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Fifty-one cents per dollar.

That is the average a Native woman makes for every dollar paid to a White man.

At that rate, the wage gap results in $2,400 a month and more than $28,000 a year working Native women lose.

According to data from the National Women’s Law Center, a Native woman starting a career today would lose $1.1 million over the course of a 40-year-career. Nov. 30 is Native Women’s Equal Pay Day, a day taken to highlight and recognize the wage gap Native women face.

Joannie Suina, Cochiti Pueblo, said it is frustrating to know that Native women have to work twice as long to catch up with the average earnings of a White man.

“When we think about culture, ceremony, family, our kinship networks, self efficacy, and sovereignty, all of these things that we see as beautiful values within our ways of knowing in our respective communities, it’s so important that we are able to thrive in all those spaces,” Suina said. “Earning only 51 cents per dollar as compared to White men and men in general is really systemic inequity and I think also just really speaks to the way that the system has continuously held us down.” READ MORE — Kolby Kickingwoman, ICT

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WASHINGTON — The halls of the Department of the Interior were abuzz with conversations and laughter before the beginning of the 10th annual White House Tribal Nations Summit, and the first in-person one since 2016 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In the Yates Auditorium, five flag bearers wearing jingle dresses were walking slowly back from the stage in an attempt to keep their dresses from making too much noise as a panel discussion was ongoing. It did little to keep the sound of the metal military tags, in replace of jingle cones, from echoing in the room.

The group smiled and laughed. One even mouthing that their dresses were loud and ended with a smile.

“Nothing says we have arrived like 300 tribal leaders on the steps of the Interior,” Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, Laguna Pueblo, said during her opening remarks. READ MORE — Pauly Denetclaw, ICT

On a clear day in April, Anna East hopped in a truck with Mike Geboe, who drove to the nearest sweet grass enclosure on the Rocky Boy Reservation. The sun was warm, but there was still snow on the ground.

Together, they stood in a field, as Geboe told East all about sweet grass. He spoke of its cultural uses. He repeated the Cree word for the plant: “Wikwahskwah.” East listened, photographed the plant and recorded Geboe speaking. A dog trotted by and sat on her feet. The dog basked in the sun as the meadowlarks sang.

Geboe is a Class 7 Cree language instructor, meaning he is licensed to teach in public K-12 schools statewide. And East, who was an educator on the Flathead Indian Reservation for 22 years and the 2014 Montana Teacher of the Year, is a tribal relations and education fellow at the Montana Digital Academy.

In 2021, the Digital Academy was allocated funds through an education committee to design and offer digital Indigenous language courses for the tribes that want them. Rep. Jonathan Windy Boy, a Democratic lawmaker who represents Box Elder, guided the initiative. READ MORE — Missoulian

MADISON, Wis. — A federal judge has ordered energy company Enbridge Inc. and a tribe to come up with an emergency plan to prevent potential spills from an aging oil pipeline running across the tribe’s reservation.

The Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa sued Enbridge in federal court in 2019 to force the company to remove a section of the Line 5 pipeline that runs across the tribe’s reservation in northern Wisconsin, arguing the nearly 70-year-old line poses an unreasonable risk to health and safety. The company agreed and plans to build a $450 million pipeline that would run 41 miles around the reservation.

Wisconsin Public Radio reported that U.S. District Judge William Conley said in an order issued Monday that risk of a significant rupture exists and the resulting spill could cause “catastrophic” impacts to the Bad River watershed. He allowed the pipeline to continue operating but ordered the tribe and the company to develop a plan to prevent possible spills.

He told the company and tribe to meet and talk about installing emergency shutoff valves and developing a protocol for shutting down and purging the line by Dec. 17. They must submit proposals by Dec. 24. READ MORE — Associated Press

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LAS VEGAS — President Joe Biden told a gathering of tribal leaders in Washington on Wednesday that he intends to designate an area considered sacred by area Native people in southern Nevada as a new national monument.

“When it comes to Spirit Mountain and the surrounding ridges and canyons, I’m committed to protecting this sacred place that is central to the creation story of so many tribes that are here today,” Biden said during a speech at the White House National Tribal Nations Summit.

The site, to be designated Avi Kwa Ame (Ah-VEE’ kwa-meh) National Monument, would encompass a rugged and dry triangular-shaped area roughly from Arizona and the Colorado River to California and the Mojave National Preserve. The area is mostly undeveloped landscape dotted with Joshua trees and bighorn sheep migration routes.

The designation is not final, but the president’s announcement was hailed by tribal representatives, members of Nevada’s congressional delegation and conservationists. READ MORE — Associated Press

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