Environmental codes frustrate landless tribes (bush screws indians)

[The Straight Story]

Environmental codes frustrate landless tribes

Posted: June 03, 2005
by: Jean Johnson / Indian Country Today

PORTLAND, Ore. - Environmentalists and the tribes don't always see eye to eye, but when it comes to the selective way in which the Bush administration enforces the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) they're on the same page.

Under President Bush, the Interior Department allows industry to skate through a streamlined NEPA process like it's Teflon-coated. All the while, tribes trying to put together a land base find a strict bar of unbendable standards firmly in place.

NEPA was designed to protect the nation's natural resources by requiring environmental assessments (EA) of any federal projects that have the potential to impact the land. Like any law, though, interpretation is half the battle; and the Bush administration has shown time and again that it favors big business, not the side of groups like landless tribes that have limited funds.

Wrote the environmental watchdog group BushGreenwatch: ''Landless tribes must pay for their own environmental assessments which contributes to a process called 'slow-rolling.' This occurs when the EA is not paid for by the government - thus decreasing the urgency of the project, and lengthening the review process.''

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