Internet for all of its citizens, they don't have a lot of bargaining power. It makes it all the more difficult to turn your back on a deal, even a bad one. But still, the tribe walked away and decided to wait for something better. It's been 12 years, and now the lawyers are back in the negotiating room with Arizona because of the way previous attempts at settlements have gone. Water lawyers today know this much. For any settlement to succeed, they need the support of the people. So, next slide. That's why they're on this water rights education tour. The lawyers are stuck between a rock and a hard place. On one side, they're fighting the state of Arizona to get a good deal. On the other, they're trying to convince their own citizens that they know what a good deal looks like. But what is a good deal? From the lawyer's perspective, it isn't litigation. They see it as costly, time consuming, and a gamble. They'd be at the mercy of a judge to award them their water rights. But a settlement? That seemed like a better deal to them. They know about the compromises involved, but they also know it would be faster and come with some amount of funding for infrastructure. In their presentation at the town hall, it's clear they have a favorite. As an attorney, you're supposed to be there for the best interest of your clients. So I am telling you in the work that we do for the best interest of the dine for our nation and for you as clients, settlement is the advantage. For their audience, the distinction between settling and litigation isn't quite so clear. Settlement still seems unfair. Thank you. Any questions? All right here. Please state your name. I'm from Big Mountain. My name is Louise Benali. A woman named Louise is past the microphone at the town hall. She has a big smile on her face when she introduces herself. She's wearing double denim jeans and a jacket, and when she stands, she's barely taller than the man sitting in front of her. The laws of the land, the natural law, the spiritual law. That's what we need to be standing on as a servant in that nation, not be told and pushed around like we always have been. It's been too long. Navajo natural law, as Louise puts it, is about respecting nature. The negotiations shouldn't be in a boardroom with lawyers. They should be with the earth, reestablishing traditional ways, preserving and protecting, not assigning dollar figures or number of acre feet. This view is echoed by other people at the meeting. Why are we engaging with this system at all? It isn't us. Louise's view is shared by many in the environmental protest movement, the same ones that chanted Water is life. Dene identity is intertwined with this idea of natural law. The problem is that the discussion around water Rights is all done through Western legal systems, that is white settler systems. And there is someone in this room who can thread the needle between these two ideas. Crystal Tulley Cordova.
- [34:24]
Crystal Tulley Cordova
So I wanted to provide an update on that.
- [34:27]
Charlie Edcity
We're currently Crystal is the Navajo Nation chief hydrologist. She's on this tour with the lawyers promoting the avenues that the Navajo are using to get their water rights. She's been sitting at the back of the room throughout the whole presentation. Unlike the lawyers who were in their suits, Crystal is wearing a traditional Navajo outfit, a three tiered skirt, long black hair tied up in a fabric wrapped bun called a tziyeh, and turquoise jewelry. She's brought her two month old baby with her and her mom who watches the baby while she speaks to the room about visiting the confluence, an area of deep spiritual significance for Navajo people. The confluence is where the Little Colorado and the Main Stem river meet at a bright blue lake at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.
- [35:16]
Crystal Tulley Cordova
And in September 2022, I had the opportunity to be able to go to the confluence that is downstream of Blue Spring, made corn pollen offerings at that confluence.
- [35:29]
Charlie Edcity
A corn pollen offering is a prayer, one of gratitude and appreciation for the river.
- [35:35]
Crystal Tulley Cordova
The type of feeling that you felt there was a feeling of this is not just my generation doing this, but generations before me. This is a practice that has been done before me. And it was just, it's just one of those things when you have a special spiritual moment like that to be able to continue to do the work that we do.
- [36:00]
Charlie Edcity
Crystal speech is making people in the room nod yes. Crystal is a bridge between the lawyers and the grassroots opposition. She's reminding them that while operating in the colonial system, being forced on them, that she can hold on to traditional values and protect what's important.
- [36:19]
Crystal Tulley Cordova
And so for all of us, having the opportunity to be able to not only do that special spiritual offering at the confluence, but also being able to see the salt area. And many of you saw that. I have a little two month old that will be two months old soon and I have salt from those areas. And I'm looking forward to the day that she laughs for her first laugh so that we can give that out to the family that we have.
- [36:46]
Charlie Edcity
Salt from the Colorado river is used in traditional Navajo ceremonies, including one ceremony thrown in honor of a baby's first laugh. Crystal is trying to say, give us a chance.
- [36:59]
Crystal Tulley Cordova
Yes, we're here. Yes, we receive our decrees, but we come from the Navajo Nation and all that we do is in the best interest of our people.
- [37:09]
Charlie Edcity
Just as Crystal finishes speaking. A man stands up at the front of the room and faces the crowd. He's got more reasons than most for supporting a water rights deal and everyone wants to hear what he has to say.
