A panel discussion about the protection of Zuni Salt Lake, the Petroglyph National Monument and other lands sacred to indigenous people packed a room at the Anderson School of Management Tuesday morning.
The event, "Indigenous Peoples and Sacred Sites," was part of the Native American Studies program's 2002 lecture series. The panel was to feature activist, author and former Green Party vice-presidential candidate Winona LaDuke, who was unable to attend.
Panelist Dan Simplicio, a Zuni Pueblo councilman, talked about the Zuni Salt Lake, which pueblo people believe is the home of the Salt Mother - a provider of brine harvested from the lake by Zunis, Navajos, Hopi, Acoma and other tribes for generations. The lake, which is about 60 miles south of the pueblo, is threatened by the proposed Fence Lake coal mine to be built by a Phoenix utility company about 11 miles from its shore. Zunis believe the mine and a planned 44-mile rail line to an existing power plant will drive the Salt Mother away from the lake, Simplicio said.
"We have prevented this for seven years, exhausting much of our resources," he said.
He compared the lake to other sites sacred to American Indians, such as Bandelier National Monument and Woodruff Butte, a natural feature south of Holbrook, Ariz., from which the state wants to extract paving granite, and the Grand Canyon, from which many pueblo people believe they originate.
He told the audience, which included about 40 children from Cochiti School, that education was part of the solution to protecting these sites.
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"It's important that we understand where these places are," he said. "You need to educate yourself to teach the outside world."
Simplicio said about 86,000 tons of coal would be extracted from the proposed mine in a year. The water requirements for such production would drain an underground aquifer that feeds the four-foot-deep lake, he said.
Hydrologists hired by the pueblo and the utility company have disagreed about the potential effects since the Zunis began fighting the mine in 1996, he said.
Simplicio added that the Grand Canyon - the sacred origin of several indigenous cultural belief systems - has been exploited as a park for the wealthy.
"It's the birthplace of the people, yet I hardly see native people there," he said. "Why? Well, it costs $20,000 to take a river trip from one end of the canyon to another. We see nothing but foreigners down there now."
Sonny Weahkee and Bineshi Albert, of the Sacred Alliances for Grassroots Equality Council, updated the audience on the current standoff between people who consider the Petroglyph National Monument sacred and those who propose to extend Paseo Del Norte NW through the monument.
The SAGE Council was founded in 1996 to protect the 17-mile escarpment, into which are carved some 20,000 petroglyphs, from being bisected by the road.
"We started to research, and there was a developer who wanted to put 40,000 new residents on the mesa on the other side of the monument," Weahkee said. "That's the size of Santa Fe. Follow the money - that's what that road is really about."
He said some of the petroglyphs are more than 2,000 years old.
"How many generations are in 2,000 to 3,000 years - that's a long time," he said. "So when the City of Albuquerque says your sacred site's getting in the way of our progress that doesn't equate to me."
Albert said the council had considerable support in state and local government, including the city council, and that the group was continuing to gain supporters, including West Side residents. Mayor Martin Chavez said during his campaign last year that building the Paseo Del Norte extension would be one of his top priorities.
"What's to our advantage right now is that the city is broke," Albert said.
