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In honor of Native American Heritage Month, we’re celebrating Native arts and cultures.

Today, we’re featuring an exhibit in Santa Fe, N.M. exploring the art of parka making.

“To Keep Them Warm” at the Museum of International Folk Art explores the art of the Alaska Native parka.

“The parka is so much more than just its final product, you know, the final parka. It’s a whole outlook on the world.”

Melissa Shaginoff is co-curator of the exhibit.

“It’s about having relationship with the land and the animals and with each other. The spirit of Ghhúunayúkata, or to keep them warm, is really this gift of love, you know, and wanting to warm our family. But also to honor the land and the animals.”

The exhibit features 20 parkas from the mid-19^th century to more contemporary ones.

“This exhibit is really about the whole story of parka making and really about…how we relate to each other, from the hunter to the parka maker to the person who is gifted a parka. It’s really a whole story, and it’s so much more than just a garment. It really represents our whole culture and how everything is interrelated through kinship and through a deep respect and love for each other.”

The traditional garments were made for survival in harsh environments.

The collection here represents Yup’ik, Inupiaq, Unangan, Dena’ina, Koyukon, and St. Lawrence Island Yup’ik.

“So you have everything from you know caribou to bear guts to fish skin…to bird skins. We have we try to represent as much as animal material is used in Alaska as we could…So, as parka making continues to change and adjust just as our traditions are fluid and changes and adjusts, you see this transition from sinew into sort of modern uses of thread, and then contemporary parkas from neon shoes strings, to velveteen and beadwork as well.”

A rich selection of drawings, photographic portraits, dolls, and other art are shown through the space – all by Indigenous people.

Shaginoff says there’s a deep connection between people in the North and the Southwest.

“I think that, you know, as we continue to show who we are and tell our stories, we’re only going to strengthen the interconnectedness that, you know, our ancestors knew that we needed to survive.”

The exhibit is showing through April 2024 and is of no cost to Alaska Native and Pueblo people.

The National Endowment for the Humanities, which provides funding for humanities projects across the country, is working with the Interior Department on the agency’s Indian boarding school initiative.

Shelly Lowe (Diné), chair of NEH, says part of the work is to support projects that bring people together and tell stories in history not often taught in school.

“One of the things that we have been doing is supporting the work that they’ve been doing in the archives to pull out records of federal Indian boarding schools to digitize that material, and to eventually make that material available to the public so that we can have an understanding of this experience of this history in the United States. And that we can create materials to teach this history so that everybody knows that this happened, and the effects of the boarding schools, on tribes and communities in the United States.”

Lowe says next steps includes finding ways to support tribes and communities that have shared their stories.

“One of the ways that we want to do that is to help really support language revitalization, language programs for tribes and cultural revitalization, those two things that were really kind of stripped away from tribes and communities through the boarding school experience. And that’s just one example of some of the work that we want to continue moving forward.”

Lowe talked about the initiative during a recent visit to Alaska.

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Hundreds of water leaders gathered recently in Tucson, Ariz., for the One Water Summit.

The goal was to discuss ways to conserve water.

Emma VandenEinde of the Mountain West News Bureau talked with some Indigenous leaders about tackling it.

The Indigenous Resilience Center was created at the University of Arizona in 2021 to work with tribes on environmental solutions.

The center puts tribes first by giving them control over the water data it collects and only steps into a project when invited. 

They’ve worked on projects like setting up solar water systems that do not rely on electricity, or providing an off-grid water filtration system. 

Vicky Karanikola has been part of some projects.

She says their goal is to not just make a technology and walk away.

“If it’s not being used after we are gone or the communities don’t want it, then we need to go back to the drawing table and figure out what it is that was not working.”

The center received a $2 million grant this month to expand on the projects.

This story was supported by The Water Desk, an initiative from the University of Colorado Boulder’s Center for Environmental Journalism.

Lynn Trujillo, Senior Counselor to the Secretary at the Department of the Interior, speaks with Gov. Joe Lombardo (R=NV) and Gov. Katie Hobbs (D-AZ) at a panel on the MMIP crisis at the Western Governors Association winter meeting in Teton Village, Wyo. (Photo: Hannah Habermann / Wyoming Public Media)

A panel discussed solutions to the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Crisis at the recent Western Governors Association meeting in Jackson, Wyo.

