The 2017 Northern California wildfires, which caused the most expensive amount of damage by wildfires in California to that date, started in Napa. In recent years, wildfires have caused record-setting damage in Canada, Australia, Europe, Hawai’i, and all over the world. We welcome Charlie Toledo (Towa), Executive Director of Suscol Intertribal Council in Napa, who shares some Indigenous perspectives on fire season that are crucial for settler climate activists to know, such as:
• What is cultural burning?
• How is it good for the land and our climate?
• How has the outlawing of cultural burns under colonialism contributed to the climate crisis?
• What can settler climate activists do to support Indigenous cultural burners, here and abroad?
If you liked the video, would you consider some ACTION ITEMS?
DONATE:
Tribes and tribal-led organizations local to you may have cultural burning programs that you can support by donating, volunteering, and talking about their work. In the San Francisco Bay area, these include but are not limited to the following:
Suscol Intertribal Council (also welcomes donations for operating expenses and the completion of construction of Suskol House)
The Tribal EcoRestoration Alliance (TERA) holds cultural burn trainings and events such as Native Steward Fellowship Career Day in Lake County
Tamien Nation
Amah Mutsun Land Trust
LISTEN and TALK:
at Suscol Intertribal Counci's Native American Historical Trauma and Traditional Healing Project
LEARN:
Suggested "Reading" List from the Indigenous Voices Reading and Listening Circle, Climate Reality Bay Area chapter.
Organized by S. Louie (settler) and moderated by Alma Soongi Beck (settler), Co-Chairs of the Climate Justice Team. Co-sponsored by the San Diego Chapter of the Climate Reality Project
Views of the speakers do not necessarily represent those of Climate Reality or of Climate Reality Bay Area chapter.