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From: Bonnie White <oakridge@gorge.net>
To: <<clipped>>
Subject: Press Release regarding Enron/Columbia Hills Events - Feb
28-29,
Portland, OR
Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2000 11:25:52 -0800
For Immediate Release February 8, 2000
Contact: Columbia Gorge Audubon Society, Dennis or Bonnie White, 509-493-3891
Kay Bridge at KBOO Radio, 503-231-8032
Enron Energy Development in the Columbia Gorge Threatens Sacred Sites,
Endangered Species, and Scenic Area
Three internationally know speakers, Cascade-Klickitat Chief, Johnny
Jackson;
Tom Goldtooth, National Director of the Indigenous Environmental Network;
and
Bradley Angel, Executive Director of Greenaction, will address Enron
Corporation's energy development in the Columbia River Gorge at a fundraising
salmon bake
dinner at St. Marks Lutheran Church, SE 58th and Powell, Monday, February
28,
6-9 p.m. They will appear again at a rally at Pioneer Courthouse
Square on
February 29, at noon.
Texas natural gas giant, Enron Corporation, has purchased leases to
thousands
of acres on the Columbia Hills, in the Columbia River Gorge.
This area,
located near Celilo Falls, Maryhill Museum of Art and the confluence
of the
Columbia River with the John Day and Deschutes Rivers is renowned for
its environmental,
scenic, Indigenous and European cultural and historical significance.
This area overlooks the scenic Columbia River Gorge and provides critical
wildlife habitat for a long list of sensitive, threatened and
endangered species.
The Columbia Hills has recently been designated an "Important Birds
Area" under
National Audubon Society's IBA program.
Enron corporation's stated plans are to use the land leases to generate
"green" wind energy. Chief Johnny Jackson, the Columbia Gorge
Audubon Society, the
Indigenous Environmental Network, and Greenaction believe that energy
cannot
be "green" when it is generated at the expense of sacred and scenic
sites and
habitat for threatened and endangered species.
Fundraiser purpose: Chief Johnny Jackson and the Columbia Gorge Audubon
Society are presenters of this salmon bake dinner to support CGAS's
ongoing
legal and political campaign to prevent industrial wind power from
being
located in the Columbia Hills. They will be joined in this public
campaign by the
Indigenous Environmental Network, a national Native environmental justice
organization, and Greenaction, a San Francisco-based health and environmental
justice advocacy and watchdog organization.
Sponsors: Radio Station KBOO 90.7
FM, Portland, OR; KAOS 89.3 FM,
Olympia, WA; PRIMAL MINDS w/Tiokasin, Radion Station KAOS; Indigenous
Environmental Network, Bemidji, MN; Greenaction, San Francisco, CA;
Media
Island International, Olympia, WA; Indigenous Support Coalition of
Oregon,
Eugene,
OR.
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Biographies
Chief Johnny Jackson:
Johnny Jackson is the Cascade-Klickitat Chief of the fourteen bands
and
tribes of the Yakama Nation; a national council member of IEN, an international
organization with an affiliation of over 200 indigenous organizations
and nations; a
member of the International Treaty Council; and a board member of the
Columbia Gorge
Audubon Society.
Johnny's activism began after he was served an eviction notice from
the
government, asking him to move out of the in-lieu fishing site and
go to the
reservation. Since the fight to save his home, Johnny has become
a
well-known and respected activist involved in issues such as Native
fishing rights, the
protection of sacred land and vision quest sites, development along
the
Columbia River, upholding treaty rights, the removal of dams, polluting
industries,
and Hanford, to name a few.
Johnny Jackson is the voice of his people in protecting sacred sites
such
as Lyle Point [Lyle, Washington], Enola Hill [Oregon], and Juniper
Point
[Washington] which is located on the Columbia Hills. In September
of 1993, Johnny helped set
up an encampment on Lyle Point to stop ng environmental protection
policies on or
near native lands. He has an international reputation for his
work on
environmental issues in relationship with traditional eco-knowledge
and sustainable
community development. Along with the coalition members of the
Indigenous
Environmental Network, officially formed in 1991, Goldtooth works unceasingly
to protect
the Sacredness of Mother Earth from contamination and exploitation
- all based
on his understanding of traditional teachings. He also advises
various science and
historical museums on repatriation and reburial of human remains and
return
of cultural items.
Bradley Angel:
As Greenpeace's Southwest toxics coordinator, he spent 11 years helping
communities fight for their health, their land, and often their survival.
Angel has organized in the Mojave Desert, where Native Americans are
fighting to stop
the construction of a nuclear-waste dump; in West Oakland, where low-income
residents are trying to force Caltrans to clean up toxic ground water;
and
in the Central Valley, where farm workers are organizing against a
hazardous-waste
megadump. So in July 1997, when word came down from Greenpeace's
national
office that all environmental-justice campaigns would be discontinued
in
January 1998, community leaders all over California started thinking
about how to
keep Angel's work going.
Angel and some former workers from Greenpeace, and colleagues from
throughout the state, decided to start a new group to pick up where
Greenpeace had left off. The new group is called Greenaction.
Bradley Angel has also assisted the Dakota People of the Yankton Sioux
Reservation in South Dakota in ongoing efforts to stop a major landfill
project from moving forward. Bradley's efforts have reached Native
Peoples' communities
across the Western Hemisphere.
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