- [37:33]
Rick Julius
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- [38:04]
Earl Tooley
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- [38:34]
Charlie Edcity
Man standing up at the meeting was Earl Tooley.
- [38:37]
Ben Shelley
My name is Earl Tooley and first generation Tooley. For one reason or another, they couldn't spell. You know you got 26 letters in the Alphabet and you can't spell.
- [38:54]
Charlie Edcity
He is in his 60s with a little gray in his beard and hair. When we visited him in his garden outside of his comfortable house where three generations of his family lived together, he showed off his fruit trees and vegetable patch. He works for the Water Rights Commission on the team, trying to keep people informed at these meetings. Earl's been involved in water rights for a long time. He remembers the 2012 settlement or settlement number three pretty well. He thought it was a good deal. He still does. The activists who opposed the deal 12 years ago had idealism on their side, but Earl's more of a pragmatist and he's hoping that settlement number four comes soon. Earl now lives near Gallup, New Mexico, but originally he's from Blue Gap, Arizona.
- [39:46]
Ben Shelley
Blue Gap is a very rural area. Our closest neighbor is probably about a half a mile away.
- [39:54]
Charlie Edcity
He hauled water growing up and watched his children do the same. Earl loves it there, up in the high altitude in the center of the reservation. He calls it oceanfront property.
- [40:08]
Ben Shelley
I say that because there are fossils out there, seashells, petrified and then also.
- [40:16]
Charlie Edcity
Fossilized When Earl was growing up, most people herded animals and lived close to the land. No electricity, no indoor plumbing, no television. The only other industry up there used to be mining uranium mining. Backed by the federal government, the entire industry escalated during the Cold War and employed Navajo people by the thousands. It allowed the US to bolster their nuclear arsenal. But like the coal mines on Black Mesa, the uranium mining mostly benefited people living elsewhere and led to long term suffering for the Navajo people. The Navajo people worked in these mines, often without masks, and they brought home the poisonous dust on their clothes. At the peak, there were over 500 uranium mines. Radioactive freckles dotted all over. After the Cold War was over, the mining slowed and was finally banned by the Navajo Nation. The mines became biohazard zones and leftover radioactive material leached into the ground, which in turn polluted the water and led to deadly health issues.
- [41:30]
Ben Shelley
The contamination, as to when I became aware, there was a hush, hush about it. You know, you don't talk about ailment. People didn't openly talk about it because if I openly talk about it, I could expose you. Expose to your spirit and to your being. And that you might, you might get that ailment if I just mention it to you. There are no words in our vocabulary for cancer, but what we call it is the sore that never heals.
- [42:10]
Charlie Edcity
In 2021, Earl found a lump right under his jawbone. He was scared to find out what it was, but eventually his family convinced him to go to the doctor.
- [42:21]
Ben Shelley
He says, okay, let's take a look at it. And then, you know, you go through the blood test, and then that's where the ears, nose, and throat doctor basically told me. He says, you have lymphoma. And I looked at him and then he. He said, did you hear me? I says, yeah, I did. And then he spelled it out for me. I still have that paper. He spelled it out for me. He says, this is what you have, and cancer doesn't hurt. Telling your family you have cancer, that hurts.
- [43:04]
Charlie Edcity
Earl had gone swimming in the natural pools and streams near Blue Gap as a boy. He drank the water straight out of the ground. He blames the water for his cancer. And he's not the only one. According to research by Northern Arizona University, the Navajo have higher rates of particular types of cancer than the rest of the country. The rates of cancer correlates with closeness to uranium mines. In a study by researchers at the University of New Mexico in 2015, of 600 Navajo homes, they found that 85% of them have been exposed to Uranium to some degree. But even though the risks are known today, many people still rely on containers contaminated water sources across the reservation because they have no other option. My Uncle Addison was just a boy when my grandparents lived at a uranium mining camp near Mexican Hat, Utah. My aunt, my uncle, and my mom drank the water and played in nearby streams. My grandmother washed my grandfather Shiche's clothes. He worked at the mine without any protection or safety equipment, just trying to make a better life for his family. I was just three years old when my uncle passed away. I don't remember him. And my mom says that he was diagnosed with a very rare form of leukemia and his health declined quickly. I was 18 when my grandfather died after living out the last years of his life carrying around an oxygen tank. He had lung cancer. Both of these deaths tore irreparable holes in our family, deaths that were caused by uranium exposure. My family is among many who have the same loss, the same pain, the same story. Earl went through grueling rounds of chemotherapy. During his treatment, he had a lot of time to think. He thought about the fragility of life, about what the contamination did to his home and family.