Wyoming Public Radio’s Hannah Habermann has more.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Native American women are murdered at a rate ten times higher than the national average.

How can state, federal, and tribal groups work together to address this crisis?

That’s what a panel at a conference in Jackson hoped to explore.

It was led by the governors of Nevada and Arizona.

Lynn Trujillo was one of the guest speakers and works for the Department of Interior.

She says one solution rises above the rest.

“I think most importantly, all of us agree, one of the most important factors is funding.”

Trujillo says more funding is needed for law enforcement and for resources for impacted families and communities.

She also highlighted the newly-released 212-page report from the Not Invisible Act Commission, which shares additional recommendations for solving the crisis.

Courtesy CCT F&W / Facebook

The Colville Confederated Tribes have received a unique gift from the Kalispel Tribe.

Steve Jackson reports.

The two tribes have been trading goods for many years.

The Colvilles would often send the Kalispels salmon and the Kailspels would return the favor with bison meat.

Now the Kalispels have upped their annual gift by sending a herd of 30 pure-bred bison.

Courtesy CCT F&W / Facebook

He says having a living herd on the reservation now is a big deal.

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The Oglala Sioux Tribe has announced a state of emergency due to increasing crime.

Now, tribal government alleges the federal government is not doing enough to support reservation safety.

South Dakota Public Broadcasting’s C.J. Keene has more.

The declaration was made by Oglala Sioux Tribal government representatives in Rapid City as a result of concerning crime trends over the last few years.

Among the most pressing issues are a murder rate over twice the national average and suicide rates among Native youth that’s well over two-and-a-half-times the average in the rest of the nation.

While the tribe has entered into a mutual aid agreement with regional law enforcement, tribal leaders say the federal government needs to do more.

OST President Frank Star Comes Out says the US government is in violation of the 1868 Fort Laramie Treaty and the Black Hills Act of 1877.

“We don’t live in Indian County, we survive. This needs to change. It’s time to bring awareness to the world that the government has a responsibility to uphold – and that is treaty obligations.”

In multiple treaties dating as far back as 1825, the United States Government is named as a responsible entity in protecting the Oglala Sioux Tribe and its people from “bad men.”

Further, the 1877 Black Hills act formalized the existence of the Pine Ridge Reservation and the cede of the Black Hills to the American government.

That treaty was signed after the “sell or starve” rider cut off all rations to the Sioux people.

Those treaty interpretations led to a lawsuit last year that continues to move through the court system.

This May, a federal judge ruled the federal government does have a treaty obligation to fund tribal law enforcement.

OST Council member Anna Halverson reflected on changes she’d seen.

“I feel like a long time ago we maybe dealt with one homicide, maybe once a month or once a year, and now it’s every day. It’s getting to be very horrendous crimes that are being committed.”

Oglala representatives will send the proclamation to lawmakers in DC to agitate for additional support for reservations.

Additionally, President Star Comes Out says he hopes to speak directly with President Joe Biden soon on the matter.

Courtesy Wisconsin Historical Society Press

A new memoir called SURVIVAL FOOD shares tales from growing up on the Menominee Indian Reservation.

The author, Thomas Weso, was born in 1953. He passed away in July before the book was published.

WUWM’s Lina Tran has more.

Thomas Weso grew up in a time of economic transformation – when commodity goods were eaten alongside game from Wisconsin’s Northwoods. And then there was the rise of processed foods.

He often wrote about food. Here he is speaking in a 2021 interview with Wisconsin Historical Society Press.

“We should think about where food comes from. Because if we think where food comes from, we’ll take better care of the land around us.”

Weso’s wife, the writer Denise Low, says he was interested in writing about Indigenous people in the present.

“He had a very zen sense of like, “What’s here now?” and not “what were Indians like, or Indigenous people like, 100 years ago? Here we are now.”

Courtesy Wisconsin Historical Society Press

That’s why you’ll find all kinds of recipes in the new book, from tamale pie to turtle soup.

There’s instructions on how to forage milkweed pods, which Weso writes are tasty with butter. But he likes mixing them with canned tuna into boxed mac and cheese.

“He doesn’t just stick to Indigenous food. He tries to embrace the diner foods that he loved also. And to accept that there was an intermixture.”

Weso’s taste celebrated that unique mix, found only in Wisconsin, on the Menominee reservation.

