Ft. Sill Apache Tribe News:
DEMING — Representatives from the Ft. Sill Chiricahua Warm Springs Apache Tribe are coming together in Washington, D.C. March 18 with other tribal leaders, local officials and organizations to meet with New Mexico’s Congressional Delegation, to advocate for passage of the M.H. Dutch Salmon Greater Gila Wild and Scenic River Act.
The Act would protect the last free-flowing rivers remaining in New Mexico – the Gila and San Francisco Rivers and tributaries.
Legislation to protect the Gila River and its tributaries has been introduced four times in the last decade, recently passing with bipartisan support in July 2023 by the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.
Along with the Tribe, the New Mexico Wilderness Alliance, American Rivers, Grant County Commissioner Harry Browne, the Center for Biological Diversity, the Pew Charitable Trust and Gila River community members will be advocating for passage of the M.H. Dutch Salmon Greater Gila Wild and Scenic River Act.
Passage of the Act would designate nearly 450 miles of Gila and San Francisco Rivers as Wild and Scenic, under the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, which would protect the land from development. Protection would mean that tribes, such as Ft. Sill Chiricahua Warm Springs Apache, would still be able to access the land for traditional usage and would protect artifacts found in places like Mogollon Box. Additionally, crucial wildlife habitat would be protected.
“Much of the Gila and San Francisco rivers are located within the Ft. Sill Chiricahua Warm Springs Apache Tribe’s original 14-million-acre settlement area, which provide a historical roadmap to our ancestors who have hunted and harvested on these lands for centuries,” said Chairwoman Jennifer Heminokeky of Ft. Sill Chiricahua Warm Springs Apache Tribe Vice. “I urge Congress to stand with our tribe to designate these rivers as wild and scenic, thereby, protecting historical and archaeological resources for generations to come.”
Designating the rivers and tributaries as Wild and Scenic would enhance rural economies that depend upon traditions like grazing, ranching, hunting, and fishing as well as outdoor recreation activities like rafting and paddling, horseback riding, wildlife watching, and hiking and camping, which bring in nearly $10 billion in spending.
The Ft. Sill Chiricahua Warm Springs Apache Tribe is the successor to the Chiricahua Apache—made up of a combination of the Gila, Mogollon, Mimbres, Copper Mine, and Warm Spring Apaches—who once held the Aboriginal and Indian Title to over 14 million acres of land that included much of southwestern New Mexico and southeastern Arizona until the forced removal of the entire Tribe as prisoners of war in 1886.
For more information, contact Joel Davis at 505.301.3394 or jd@jdlawnm.com.
