Coeur d'Alene Tribe's Department of Education Summer Youth Internship Program: Land & Life eBook

1. Land and Life Ebook

3. Past
In the last 100 years the Coeur d’Alene Tribe has dealt with debilitating
effects of encroachment, extraction, and erasure. In the mid 1800’s, the
reservation was over 5,000,000 acres. When settlers came in our reservation
decreased to 70,000. The settlers took our land for developmental purposes
that damaged our lands tremendously, using it to create the logging and
farming industries as well as build mines. These changes caused large
amounts of pollution. Polluted water can lead to detrimental population
decreases of wildlife as well as habitat loss.

4. Past
Past: Effect on the Waters
https://idahobusinessreview.com/2021/03/22/what-80-years-of-
mining-did-to-lake-coeur-dalene/
During this time period the miners would dump
their mining waste into the Coeur d’Alene river.
This resulted in the fish population decreasing.
Lead also took out the forests and other
variations of vegetation.
If you swim in polluted water you can
get lead poisoning, lead poisoning
can cause memory loss and very high
blood pressure.
https://www.shraboise.com/2015/01/11215-coeur-dalene-mining-
pollution/

5. Past
In response to the horrible impacts of mining waste, the Coeur d’Alene Tribe
was able to sue the mines for the contamination of the land, holding the mines
accountable for the damage they caused.
We faced these issues in the past and the tribe dealt with these issues the best
they could yet we still continue to fight back.

6. It is a huge thing today for our tribe to get our
land back. We have 46,000 acres left to get
back until we gain that 51% which would give
us so many opportunities. The leaders of the
tribe have shown great Stewardship
(ats’qht’wesh) by starting at 70,000 acres and
bringing that up to 130,000 acres. Our land is
sacred, it is a place that our ancestors fished,
hunted, gathered, and lived. Our people took
care of our land and then it was swiped away
from them just like that, so it is a very good
feeling to be gaining the land back that our
ancestors once took care of so that we could
take care of it the way they did. In present time
it is a feeling of Spirituality (chspasilgwesn)
because in a way gaining our land back is like
connecting with our ancestors.
Land

7. Insects
‘ast’qhnt’wesh also known as stewardship was chosen for insects
because they take care of the fish losing the smallest thing such as a
stonefly, or a caddis fly is able to cause a chain reaction that will affect our
people in the future.
Waste from mines pollutes our waters by adding toxic metals, which
removes algae off of rocks taking away the insects food source causing them
to migrate elsewhere. When the insects are gone the fish will follow in their
trail because they prefer to be with their food.
This effects us because fish are a huge part of our culture that we
shouldn’t lose or have to travel far to find when they could be in our backyard.
For example when we traveled to the South Fork of the Coeur
d’Alene River there weren’t that many bugs and hardly any fish, but once we
reached the North Fork we saw many stone flies, may flies, caddis flies, and
we even saw fish known as trout and sculpins. The South Fork is an example
of the chain reaction I explained while the North Fork is an example of
healthy water. In conclusion the insects show stewardship by taking care of
the fish and not causing a chain reaction.

8. Today’s contamination to the water is better than it used to be.
Our tribe is taking part in overseeing the clean up of the waters.
The Tribe has 5 core values: stewardship, guardianship,
scholarship, spirituality, and membership. The Tribe taking their
part in cleaning up the waters from the hard metals is showing
stewardship. ‘Ats’qhnt’wesh is stewardship in Coeur d’Alene.
Present - Contamination

9. Today poor water treatment makes it hard for us Native Americans to get back to
our roots. Everyday back then we would eat 2 lbs of fish a day but because of the
mining dumping, our water supply was contaminated and now we have to go to
Wenatchee to get our fish.

10. Projected Environmental Outcomes
Statutes and Rules
Statutes:
● Idaho Code – Title 47, Chapter 15, Idaho Mined Land Reclamation Act
● Idaho Code – Title 47, Chapter 18, Section 1803, Reclamation Fund Created – Financial Assurance
Rules:
● IDAPA 20.03.02 – Rules Governing Mined Land Reclamation
● IDAPA 20.03.03 – Rules Governing Administration of the Reclamation Fund

11. Building of Relationships amongst all the Lakefolk
● Coming together as a group of people around the lake and river areas to
continue holding companies and government accountable for the situations
that they facilitated.
● Realizing that the best way to move forward as a culture is to find
commonalities with the other communities around the lake and capitalize on
those instead of pointing out the differences.

12. The Goal for the Future
Being able to utilize our waters for tribal uses again. Our ancestors ate 2 pounds
of fish a day. Being able to reconnect with our culture is a sign of resistance and to
let people know were still here. So we can also let people know we won’t give up
until we get our waters and fish back.

13. Summary of the Future
Utilization of Coeur Values for the Preservation of the Future
The core values of the CdA Tribe are as follows: Membership, Scholarship, Stewardship, Guardianship, and
Spirituality. If the tribe continues to maintain these values and expand to not only the reservation but Lake and River community
as a whole these standards can help to bring us together as fellow lake and river dwellers in the preservation and rehabilitation of
the waterways and the lake itself.
If we capitalize on Membership, Stewardship, and Guardianship this will help to increase the drive amongst all of
the lake and river community to help restore the lake and rivers to a more usable state. This initiative would create more
members which means more stewards, and thus creating more guardians. This will help in the process of healing fractured
relations with people by finding a common goal to resist against.

14. Summary of the Future, Continued
Scholarship is important because it teaches people about why our culture is so important to learn about because it shows how we used
to fish and how our land was stolen and how our water was polluted with lead and other chemicals and how our animals were dying
from the mining companies. We need to inform the entirety of the lake community of the wrongdoings in the past not only to the CdA
people but to the environment and to the outlining communities as well. If we continue to educate and show that this is not just the
Tribe’s problem but the lake communities problem because the lakes and rivers are used by all these people. Educating the people of
the poisons that still to this day affect the lake, forests, and wildlife. These are all common problems not just localized to reservation but
to the Coeur d’Alene basin as a whole. This would increase the membership, increase the drive to improve, increase the drive to Resist
the draw of destruction, and increase the motivation for Restoration. This resistance needs to be spread from the tribe to the entirety of
the lake and river community because through numbers, knowledge, and innovation shall we be able to restore these things back to a
more natural state.

15. The preservation and restoration
of these areas will benefit our
tribe in so many ways. By
providing clean water, habitable
habitats, and balance to nature.