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The National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) has new leaders including president, Pechanga Tribal Chair Mark Macarro.

Rhonda LeValdo has more.

New NCAI president Mark Macarro was officially sworn in with other leadership positions Friday as the organization’s annual convention wrapped up in New Orleans.

Macarro says his priorities as president will include being more vocal in Washington D.C.

He also says there needs to be healing with state-recognized tribes, upset with this year’s membership amendment vote that would have stripped them of their voting rights and leadership positions at the organization. Those amendments failed.

“I want to get all of us used to coming to D.C. to reengage in a better way the mission of NCAI, which is being present in D.C. to Congress, the Administration, and the White House to advocate priority issues.”

Outgoing NCAI president Fawn Sharp reflected on some of her greatest contributions as NCAI president.

“Continuing to advance tribal sovereignty in the face of a myriad of challenges including, just three months after my election, a global pandemic and disproportionate funding that left us vulnerable. And we achieved equity with state, local government. I think that laid a foundation for our advancements in tax policy. I was the first tribal leader to receive diplomatic recognition to join the U.S. delegation to COP 26 and 27. The U.S. looked to us to lead a high-level conversation between the United States directly with Indigenous leaders from every continent.”

Sharp says she’ll continue to work to make an international imprint as she works to get tribal nations more visible outside of the United States by attending a meeting with Indigenous leaders in Dubai as Macarro starts his term as president.

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Two controversial amendments were voted down Thursday at the National Congress of American Indians annual convention.

Rhonda LeValdo has more.

As voting took place early in the day, attendees at NCAI had a wide range of opinions in both support and opposition on the amendments regarding membership.

The two, calling for only federally recognized tribes to be voting members and also for leadership roles, failed to pass.

Darrell Waldron Chief of the Seaconke Wampanoag Tribe was in opposition.

“I thought it was disgusting. The argument, pre-recognition we worked on the recognition applications back in the (19)70s creating it uh… and it was disgusting to hear what I heard today and not today, but this week, and to see a lack of education of the time span that had happened between, you know, first contact and then 200 and something years later, contact. And a lot of the work was done in the middle somewhere, you know, and I don’t believe the intentions were to come across as malice.” 

Christopher Tabbee, Vice Chairman of the Ute Indian Tribe, was among tribes in support of the passage of the amendment to limit NCAI’s eligibility criteria.

“I don’t think it’s fair for them to just vote on things that aren’t going to be affecting them and things that they vote on could hurt a tribe somewhere else, a federally recognized tribe, where they’re a state it doesn’t bother them. They’re not party to it. They can just say okay we’ll just go back to our state and deal with them, right. Funds through them or whatever, funnel through them. So I think that it’s important for one thing is important is that we’re not saying, I’m not saying that they’re not Indians or they’re not natives or they have no culture or they have none of that stuff but I’m just saying go get federally recognized and can you come back to the table.”

The next leaders of NCAI were also decided on, including the top position of president.

Mark Macarro, Pechanga Tribal Chairman, won that leadership role and will fill the place of outgoing NCAI President Fawn Sharp.

Marcarro, along with the next 1st vice president, secretary, and treasurer, will be sworn in on Friday as the convention wraps up in New Orleans.

PBS’ Native America had the last episode of its second season air this week.

For the Mountain West News Bureau, Dylan Simard reports the program received positive reception across the country.

Native America is a series that showcases the ways that native people are shaping modern American society – in science, sports, culture, and more.

Native Public Media has done some polling that shows the reaction in Colorado and Alaska has been extremely positive.

Loris Taylor is CEO of Native Public Media, a network of tribal public radio and television stations.

She says the show challenges stereotypes and gives Native Americans more representation in popular media.

“I think if you look at the ecosystem that we have, there’s a lot to share and Native Americans are just beginning to flex their storytelling arm – and it’s really wonderful to see.”

Taylor hopes that enthusiasm among the viewing public will lead to a third season.

Native Public Media and Koahnic Broadcast Corporation, which produces National Native News, worked on events and conducted Native radio station outreach for Native America Season 2.

This week, a small delegation from the Cherokee Nation attended a U.S. Senate committee hearing on the nomination of Sara Hill to serve as a federal judge in Oklahoma.

Hill is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation and the tribe’s former attorney general.

The Cherokee Nation is supporting her nomination and advocating for it to move forward.

