WSPC02585 - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

Indian Waler-1997: Trends and Directions in Federal Water Policy I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I We see the water still going by, and some of us see the water not going by. We see the waters being dammed for agriculture. On the desert up in Eastern Washington, they are growing grapes. They've got water from the great Columbia River and the Snake'River. You know; you shouldn't even be growing grapes out there, but with water you can do that, and so now they are a political body. You'll never stop them growing grapes anymore. They take it right out of that river, that giant river. The state legislature today in the State of Washington has some ten or fifteen water bills out. One reads that the water going by down the Columbia River is being wasted, so we've got to corner that water somehow and use it. The state legislators don't talk to us. We testify in front ofthem. They don't give a damn about what we say or what kind of paper we hand them or anything. All they are looking after are the special interests of their people, and we don't have any representation whatsoever on any of the legislatures, the United States Congress, the body of the United States Supreme Court or among any of the judges. You know, we have to take our. case ourselves and that's why we are here today, to take our case forward and find out who we can talk to. Can we talk to this guy tomorrow? You know, he's in charge. Can we talk to the President to address water issues? We have a team of the most capable people in Indian country that is ready to sit down and find some solutions to our problems. But is the United States Government ready to do that, or the states, or our neighbors, the industry, big business,.whoever? We need the money to do that. We need money from that renter, the United States Government. He's still renting this land, and he'd better be paying up. Senator Gordon, right now, is finding ways to cut our budgets so we don't-we can't-sit down at this table. We have to have that funding coming in so we can sit down and solve some of these problems that we have. So we ought to think about this 60 Minute program that was on severa] months ago. Some of you might have seen it-they were talking about Russia. Russia is dying, that culture over there. They don't have any infrastructure. They don't have doctors. They don't have dentists. They don't have any of that. I sit there listening to this 60 Minute program, and I thought about us, us Indian people, here. I thought about our old people, our people down in the desert, our people up in the mountains, our people along our watersheds, our 36