News

Indigenous people and tribes have inhabited the West for thousands of years, collecting generations of knowledge about the landscape and ecology of our region. While Indigenous groups have long been blocked from implementing their ancestral understanding to steward western landscapes, that dynamic is shifting in important ways, allowing for more robust Indigenous input into the techniques that are used to maintain healthy ecosystems.  

Traditional Ecological Knowledge, or TEK, describes the ongoing accumulation of knowledge, practice, and belief about the relationship between living things and the ecosystem – an understanding that Indigenous communities have been refining for generations.  

One important area where TEK is being implemented is in the world of wildfire management.  

For thousands of years, fire was an essential part of Indigenous life in the West. Native Americans, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians used fire to clear areas for crops or travel, to manage the land for certain plants and animals, to hunt game, and for many other purposes.  

Some Indigenous groups considered fire to be medicine for the forest, and prescribing it in the right moment and quantity would maintain the abundance and productivity of the whole ecosystem.  

Since the 19th century, however, cultural burns have been largely restricted across the West, which many now believe has helped fuel the megafires we see today. According to a report from the University of Utah, “in the absence of natural fire cycles and Indigenous burning, modern forests have more fodder to fuel high-severity fires.” 

This renewed understanding of wildfire behavior has sparked a movement away from extinguishing every fire on the landscape and toward an appreciation for the Indigenous use of “good fire.”  

Western Governors have collectively acknowledged the importance of these practices in their bipartisan policy resolution through WGA, titled, National Forest and Rangeland Management.  

“Traditional Native American cultural burning and tribal ecological knowledge and practices can contribute significantly to improved forest management in the West and should be incorporated more effectively into federal and state planning management processes,” reads the Governors’ resolution.  

Last year, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed a landmark bill to allow tribes in California to conduct cultural burns, while acknowledging their sovereignty over these practices.  

Now, communities such as the Karuk and Yurok tribes in northwestern California are practicing burns on their lands to support the local ecosystem and reduce the risk of out-of-control wildfires. 

Further south, in Altadena, a property owned and managed by the Tongva people escaped this year’s fires near Los Angeles without nearly as much damage as surrounding areas. The community credits its removal of fire-prone eucalyptus trees and its efforts to nurture native oaks with the property’s relative fire resilience.  

In Montana, the Salish and Kootenai people are bringing cultural burning back to the Flathead Reservation, in part to help enhance the habitat for native blue camas. Other tribes, such as the Washoe in Nevada, are also bringing back intentional burns on their lands. 

In addition to fire management, traditional Indigenous knowledge is being used to benefit a variety of crucial western landscapes.  

In Idaho, at the site of the Bear River Massacre, the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation is restoring the area to its wild, natural state. In addition to helping the local ecosystem thrive, the restoration will help deliver an estimated 13,000 acre-feet of water to the Great Salt Lake, which has hit dangerously low levels in recent years.  

Another example comes from Hawaii, where traditional Native Hawaiian aquaculture systems, known as loko i‘a, were recently proven to work in tandem with the surrounding ecosystem more sustainably than common commercial aquaculture.  

Financing missing middle housing: in Oregon, Governor Tina Kotek announced that the City of Coos Bay and Tillamook County will build 132 new housing units through the Governor’s Moderate Income Revolving Loan Program.  

Governor Kotek created the program to help finance the construction of housing for moderate-income families.  

“Hard-working families should have an easier path to finding a home they can afford,” Governor Kotek said. “We must work together and use every tool we have to achieve housing affordability for every Oregonian. Thank you to the City of Coos Bay and Tillamook County for blazing the trail on this new loan program.”   

For more on housing in the West, including solutions for building “missing middle” housing, check out the BRAND West initiative report from New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham’s term as WGA Chair. 

Building state-tribal relationships: North Dakota Governor Kelly Armstrong, Lieutenant Governor Michelle Strinden, and other state officials visited the Spirit Lake Nation last week to meet with Chairwoman Lonna Jackson-Street, legislators, and other tribal leaders and members. 

The visit was part of Governor Armstrong’s commitment to building strong state-tribal bonds. Armstrong will visit all five tribal nations in North Dakota during his first year in office.  

“Our goal with these visits is to listen to the needs, challenges and opportunities of our tribal nations, which are each unique in their own way, and identify avenues to turn ideas into action,” Governor Armstrong said. “We appreciate the hospitality shown by Chairwoman Street and the Tribal Council and look forward to continued collaboration and partnerships that strengthen state-tribal relations for the benefit of tribal members and all North Dakota citizens.” 

Avalanche awareness: those venturing into the winter backcountry have a new resource to stay safe from avalanches, thanks to a collaboration between the Colorado Avalanche Information Center, the Northwest Avalanche Center, and the American Institute for Avalanche Research and Education.  

The trio has paired up to release Avalanche Aware, a free one-hour online education course to introduce people to snow safety and avalanche awareness.  

Hoofed reptile fossil uncovered: paleontologists recently published new findings in the journal Science that reveals the first evidence of hoofed, duck-billed reptiles from the age of dinosaurs.  

The discovery was made in eastern Wyoming, where the creatures were mummified under a thin layer of clay, which preserved the fossils in rare detail. Scientists have pondered the existence of reptilian dinosaurs with horse-like hooves, but this discovery marks the clearest evidence yet.