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Some of the controversial amendments proposed at the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) annual convention will be voted on Thursday.

One proposal seeks voting membership to be restricted to only federally recognized tribes and only citizens of federally recognized tribes to be eligible for an individual membership.

Another proposal is for board members and regional vice presidents to be citizens of federally recognized tribes.

As Rhonda LeValdo reports, while there’s much debate, not everyone wants to go on the record to share their viewpoints.

Currently, NCAI considers both state and federally recognized tribes as voting members of the organization.

Chief of the Shawnee Tribe Ben Barnes has concerns about the proposed amendment which eliminates the voting status to only federally recognized tribes, saying it diminishes the sovereignty of federally recognized tribes in NCAI.

“For the majority of these state recognized tribes that are members of NCAI, they have no Native ancestry, they’re not Native governments, so this creates problems for folks that are still seeking recognition and they’re legitimate, but NCAI has refused to deal with this issue and now its member tribes are left to take it up, and make sure that this passes.”

Several attendees at NCAI with various views declined to comment to National Native News about the proposal, but in an opinion piece in Native News Online, Lumbee Chairman John Lowery called the possible changes an “internal termination process that contradicts the founding principles of NCAI” and a slippery slope for the organization that could open up other tribes as targets including landless or non-treaty tribes.

NCAI is being held in Louisiana, a state with four federally recognized tribes and nearly a dozen state-recognized tribes.

Currently, NCAI has 145 tribal memberships and, of that number, 24 are state-recognized tribes.

For years, drought and development in the West have caused water shortages for tribes.

Now, a new institute aims to give tribes resources and training to advocate for their water rights.

The Mountain West New Bureau’s Kaleb Roedel reports.

It’s called the Tribal Water Institute.

Its goal is to help tribes navigate laws and policies, and recruit and train young water attorneys. 

The project was created by the Walton Family Foundation, a group working to protect rivers, and the Native American Rights Fund, a nonprofit law group in Colorado, where the institute will be based.

David Gover is a managing attorney and Pawnee and Choctaw.

He says helping tribes protect and assert water rights comes at a critical time.

“Climate change is impacting all of our communities, right? And there becomes more competition for that resource. And, of course, the states and industries are not waiting around, right? They’ll continue to find what they can and take what they can.”

He says the new institute will allow the fund to double its water staff to 14 members. 

The team will publish a semiannual report to educate tribes, policymakers, and attorneys about new and ongoing water rights cases and issues.

The U.S. Senate passed a bill late Wednesday night to avoid a government shutdown on Friday.

It has two expiration dates – one for funding programs for agriculture, energy, water, veterans, military construction, transportation, and housing through January 19.

The second has an expiration date of early February for the rest of the government.

The measure also extends the Special Diabetes Program for Indians through January 19 and the nation’s farm and food programs (WIC and SNAP) until September.

Congress is on break for Thanksgiving.

The bill was sent to the President for a signature.

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Broadband access is a top concern among many tribal citizens across the country.

The topic was addressed at the National Congress of American Indians annual convention Tuesday in New Orleans.

As Rhonda LeValdo reports, attendees also discussed technology, and data collected, managed, and applied responsibly in Indian Country.

Indigenous Data Sovereignty and Governance was a packed session.

The session talked about how tribes could model after the Gila River Indian Community.

The tribe, located in Arizona, started its own telecom company.

Governor Stephen Roe Lewis talked about how he was impressed by seeing his own people being taught about the telecom industry and its economic impact, which he says can be helpful for other Native nations.

“This is a moment that could be a digital mover across Indian Country and it’s important that tribes and tribal leaders take advantage of this moment.”

Former Federal Communications Commission Chief of the Office of Native Affairs and Policy Geoff Blackwell talked about the importance of Digital sovereignty for tribal nations.

“You are preparing yourself to assert your sovereignty in the cyber world that you are beginning to understand, to address, all these areas – network, governance, participation, authority.”

Blackwell was recently announced as NCAI chief of staff, and told the audience NCAI would provide an outlet for tribes to get connected with ways to navigate how to get started with digital sovereignty. And, federal funding may also be a way for tribes to improve access to broadband. 

More than $9 million has been approved for a project incorporating Native American management practices for oak habitat restoration in Oregon.

As KLCC’s Brian Bull reports, this includes cultural burns.

The USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service awarded the money, which will go to the Oregon Agricultural Trust and its partners.

