In the past year, the Gabrieleño Indian mission gang – Kizh Nation has worked to protect its cultural sites from more than 850 land development projects around the Los Angeles basin, thanks to a State law 2014 This allows tribes to give comments during the environmental examination processes of projects.
Now his leader fears that a Bill recently proposed could considerably limit the way in which the tribe – and dozens of others still without federal recognition – could participate.
“This is an atrocity,” said Andrew Salas, president of the Kizh nation. “Let us not call this a bill. (It is) an erasure of the tribes not federally recognized in California. They remove our sovereignty. They remove our civil rights. They remove our voice.”
The new bill, AB 52, was proposed by Cecilia Aguiar-Curry State assembly (D-Widers) and co-packed by three tribes recognized by the federal government: the Indian Pechanga band, the federated Indians of Graton Rancheria and the Habematolel Pomo by Upper Lake. Supporters say that changes would strengthen and reaffirm the rights of tribes to protect their resources, granted by the 2014 law of the same name.
“This bill aims to protect tribal cultural resources and to assert that tribes – both federally and not federally recognized – are experts in our own heritage,” said Mark Macarro, tribal president of the Pechanga group, in a statement.
But shortly after the bill was presented substantially in mid -March, the tribes without federal recognition have noticed that although the tribes recognized by the federal government have a right to comprehensive government consultations in the government, their tribes – still sovereign countries – would be considered as “additional council parties”, a legal term which includes Organizations, companies and public members.
AB 52 of origin is key legislation on the Aboriginal rights of California, representing one of the main means that tribes must protect their cultural resources – such as cemeteries, sacred spaces and historic villages – of land development in their territories.
The new bill would require the ancestral knowledge of the tribes to have more weight than archaeologists and environmental consultants with regard to the cultural resources of the tribes. It would also explicitly oblige the State to maintain its tribes lists – including both recognized by the federal government and not federally recognized – on which many California's indigenous law actions count.
However, the scholars and indigenous leaders within non -federally recognized tribes say that the new differences between the way in which tribes with and without federal recognition can participate in a violation of their fundamental rights, including their sovereignty.
“It is an atrocity … They remove our sovereignty. They remove our civil rights. They remove our voice.”
– Andrew Salas, president of the Kizh nation.
They say that the language could allow tribes with federal recognition to go beyond their territory and consult the cultural resources of tribes not federally recognized neighboring.
“I do not want a tribe to 200 miles from my tribal territory gets engaged in my ancestral lands,” said Rudy Ortega, president of the Fernandeño Tataviam mission band. “We know the ancestral territory, we know the landscape, we know our history.”
The sponsors of the bill say that the new amendments are not designed to declare who deserves recognition and who does not do so – and the difference in language is simply a reflection of reality whose tribes have federal recognition and which do not.
“Tribal cultural resources and the recognition of tribes as a separate political stitches are fundamental pillars of our tribal sovereignty,” said Graton Rancheria and Pechanga Band Tribes in a joint press release. “It is essential that this bill protects and reaffirms sovereignty and government relations to government between the State of California and the tribes recognized by the federal government.”
In practice, supporters say that there would be little difference between the way the tribes with and without federal recognition consulted Californian government agencies. But for tribes without federal recognition – which argue that there is no reason to apply tribal distinctions federal to the law of the State – which does not give much comfort.
“Excluding us is a violation of our human rights.”
– Mona Tucker, president of the yak titʸu titʸu yak tiłhini northern chumash tribe of San Luis Obispo County and Region.
The confrontation began in mid -March when a friend of Salas – also a scientist who consults on environmental examinations – noticed the language modifying the status of tribes not federally recognized in the middle of the collections of other amendments to the process.
Salas' friend alerted her by phone: “Be aware, I tell you – look at him.”
He immediately alerted everyone to the tribe office in Covina. When the tribe began to reach out to other governments, it has become clear that the bill was unforeseen. “The main agencies did not know it; the city, the county – no one knew it,” said Salas.
The word quickly spread by tribal chiefs through the state. None of the tribes without federal recognition interviewed by the Times said that the Aguiar-Curry office had contacted them on the new bill before its publication.
“The contributions of the tribes recognized by the federal and non-federal government informed the printed invoice,” the Aguiar-Curry office said in a statement in Times. “We have received comments, we admitted that the language of the bill began in a place that did not fully reflect our intention – namely that all the tribes … be invited to participate in the consultation process.”
Non -federally recognized tribes quickly began to form coalitions and express their opposition. At least 70 tribes, organizations and cities had opposed the amendments by April 25.
The following Monday, Aguiar-Curry announced that it would denounce the bill until the beginning of 2026, but remained determined to continue it.
“The decision to make it a two -year bill is in direct response to the need for more time and space to respectfully start all well -intentioned stakeholders,” said his office in a statement. “In January, we will advance a bill that represents these thoughtful efforts.”
Many tribes without federal recognition still see a long road to come.
“I don't have a huge sense of victory,” said Mona Tucker, president of the Yak Titʸu Titʸu Yak Tiłhini Northern Chumash Tribe in the county and the County of San Luis Obispo. “I hope that the person of the Assembly, Aguiar-Curry, will engage with us, with a group of tribes who have no federal recognition, so that there can be a compromise here. Because excluding us is a violation of our human rights. ”
Salas prefers to see the changes killed entirely.
“We thank the Member of the AGUIAR-CURRY assembly for having at least put it on hold at the moment; however, this is not the end,” he said. “We ask that she – completely and urgently and respectfully – withdraw the amendment.”
Government to government consultations are often detailed and long -term relations in which tribes work behind the scenes to share knowledge and work directly with land promoters to protect the resources of the tribe.
Last year, the environmental examination process helped the Kizh nation to win One of the largest land yields In the history of southern California for a tribe without federal recognition.
When a developer of Jurupa Valley proposed a development of nearly 1,700 houses which threatened large cultural spaces nearby, the Kizh nation undertook a consultation of several years with the developers behind the scenes. Finally, the promoters agreed to maintain a conservation area of 510 acres on the property, to be treated by the tribe.
Likewise, it was one of these tribal consultations that has rekindled the cultural burning practices of the Chumash Northern Ytt tribe. In 2024 – for the first time in more than 150 years since the State prohibits cultural fire – The tribe Burning duct along the central coast With the support of Cal Fire.
California has 109 tribes recognized by the federal government. But it also has more than 55 tribes without recognition. Indeed, federal recognition is often a process of several decades and ARDU which requires verifying the native line of each tribal member and of documenting the continuous government operations of the tribe since 1900.
And the tribes in what is now California – which has been colonized not one but three times – has a unique and broken story. Since 1978, 81 Californian tribal groups asked for federal recognition. So far, only one has succeeded and five have been refused – more than any other state.
For this reason, AB 52 and other parts of key key to the Californian indigenous law – such as those which allow tribes to give comments on urban planning and take care of ancestral remains – use a list of tribes created by the State which includes tribes both with and without federal recognition.
The managers of the tribes without federal recognition have seen the last weeks AB 52 Flash Point as an opportunity to take a momentum for higher protections and rights for all California tribes.
“What does the world look like on October 10, 1492?” said Joey Williams, president of the Coalition of California State Tribes and Vice-President of the Indian Community of Kern Valley. “Here in California, there were about 190 autonomous governments of villages and languages and self -determinated people – liberated sovereign people, who are free.”
Williams helped form the California tribes coalition in 2022 to fight for this vision.
“We just want this for our tribal people,” he said. “We want them to have access to all this sovereignty, self -determination … and to total recognition by the federal government and the government of the state.”
