July 19th 2011 - Taku Agreement Signed!

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Download Wóoshtin wudidaa Atlin-Taku Land Use Plan

Over 95% of the 10 million-acre territory of the Taku River Tlingit First Nation (TRTFN) in north western British Columbia is wilderness. The prevailing salmon producer of Southeast Alaska and the largest intact wilderness river system on the Pacific Coast of North America, the 4.5 million-acre watershed of the Taku River, dominates this territory as it flows from the interior boreal forests of British Columbia to the coastal temperate forests of Alaska.

Achieving conservation success across such a broad landscape requires the implementation of a suite of creative land designations, inventive management arrangements, and supporting economic developments. As the Taku’s long serving stewards and its powerful political advocates, the Taku River Tlingit First Nation (TRTFN) provides the fulcrum for this work.

The best prospect for achieving conservation success lies in increasing the wildlife, fish, and land management capabilities and authority of the TRTFN. On-going treaty negotiations, government land planning decisions, and resource development proposals each have potential to impact the salmon, wildlife, ecological integrity, and wilderness characteristics of the Taku River. Each of the components of this project are designed to best equip the Taku River Tlingit to assume management authority, engage with the government in land planning and designations, participate in treaty negotiations, and to effectively review, challenge, and manage proposed development activities in the Taku River watershed and throughout their traditional territory.

Project History

On July 19, 2011, the Taku River Tlingit First Nation signed historic agreements with the British Columbian government establishing land protection measures and shared management responsibility for their ancestral lands. The Wóoshtin Wudidaa (Flowing Together) Land Use Plan protects more than seven million acres from commercial logging and designates over two million acres as First Nation Conservancy Parks. In addition, the Taku River Tlingit and provincial government have agreed to a joint governing process, Wóoshtin Yan Too.aat (Walking Together), to guide future resource-related decisions.

“These agreements represent long overdue respect and recognition for my people, an acknowledgement of who we are as a people and our Tlingit khustiyxh, or way of life on the land, that we are so intricately connected to,” says Taku River Tlingit First Nation Spokesperson John Ward.

When Round River arrived in Atlin, British Columbia in 1999, they found relations between the province and the Taku River Tlingit strained over plans to build a 99-mile road to the Tulsequah Chief mine, through the otherwise pristine salmon streams of the Taku River watershed.  The Taku River, one of the largest salmon wilderness systems remaining in North America, supports the principal commercial salmon run in southeastern Alaska and perhaps the highest density of grizzly bears in British Columbia.

The Taku River Tlingit sued the province over its lack of consultation with the First Nation, and a 2004 Canadian Supreme Court ruling ordered BC officials to engage in government-to-government negotiations to resolve land management issues.

The resulting Land and Resource Management and Shared Decision-Making Agreement is the first of its kind in British Columbia. The Land Use Plan creates a system of protected areas equivalent in size to Yellowstone Nation Park and an array of conservation priority areas within a no commercial logging zone of over seven million acres. The companion Shared Decision Making Agreement allows the province and First Nation each to review and make decisions about resource questions, while working together to forge consensus.

The agreement, reached after four years of negotiations, defines what kind of development can occur where and under what conditions, and allows the province and First Nation to coordinate their own decisions as governments on resource related questions.

“What the agreement does is allow the two governments, to make decisions respectfully and in a collaborative way, notwithstanding the fact that they still disagree on who really owns the land,” says Round River Associate, Julian Griggs. “By producing a land use plan, you provide greater certainty and clarity for conservation, for the preservation of cultural landscapes, and for economic development interests.”

Round River’s Taku 12-year project was unique, says Bryan Evans, Round River Associate, in that it was so much more than a conventional environmental campaign. “We realized that the Taku River Tlingit had a strong land ethic and a desire to steward their lands responsibly. But they needed resources and technical help to express their values in a way that would be heard by government and industry. Round River built a long term respectful working relationship with the Taku River Tlingits, helping them with land management issues, but also creating economic opportunities for the community. Along the way, we made close and valued friendships.”

Taku River Tlingit Spokesperson John Ward says his people have always struggled to explain their relationship to their land in a way that provincial and federal officials could understand. “The closest we’ve been able to say is we’re just part of the food chain,” he says. “We’re an intricate part of it, and our land must continue to do what it does for it to provide for our needs.”

To the Taku River Tlingit First Nation, Round River offered technical expertise, student labor, biological and mapping skills. “We started with grizzly bear work,” says Round River Lead Scientist Kim Heinemeyer. “It was a nice entrance into the community because we had a distinct project and we were providing technical-based field work.”  Round River hired young Tlingit members to help, and the first crew spent five months hiking the watershed. “It was life changing for me, and I think it really changed their lives to have five months in the bush on the Taku.”