Ka-Voka Jackson is a program manager for the EcoStudies Institute, one of the partners.

She’s done controlled fire operations based on how Indigenous people did for ages, blending ancient practice with modern methods.

“Use of cultural fire, traditional fire, on the landscape, which usually entails people who are trained or have the wildfire qualifications. That usually entails fire trucks or water resources, the use of drip torches, other hand tools.”

The project also seeks to permanently protect designated oak savannas and woodlands, and give Native Americans access to them for cultural use and environmental stewardship. The priority area for this project are Lane and Linn Counties.

U.S. Sen. Markwayne Mullin (Cherokee/R-OK) made headlines after a heated confrontation with a witness during a hearing about unions Tuesday in the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committee.

The Senator from Oklahoma challenged Sean O’Brien, the president of Teamsters, to a fight during the hearing.

“(Mullin) Sir, this is a time, this is a place. You want to run your mouth. We can be two consenting adults, we can finish it here. (O’Brien) Okay, that’s fine, perfect. (Mullin) You want to do it now? (O’Brien) I’d love to do it right now. (Mullin) Well, stand your butt up then. (O’Brien) You stand your butt up. (Sanders) Oh, hold on, oh, stop it. (O’Brien) Is that your solution every problem? (Sanders) No, no, sit down. Sit down. You’re a United States Senator. (O’Brien) Act it. (Mullin) Okay. (Sanders) Sit down please. (Mullin) All right.”

The exchange happened after Sen. Mullin held up several pieces of paper reading critical Tweets made from O’Brien at the Senator.

The two threw insults at each other for several minutes as U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), chair of the committee, tried to calm the situation and then proceeded to move the hearing forward.

Sen. Mullin, an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation and first Native American to serve in the Senate in nearly two decades, is a former MMA fighter and challenged O’Brien to a charity match next year.

In an interview on FOX News, Sen. Mullin defended his actions saying he’s a guy from Oklahoma and was responding to O’Brien.

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The Grand Gateway Hotel in Rapid City, S.D. has settled one federal suit, but still faces two more.

South Dakota Public Broadcasting’s C.J. Keene has more.

The settlement agreement between the Department of Justice and the owning family of the Grand Gateway Hotel and Cheers Lounge in Rapid City comes over a year after the beginning of the saga.

The suits stem from owner Connie Uhre’s 2022 efforts to ban Native peoples from the businesses after an act of violence.

This particular federal discrimination suit was brought by the DoJ after the incident and the settlement terms must be approved by the federal court for the District of South Dakota.

Under the agreement, Uhre will be removed from any role with the business for the next four year.

Additionally, the company will hire a compliance officer, train employees, and implement anti-discrimination policies while reaching out to South Dakota-based Native organizations.

Those trainings are required for all owners, directors, partners, and employees of the Retsel Corporation – the hotel’s parent company – and will center around Title II protections which prohibit race-based discrimination in hospitality businesses.

Further, a written apology letter was published by the company’s board, largely made up of Uhre family members, acknowledging all Native peoples are welcome in their businesses.

This letter will be sent to the presidents or chairpersons of each of South Dakota’s tribal nations and to 19 news publications around the nation.

The company has 60 days to comply with the terms of the settlement.

The two other ongoing lawsuits come from Indigenous advocacy network NDN Collective and a Wisconsin family, who both allege the hotel denied Native people service illegally.

Both of those suits are pending. Representatives from the Retsel Corporation did not return request for comment.

Tribal leaders from across the country are gathered in New Orleans for the National Congress of American Indians annual convention where they’re addressing top concerns.

This week, they’re hearing directly from government officials including from the Interior Department as Rhonda LeValdo reports.

Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Bryan Newland (Ojibwe) was at the convention in person to address attendees Monday and held a press conference in the morning.

He was asked by reporters about the conclusion of the Interior Department’s Indian boarding school “The Road to Healing” tour.

Asst. Sec. Newland and Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland hosted the year-long healing tour, traveling across the country gathering testimony from survivors of Indian boarding schools, and helping connect communities with trauma-informed support.

The 12^th and final stop was held recently in Montana.

Asst. Sec. Newland was asked if the Interior Department would assist states in forming curriculum with accurate information and history of federal Indian boarding schools.

