Among the stakeholders who share concern about Friday’s train derailment and oil spill in the Columbia River Gorge is the tribal community, but their response is easy to overlook.
A press briefing Saturday included spokespeople from the Union Pacific Railroad Company, officials with various environmental agencies from both Oregon and Washington, the county sheriff and even Richard Franklin, a federal-level official with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
“Yesterday, afternoon we mobilized immediately with multiple resources to assist and work in unified command with our federal state and local brethren,” Franklin said.
But the press did not hear from anyone that could speak to the concerns of the Native American tribes and nations that call the Columbia River Gorge home.
David Byers with Washington State’s Department of Ecology said responders are accommodating tribal resource concerns.
“They’ve expressed concern about the species that might be impacted by the oil in the water and have been giving us advice as to how to implement our geographic strategies to protect those resources,” Byers said, “so they have been actively involved. Even though they are not here now, they have been involved.”
Meanwhile, a different scene ramped up a few miles downriver.
Lana Jack, who grew up in Celilo Village, 30 miles up the Columbia, was among the hundred or so citizens that gathered for an anti-oil train rally in Hood River.
“Our connection to this river is huge. It’s our life way, there’s really no other way of putting it, whether it be the salmon or all that the water provides,” Jack said.
Jack said she feels disempowered.
Even so, she proudly beat her handmade elk-skin drum at the rally in the hot Saturday sun.
The train derailment happened at the start of a weekend during which tribal members are gathering to commemorate the signing of an 1855 treaty between the U.S. government and 14 bands that make up the Yakama Nation.
“I speak for those things that can’t speak for themselves. Our fisheries, our water, our land and our air and we are at risk right now and it is very disheartening,” said Elizabeth Sanchey, the nation’s Environmental Manager.
Sanchey said the Yakama Nation has been included in the unified-command model response to the train derailment. She said cleanup of any spilled oil must be immediate.
OPB’s Amelia Templeton contributed to this report.
