Bates addresses concerns about mine spill and Bennett Freeze

WINDOW ROCK

Speaker of the Navajo Nation Council LoRenzo Bates is still seeing unanswered questions in the recent Gold King Mine spill as well as challenges in bringing more infrastructure to people living in the Bennett Freeze area.

In his quarterly report to members of the Navajo Nation Council Monday, Bates addressed challenges and issues facing the nation with a focus on collaboration and communication between the council, outside government and Diné citizens.

In the report, Bates said conversations between council members and citizens in recent months and weeks added greater knowledge and experience for council members going forward.

“This 23rd Council wants to and is moving in the direction to be able to better its people, whether it be in education, whether it be in infrastructure,” he said, in an interview with the Navajo Times on Oct. 20. “Whatever it may be, this council is dedicated, but we also recognize the challenges that face us.”

The 13-page report outlined continuing and new issues facing the nation in seven sections.

The sections addressed the rehabilitation of the former Bennett Freeze area, the Gold King Mine spill, the S’hasin Fund Subcommittee efforts, fire and rescue services on the Navajo Nation and in San Juan County, New Mexico, renovation of the Navajo Nation Council Chamber, the Naabik’iyáti’’ State Task Force, and the Navajo Energy Policy.

“As long as we’re respectful and patient, we can work through these challenges,” said Bates, who represents Nenahnezad, Newcomb, San Juan, Tiis Tsoh Sikaad, Tsé Daa K’aan and Upper Fruitland.

One of the issues detailed in the report, the Gold King Mine spill, impacted the speaker directly as a council member, as the speaker, and on a personal level.

“Of those six chapters, four of them were directly impacted,” he said.

“I have been advocating for all of my constituents that are farmers and ranchers. Every one of them have incurred some sort of loss as a result of the spill,” he said.

Representing the council, the speaker has maintained communication regarding the impact on the wider Navajo Nation with federal agencies, such as the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

“I have talked to the U.S. EPA several times. I have advocated to senators’ congressional outlets, I will continue to advocate simply because, again, I as a farmer and rancher experienced the situation first-hand and saw everybody else downstream from me that’s in my chapters experience it.”

He said the process involved addressing questions impacted parties have.

“Who’s going to cover the losses that they incurred? How soon are they going to cover those losses?”

He said his experience as a rancher and a farmer gives him perspective on the concerns of directly impacted constituents.

“I’ve done it. I’ve been there,” Bates said. “I continue to do it, and I will continue to be a farmer and rancher. So, when I make these comments, I am talking as a delegate, and a farmer, and a rancher, not as someone that grew up and moved away.”

Bates said the Bennett Freeze issues addressed in the report will require a sustained commitment.

“All that needs to be addressed to come to some solution to the entire Bennett Freeze won’t be done in one year. Hopefully with the first move to address it, we will set the kindling, if you may, on how to move forward,” he said.

The report said a July Naabik’iya’ti” Committee held in Tuba City, Ariz., with 300-plus community members in attendance resulted in a list of 30 recommendations from the council and a group called Forgotten People Community Development Corporation.

Bates used a baseball analogy to describe the situation. He said home plate would be the point where issues in the Bennett Freeze begin to reach resolution.

“So, we’ve got to get to first base first,” Bates said.

As Bates commented on a section of the report that addressed the Si’hasin Fund Subcommittee he spoke about the role of the council addressing that issue.

“One of the recommendations that they are going to ask council to consider at some point is to invest in water projects,” he said.

Bates said the council would have to look at key questions as the issue comes before it.

“The next thing to that would be how do we pay for it?” he asked. “After council has decided that, how do we implement? Where do we start with those water projects?”

Bates spoke also about a section of the report that addressed the need to maintain emergency services to several Navajo communities in San Juan County, N.M.

According to the report, the county presented three options to the Navajo Nation.

In the first option, the Navajo Nation could pay $810,000 annually to cover operational and equipment costs. In the second option, the county could transfer the fire stations and a portion of the equipment to the Navajo Nation Fire Department for response and operational costs with a kind of mutual aid agreement in place. Under the third option, the county could close fire stations to allow the Navajo Nation Fire Department to assume all responsibility and provide equipment and emergency response.

The council elected to consider the transfer of stations and equipment in the second option, according to the report, which also said the 2016 Navajo Nation Comprehensive Budget allocated $768,596 for the hiring of 15 additional firefighters.

On the renovation of the council chamber, the report said the primary objective of the council is to determine the feasibility of the proposal and identify potential funding to preserve the historical landmark.

The report also said the Office of the Speaker continues to work closely with the Naabik’iya’ti’ State Task Force, which works to coordinate efforts of the Navajo Nation in New Mexico, Utah and Arizona. Bates said the council aimed to raise the profile of the Navajo Nation by creating the task force.

“Council said we want to raise the level of Navajo so that we are recognized even more than we have been on every scale – state and federal. So, one of the ways was to create a state task force,” he said.

The report said the task force has identified transaction privilege tax, energy, water, and education as priorities. The section on the task force noted recent meetings between Navajo Nation leaders and state leaders, including a recent meeting of Navajo Nation President Russell Begaye and Vice President Jonathan Nez with Utah Governor Gary R. Herbert and Lieutenant Governor Spencer Cox.

With a recent meeting between Arizona Senator Carlyle Begay and Arizona’s Governor Doug Ducey, the task force requested a meeting with U.S. Senator John McCain.

“Now state leaderships know that the nation wants to form, if you may, partnerships,” Bates said.

The final section of the report addressed energy needs in the Navajo Nation. First, the report outlined the possibility of development of solar assets that could make commercial scale solar development a challenge.

The report also gave details of a visit by members of the 23rd Navajo Nation Council to Camp Pendleton in California, to honor Navajo Code Talkers, at which the Marine Corps demonstrated a recently declassified off-grid renewable energy system.

Bates said the cost benefit of the system impressed him with its simplicity, and its ability to adapt to unforeseen disruptions.

“The off-grid with the way it was put in place, one, it could store electricity. Secondly, in the event there was a situation that caused the equipment to go off, it triggered so that it could tap into the grid system,” he said.

He said he could see practical applications and budgetary benefits for the Navajo Nation and specific areas.

“Now, let’s use the Bennett Freeze area as an example. There is some very remote areas within the Bennett Freeze, and when it costs anywhere from 35 to 60 thousand dollars a mile to do a power line extension, do the math,” he said.

The report went on to consider an MIT study that looked at the future of coal based on new EPA regulations.

“The Nation recognizes that we have a hundred years of coal reserves, and that the coal reserves have provided the jobs. It has provided revenue, but we also recognize that the coal industry is struggling,” Bates said.

He also stated the need for the Navajo Nation to use assets currently available as well as laying a path toward the future with new technologies, a balance as he described it.

“There needs to be a balance in terms of not only the revenue, but in the job creation. So, we have got to look on both sides and how both sides can be mutually benefited here,” Bates said.

“When you look at the remoteness of Navajo and how we’re so spread out, as a result of that, we as a nation have to look at what do we have now? How can we use what we have to benefit our people in the most effective and most efficient manner that we can do this?”

He again referenced the technology featured at Camp Pendleton.

“It’s technology that is in place, and it’s the future as I saw it,” he said.

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