“The President, (U.S. Education) Secretary Cardona, and the Department of Education have been clear about curriculum standards and things like that. For us, what we want to make sure is that we’re doing an accurate truth telling about what happened and being accountable for it and planning to move beyond that. And once that information is out there and once we the federal government are accountable for it, it’s not going anywhere, and that will be accessible to everybody.”

“The Road to Healing” is part of Sec. Haaland’s investigation into the troubled history of federal Indian boarding school policies and impacts on Native people.

This week, NCAI’s agenda includes a Tribal Consultation by the National Endowment for the Humanities on boarding schools, and a National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition update.

Other issues Asst. Sec. Newland was questioned about by reporters included cannabis, tribal colleges and universities, land-into-trust, and the process for federal recognition status.

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The Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation’s farm in Connecticut is thriving since its establishment eight years ago.

Back then, the land was a largely unused wooded area near the reservation.

Edwin J. Viera has an update.

Meechooôk Farm is home to livestock and several greenhouses growing a bevy of crops.

Tribe Agricultural Director Jeremy Whipple spearheaded the project, and this year, the University of Connecticut Extension helped establish a youth engagement group for agricultural training.

Whipple says the training’s focus is to strengthen the tribal community and establish self-sufficiency.

“So we’re going to train the community – you know, it’s community-based. So, we’re trying to get the membership and everybody on the same page, on growing and bringing back our traditional roots for gardening in our culture.”

One aim is to teach the importance of good nutrition to members of the tribe dealing with health issues.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has funded the project for an additional four years due to its success.

Whipple says he hopes to expand the farm, and will apply for grants to add a meat-processing facility and an event space for classes.

For now though, Whipple and his cohort of farmers are looking to add more greenhouses.

While some of the food grown at Meechooôk Farm is sold, most of it goes to a tribal food assistance program.

He describes how that program has gone so far.

“Right now, we have 180 members that are signed up for the program, and the grant reimburses the farm $70 a box that we give out. So that’s, you know – the USDA actually compensates us for feeding the community healthy food.”

Members of the Tribe receive a box of vegetables every two weeks during the growing season.

This story was produced with original reporting from Jeniece Roman for WSHU and a Solutions Journalism Network-Public News Service Collaboration.

The movie adaptation of David Grann’s book Killers of the Flower Moon premiered a few weeks ago.

It examines the Reign of Terror, the mass murder of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma during the 1920s for oil money.

KUNC’s Emma VandenEinde reports on what some Osage people have to say about the film.

Many Osage people were impressed with how director Martin Scorsese reflected Osage culture in the movie.

Not only did he choose to film in Oklahoma, but he met with tribal members to ensure cultural accuracy – from the clothing to the language.

Some Osage people, like Colorado resident Tink Tinker, would have liked Scorsese to portray the movie from an Indigenous perspective.

“Unfortunately, he’s a white man who’s working with white money and selling our movie to a largely non-Native audience, so he couldn’t take the risk of putting the Osages in the center of the stage.”

It’s not the only criticism the movie has received.

Some think the nearly three-and-a-half hour movie is too long. But Tinker and other Osage people are happy the story is finally being shared, as many Americans are unaware.

Jay Kilbie Reed, another Colorado Osage person, says he’d often tell his family’s history to friends and be met with skepticism.

“Now I’ve had so many people that have texted me and been like, ‘This Leonardo DiCaprio movie is this the story you were telling me years ago?’ And I’m like, ‘Yes!’”

This movie is part of a recent rise in Indigenous stories and creators in the spotlight.

But Geoffrey Standing Bear, the principal chief of the Osage tribe, says action is key to keep lingering racism at bay.

“If you don’t say nothing, you just sit back and watch it, you’re complicit in murder. You’re complicit in what’s going on. You’ve got to understand, there’s a true story. And it can happen again.”

Standing Bear, along with other Osage people, hope this movie will serve as a catalyst for people to learn more about their history.

U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), vice chair of the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, is holding a field hearing at Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation in Bethel, Alaska on Friday.

It’s titled, “The Impact of the Historic Salmon Declines on the Health and Well-Being of Alaska Native Communities along Arctic, Yukon, and Kuskokwim Rivers.”

Tribal leaders are expected to testify.

The field hearing will be followed by a public listening session.

Those who want to provide comments will have an opportunity to sign up on site.

It will be streamed online and broadcast on KYUK radio.

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