Written by James Hale, Prairie Band Potawatomi
This past Wednesday, November 1, I got on a bus in Minneapolis (thanks to MN350) going to Bismark, NF to #StandWithStandingRock and voice our concerns with the Draft EIS that the Army Corps FINALLY got around to after the #DakotaAccessPipeline has been operating illegally without one for the past 7 years.
It was supposed to be a public comment hearing and the Army Corps didn’t even show up. There was no panel to listen to folks testify, just a weird voting booth type set up where folks were made to enter individually to submit their comment to a stenographer. So basically, there was no “public” comment but “suppressed”comment from the public only for the Army Corps. it was like they didn’t want to hear us because they weren’t there and again, it felt like they were suppressing Indigenous voices and the voices of Standing Rock. So folks let their comments be known via bullhorn inside the building!
It’s ridiculous how many many discrepancies there STILL are with the Draft EIS. There STILL hasn't been any meaningful consultation with the #StandingRock or the #CheyenneRiver #SiouxTribes. It is STILL operating at TWICE its MAXIMUM capacity of 570,000 barrels a day to 1.1 million barrels per day. They are STILL violating the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe's #TreatyRights. And there is STILL no emergency response plan in place should the #DAPL ever have a large scale leak.
We know that #ALLPIPELINESLEAK and #DAPL has already leaked at least 5 times!
I believe that the EIS should be done by an independent contractor and NOT the American Petroleum Institute who is obviously in the pocket of Energy Transfer Partners. So, until ALL these issues are addressed we must continue to demand that the Army Corps #ShutDowmDAPL!!!
