Makah whaling

[blackcrowheart]

Makah whaling meetings start this week
2005-10-02
by RAUL VASQUEZ

NEAH BAY -- What kind of environmental impacts will happen if the Makah
tribe once again hunts gray whales off this northern tip of the North
Olympic Peninsula?

That will be the primary question asked in three meetings Wednesday at
the Makah reservation in Neah Bay, Thursday in Port Angeles and Oct. 11
in Seattle.

The three public comment sessions are preliminary steps in a process led
by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

No decision on whether the Makah can resume whaling is expected for at
least a year -- longer if there are more lawsuits from anti-whaling
activists, which is likely.

The tribe's last successful whale hunt was in May 1999.

The Makah killed a 30-ton gray whale, striking it with harpoons and then
killing it with a gunshot to the back of the head.

``We want to hear comments on the biological and environmental aspects
of a [whale] hunt,'' said Brian Gorman, NOAA spokesman.

``And this won't be an opportunity for people to make statements in a
auditorium setting.''

Whaling meetings

THE NOAA HEARINGS this week and Oct. 11 are workshops, not public forums
for comments for or against Makah whaling exercise.

There will be no podium for participants.

Those attending the sessions will be broken up into study groups that
will be asked to make recommendations for an environmental impact study.

The schedule:

* Wednesday -- Neah Bay's Makah Tribal Council Community Hall, 81 Third
Ave., from 6:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.

* Thursday -- Vern Burton Memorial Community Center, 308 E. Fourth St.,
Port Angeles, from 6:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. on Thursday.

* Tuesday, Oct. 11 -- In Seattle at South Lake Union Park, 860 Terry
Ave. North, from 6:30 p.m. to 10 p.m.

www.peninsuladailynews.com/sited/story/html/219028

[blackcrowheart]

Update on the Makah Whaling issue

Hearing shows Makahs, public divided over whaling rights
Tribe requests federal waiver, but critics have their say, too

By CLAUDIA ROWE
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Would-be whale hunters from the Makah Indian tribe clashed Tuesday
night, in quiet but heated tones, with animal-protection activists and
others in Seattle who oppose the tribe's long-sought effort to secure
the right to hunt gray whales.


MIKE URBAN / P-I
Janine Bowechop, executive director of the Makah Cultural and Research
Center in Neah Bay, listens during a public meeting Tuesday as Diane
Weinstein of Issaquah speaks against the Makahs' proposed whale hunt.
The meeting, held by the National Marine Fisheries Service to gather
public comment on the issue, marked the latest wrinkle in a torturous
legal battle pitting the American Indians' centuries-old whaling
tradition against contemporary notions of animal welfare.

The Makahs are currently barred from whale hunting by a federal court
decision and seek a waiver that would grant them special permission.

About 100 people turned out to consider the relevant issues -- cultural
identity, the image of Seattle, the pain and suffering of the mammals --
and clustered in small discussion groups as police watched. The
exchanges, while restrained, were often impassioned.

"I travel a lot for my work, and it means something when I say I'm from
Seattle," said Carol Janes, a lawyer. "(People) know about Mount St.
Helens and the Mariners. I don't want that meaning to change to: 'That's
the place where they kill whales.' "

Dave Sones, vice chairman of the Makah Tribal Council, took the heat in
stride.

"The animal rights groups would rather just see our culture disappear,
and that's their right," he said. "But we really believe that we will
get this waiver."

Similar public meetings held earlier this month in Port Angeles and Neah
Bay drew a total of about 150 participants, said federal officials, who
will consider the commentary while drafting a new, court-mandated
environmental impact assessment of the Makahs' proposed whale hunts.
Next week, they will meet in Washington, D.C., to gather the impressions
of groups with an international perspective. Federal officials expect to
present a draft of the environmental impact statement next fall. A
decision on the waiver would follow.

The Makahs, whose 1855 treaty with the United States government allows
whaling, voluntarily stopped the practice in the 1920s after the
commercial whaling industry had hunted gray whales nearly to extinction.
But in 1994, with the mammals' population rebounding, the federal
government removed the gray whale from the endangered species list, and
the tribe began taking steps to hunt again in the waters off its
reservation at the tip of the Olympic Peninsula.


In 1999, tribal members killed their first whale in some 70 years, first
using a harpoon and finishing with four shots to the back of a gray
whale's head.

Animal welfare activists soon sued the tribe and its federal backers,
contending that whale hunting violated the Marine Mammal Protection Act,
and in 2002 the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed, ruling that
the Makahs must comply with animal-protection laws and obtain a waiver
before proceeding with another hunt. The tribe has said it would kill no
more than 20 gray whales in a five-year period.

The hunt six years ago did more than simply reassert Makah treaty
rights, some discussion participants said. It also strengthened the
cultural identity of various other aboriginal groups, said one woman who
was present at the hunt.

"My heart is sad when it comes to the whaling," said Annette Berget.

P-I reporter Claudia Rowe can be reached at 206-448-8320 or
[e-mail]