- [45:28]
Ben Shelley
I spent plenty of time in the garden. The kids called that church. Spend a lot of time on my knees and just talking. Everything can impact us in this particular web of life. One of the things that I understand is that I used to take the girls out, and when it would really rain, we could hear the chorus of frogs. We. We don't hear that no more. I can't take them to the local stream and look for tadpoles. There's no more tadpoles. If that water is contaminated and they're no longer here, we're not too far down the road from. From that as well.
- [46:29]
Charlie Edcity
In some ways, Earl's story is similar to the activists on Black Mesa. Resource extraction by outside interests has done them both harm. But while the Black Mesa activists have grown distrustful, Earl has hope. Earl believes settling is the best way for the tribe to express their sovereignty. Settlement could bring water treatment plants. It could bring pipes full of clean water. It could mean that no one would be relying on wells near uranium mines. Earl's cancer is now in remission. He's working as hard as ever to solve his tribe's water crisis. This passion that he has, he also passed it on to his kids. One of them is Crystal, the Navajo Nation hydrologist.
- [47:21]
Ben Shelley
These are our children and the fourth generation from that.
- [47:26]
Charlie Edcity
Hastina Earl was at the meeting with his daughter. They stood side by side at the Town hall as he urged his community to consider that a deal with compromises would be better than no deal at all. He told the group, this time, things are different because it's your own people in the negotiating room.
- [47:47]
Ben Shelley
We have Navajo representation, Navajo voice, Navajo roots, that is speaking for us today. And that is the acknowledgment that I would like to share with you.
- [48:02]
Charlie Edcity
Earl's speech calms things for a moment, but then more questions come and keep coming. Water touches every part of life. And bubbling up into the discussions come all the unresolved issues from the decades of the Navajo people being excluded and ignored. As long as you're a native person in the United States, you're going to have an adversary relationship with the United.
- [48:26]
Ben Shelley
States, no matter what.
- [48:28]
Charlie Edcity
I know people that live in Phoenix.
- [48:30]
Melanie Yazi
They take three showers a day.
- [48:32]
Charlie Edcity
That's not fair. And I feel like we're being punished because when you grow up out here, you're taught to preserve that water. Are we not preserving our water? And we're being punished because we're preserving it. Our officials don't seem to listen to us at all. We all have complaints, but no, they don't listen to us. The three hour meeting turns into four hours, five hours. It gets dark outside. We need to wrap up. I know, I know. We have to be out of here. Five. Kiev. Don't argue, please.
- [49:13]
Ben Shelley
This is not argument.
- [49:18]
Charlie Edcity
If the gap between the lawyers and the people they're trying to represent has lessened, it doesn't feel like it right now. There's no real conclusion to the meeting, no consensus. Two days later, the two lawyers and Crystal will be back at the next meeting for more of the same. But while the lawyers tour continues, there's something that's not in their presentation. Since the 2023 Supreme Court case where the tribe took the federal government to task for not representing their interests, there has been renewed attention on Navajo water issues. Front page type of attention. By late 2023, the negotiations with Arizona became more earnest, more real. And now a deal with Arizona for the largest, most comprehensive settlement in the tribe's history isn't in discussion anymore. It's about to be announced. Down in Phoenix, their colleagues have been sitting around a negotiating table for months. And in recent weeks, they have been putting the finishing touches on a proposed settlement deal for the Little Colorado river, the aquifers underground, and for the Colorado River. On February 28, a few weeks after the meeting in Loop, the news breaks. A settlement with Arizona is no longer a hypothetical. It's real. And the details of what's being offered from both sides can now be shared. It's up to the Navajo people to decide if they will take it and be bound by it forever, or go back to waiting again for a better offer. The tribe's council needs to vote yes or no. But what compromises will the tribe have to agree to? They've waited this long for their water. Can they accept an imperfect settlement in hopes of a better future?
- [51:18]
Crystal Tulley Cordova
Like, how are people going to vote? You just never know.
- [51:20]
Ben Shelley
Tears.
- [51:21]
Melanie Yazi
Tears were definitely shed. I cannot accept it. I do not accept the best of a bad deal. Indigenous people should never have to accept the best of a bad deal.
- [51:39]
Charlie Edcity
Reclaimed the Lifeblood of Navajo Nation is an original production of ABC Audio. The series was hosted by me, Charlie Edcity. It was written by Madeline Wood. This series was produced by Madeline Wood, Camille Peterson, Kiara Powell and Amira Williams with help from Emily Schutz and Marwa Milwaukee. Edited by Gianna Palmer Our cultural consultant was Heather Tanana. Arielle Chester is our social producer. Our supervising producer is Susie Liu. Music and mix by Evan Viola. Special thanks to Liz Alessi and Lakia Brown. Josh Cohan is our director of podcast programming. Laura Mayer is our executive producer. And big thanks to my mom, Christine Howard and my aunt Arlene Howard.
- [52:29]
Rick Julius
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