AJELP Spring Symposium on Indigenous Land Stewardship - Keynote and Q and A with Dorothy Firecloud

The University of Arizona Law’s Arizona Journal of Environmental Law and Policy (AJELP) hosted the Spring Symposium on Indigenous Land Stewardship, on April 6 and 7, at the University of Arizona campus.
The hybrid symposium brought together a diverse array of leaders from tribal communities, academia, the public sector, and advocacy organizations to discuss current efforts within the field of Indigenous land stewardship and its intersections with domestic and international law and policy.
This is the recording of the first day of the Symposium, which featured a keynote address by Dorothy FireCloud (Sicangu Lakota - Rosebud Sioux Tribe), Native American Affairs Liaison and Assistant to the Director in the National Park Service. Ms. FireCloud discussed the Park Service’s efforts to improve relationships with tribal communities, ensure Native Americans access to their ancestral lands, and strengthen the role of tribes in federal land management through co-stewardship agreements. She addressed the impacts of restoring Indigenous peoples’ relationships with their ancestral homelands, noting that co-stewardship can have a transformational effect on the land, on Indigenous peoples, and on NPS visitors, scientists, and land-managers. NPS Director Charles F. Sams III (Cayuse and Walla Walla) provided recorded introductory remarks, acknowledging the critical role that Indigenous communities and tribal law can and should play in stewardship of federal lands.