BERKELEY, Calif. – After 649 days perched atop a redwood, the last tree-sitters surrendered their protest of University of California – Berkeley’s plan to chop down a tree grove to build a sports training center.
The world watched. As did such activists as Morning Star Gali, a Pit River member and community activist, with sadness and regret. It was not how she had hoped the standoff to end.
Gali and other Natives had been trying to negotiate with university officials. The old-growth tree grove was also the site of an Ohlone burial ground where UC-Berkeley anthropologists have documented evidence of two shell mound sites that contained 18 human remains.
The university is already a hotbed of contention among local Native tribes for continuing to house more than 17,000 sacred remains and objects in what Native groups charge is noncompliance of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.
After 21 months living in redwood, oak and other trees, the last four tree-sitters had agreed to come down if university officials would include the community in future land-use decisions.
The tree-sitters had asked the university to donate $6 million to environmental and Native groups and provide Natives the stump from the 200-year-old “Grandmother Tree” in the 1.2-acre grove so that they could make a drum. But officials withdrew the offer of the stump after the tree-sitters descended, Gali said, and denied Natives access to the grove for prayer.
The university’s actions “are in violation of international law. The U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples states that indigenous people have the right to free, prior and informed consent before any actions are taken with regard to sacred lands,” Gali said.
A day before the Sept. 9 surrender, scaffolding was installed to reach the platform just beneath the 80-foot treetop, making it impossible for the tree-sitters to elude police or resist arrest.
The press widely reported the tree-sitters peacefully and voluntarily climbed down from the last remaining tree of 42 redwoods, oaks and other trees in the grove after four hours of negotiations with UC Police Chief Victoria Harrison. She spoke from inside a basket on a 200-foot-tall crane.
But Gali claims the police used Native demands as a bargaining chip and lied to the tree-sitters about the negotiations taking place on the ground. As 500 onlookers watched, the tree-sitters were arrested on misdemeanor charges of trespassing, violating a court order and illegal lodging.
“We’ve inspired millions of people around the globe,” said Ayr, one of the tree-sitters’ ground supporters, who camped out across the street. “We can hold our head high. But also, it is a loss.”
The protest and lawsuits had delayed the university’s construction of the $124 million center by two years. The tree-sitting protest began Dec. 1, 2006, when Native activist Zachary Running Wolf and a woman climbed into two oaks before the Cal-Stanford Big Game to protect the grove’s trees from being chopped down to build the athletic training center.
What followed was one of the longest tree-sits ever, with at one time more than a dozen people living atop ancient oak and redwood trees. They would slide on ropes between the trees and cook on camping stoves in their tree houses. Supporters slept on mattresses lined across the street.
A round table with a green cloth umbrella became the Treesit Café, “The real free speech café,” activists declared in blue paint on a piece of cardboard. Another long table became a booth where activists hung clipped newspaper photographs and placed books and protest materials, and where supporters left behind bags of bread and other donations and supplies.
An environmental group, the city of Berkeley and local residents filed lawsuits Dec. 20, 2006, alleging the project was not seismically safe because of its proximity to the Hayward Fault. In July, after an Alameda County superior court judge ruled mostly in the university’s favor, UC police began arresting tree-sitters.
Four protestors remained on a redwood. A state appeals court denied the plaintiffs’ request to delay construction Sept. 4 and the UC cut down 40 trees in the three days that followed. Negotiations between university officials and the tree-sitters failed. On Sept. 5, provisions of water and energy bars were cut off by police.
During a prayer ceremony Sept. 7, a man was arrested and Gali said she was “violently assaulted while holding my 2-month-old” as she laid tobacco beneath the tree. She said she was served an injunction notice and warned to no longer participate in supporting the treesit.
The day the last four tree-sitters climbed down from one of only two trees still standing near the stadium, the university chopped the ancient redwood down. The act brought visible relief to some Cal football fans and athletes. Some people even cheered as chainsaws tore down its branches.
But environmentalists and Natives mourned, burning sage in prayer and drumming. Five people were arrested for charges that included blocking traffic and battery on a peace officer.
After initially being denied permission by university officials, Gali, a dozen supporters and some tree-sitters held a ceremony two days later. She brought her baby son in an act of defiance after also being threatened by police with a call to Child Protective Services, she said.
Only 10 people were allowed inside the fenced area next to Memorial Stadium, where they formed a half-circle around the stump of Grandmother Tree, its roots still deep beneath
the ground.
The dozen supporters who were denied access stood in front of the double set of chain-link fence on a patch of concrete, praying with the group. Afterward, the 10 joined the others to form a circle outside the fence, passing around a ceremonial staff as Miwok elder Wounded Knee De Ocampo spoke.
“This is our country,” he said. “We had that, before they came here.”
They departed with handshakes and hugs that gloomy, gray morning, after sharing news of upcoming protests and vowing to continue pushing for environmental and tribal rights.