Andrew Hanson.   An attorney Andrew Hanson from Midwest Environmental Advocates in Madison helped organize the recent “Joining the Waters” event in Lac du Flambeau about tribal sovereignty and protecting water in Wisconsin. Tribal sovereignty involves the inherent rights American Indian Nations possess to manage their own affairs.  During his speech lamenting shore land construction across the northwoods Hanson set the tone for event by saying,  “A threat to clean and abundant water is a threat to humans rights.  Clean and abundant water is a human right that everyone deserves”

 Nick Vander Puy from the Superior Broadcast Network interviews Andrew Hanson about the “Joining the Waters” event.

(length, six minutes) click here for a “live stream broadcast”

Tom Maulson.  At the recent “Joining the Waters” gathering in Lac du Flambeau, more than a hundred Indian and non-Indians talked about tribal sovereignty and efforts to protect water in Wisconsin.  One of the first speakers Tom Maulson from Lac du Flambeau spoke about Jim Schlender.  Schlender was a Lac Courte Oreilles Chippewa tribal member who walked on this past August.  During the fifty eight years he lived he fought for treaty rights, clean air and water, and served as the Executive Administrator for the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission. Schlender tried to infuse traditional values into the work of the commission. Tom Maulson remembers his good friend Jim Schlender.

(length three minutes) click here for a “live stream broadcast”

to download an mp3 click here

Josephine Mandamin (Man-dahm-min)  A few years ago a First Nation grandmother Josephine Mandamin, along with two other grandmothers, walked around Lake Superior.  They’ve since walked around Lake Michigan and Lake Huron.  They carried a thirty pound copper pail of water and an eagle staff. Why would three grandmothers do this?  Mandamin says, ““We did it for the water, for the earth, for the animals, for the insects, for the trees, for all the two leggeds. To remind all those we came across, that the walk was for them. Not us. The walk was for the next generations, we walked with the water for them also. They will know, as Mother Earth knows that we walked with the water for all of creation.”  Mandamin talks with Nick Vander Puy at the “Joining the Waters” gathering  about what they saw, walking around Lake Superior.

(length, fifteen minutes) click here for a “live stream broadcast”

Mercury pollution; a grave concern for Indigenous peoples.

Bob Shimek.  (Shim-meck) Special Projects Coordinator, Indigenous Environmental Network IEN

Bob Shimek spoke at the “Joining the Waters” event about mercury pollution in fish. Shimek, in fact, several years ago suffered mercury poisoning from eating northern pike.   A subsistence netter, Shimek is an enrolled member of the Red Lake Chippewa Nation.  Nick Vander Puy asks Shimek why it’s so difficult in Indian Country to interest people in seeking a constitutional amendment protecting the common air, land, and water for the Seventh Generation.

(length, sixteen minutes) click here for a “live stream broadcast”

"The right of citizens of the United States to use and enjoy air, water, wildlife, and other renewable resources determined by the Congress to be common property shall not be impaired, nor shall such use impair their availability for the use of future generations"

A proposal to protect the future generations, presented to the Joining Waters forum by Sandy Lyon on behalf of Walt Bresette.

to view the document click here