Heinemeyer says that first bear study led to the idea of doing a conservation area design, and the next big challenge: combining traditional ecological knowledge with modern scientific modeling technology. Round River staff and students conducted dozens of interviews, learning where, when and how wildlife use the landscape, then translated that wisdom into data within an analytical framework that independent scientists would accept as valid.

“The Round River team has been instrumental in helping us get to this point, providing technical and planning support consistently throughout the last decade, as well as contributing to economic development projects and language programs.” says Susan Carlick, lead negotiator for the Taku River Tlingit. “They listened respectfully to our community members, helped to bring our own traditional knowledge forward and incorporate it into planning products, and assisted at all levels in our negotiations with British Columbia.”

Covering approximately 7.5 million acres, the Atlin Taku Land Use Plan draws heavily on much of the research, analysis, and mapping work undertaken by Round River during the last decade. “Our research projects in the Taku, which involved our own staff working side by side with the Tlingit, helped to define the areas of habitat that were most critical to protect,” says Kim Heinemeyer. “The resulting Conservation Area Design was used as the basis for decision support tools in the planning process, and allowed the Tlingit to make informed decisions about trade off between areas for the conservation of wildlife habitat and important cultural areas, and areas that needed to be available for economic development.”

Tlingit lead negotiator Susan Carlick credits a hike on the Nakina Trail as her inspiration through the years of diplomacy. “When Round River came to town, I was really concerned that environmentalists were trying to do something harmful to us,” she says. “Then John Ward took me on the Nakina hike, and I remember coming back and saying (whispering) ‘I think I’m an environmentalist.’”

“What the agreement also does is allow the two governments, to make decisions respectfully and in a collaborative way,” Carlick says. “After many years of conflict over resource management and land use in our territory, this is a new beginning and the start of a very different, more cooperative way of working together.”

Carlick is now charged with re-building the First Nation’s land office, and has hired two young Tlingit women as part of that process. She says Round River’s social work with the community has made her optimistic about her people’s ability to manage their own lands. Of particular importance, she says, were the Tlingit language CDs they produced. “Now I hear Tlingit being spoken on a daily basis, she says. “It’s caused people to want to be who we are, and speak our own words.”

“For more than a decade, the Taku project has been the centerpiece of our conservation efforts in Canada,” says Dennis Sizemore, Round River Executive Director. “Today’s announcement marks a hugely significant achievement for the Taku River First Nation and the government of British Columbia, and a milestone in forging respectful relationships with aboriginal peoples. We congratulate them both on reaching this agreement, and we are proud and honored that we were able to play a role in contributing to this outcome.”

Looking ahead, Round River hopes to assist the Tlingit as they work to implement the Land Use Plan and collaborate with British Columbia as managers of their ancestral territory. “The U.S. foundations that have been supporting our work so generously over the last decade, have also helped to create an endowment fund for just this purpose, “ says Sizemore. “The Tlingit now have what comes with shared decision making, which is shared responsibility.” He adds, “We are now investing in training and capacity building with the Taku River Tlingit as they tackle these new challenges. I made a personal multi-generational commitment at the outset of our relationship with the Tlingit and we’ll be there for another 12 years if they still want and need us.”

Michael Soulé, a Round River Trustee and pre-eminent conservation biologist, says he hopes the successful negotiations will be helpful to First Nations and global conservation: “This agreement with the BC government is precedent setting and will encourage other First Nations world wide to confidently strive to protect wilderness and wildlife on their ancestral lands.”

Background and Current Activities

Over the last 12 years the Taku River Tlingit have completed an ecological assessment of their traditional territory, developed a comprehensive community-based land use vision, negotiated a framework agreement for land use, wildlife management and shared decision making with British Columbia, and jointly lead a multi-year strategic land use planning process for the 7.5 million acre Atlin-Taku planning area. To implement these agreements and engage with BC as effective land stewards continued support is needed to maintain and expand the capability of the Taku River Tlingit.

The conservation achieved through these agreements is very significant.  The Atlin-Taku Land Use Plan designates 98% of the 8 million acre planning area as a no commercial logging zone; over 18% as Special Management Areas specifically managed for wildlife and cultural values; and over 25% as fully protected parks. Additionally, the plan protects all major salmon bearing streams through the establishment of Salmon Ecosystem Management Areas. In addition, over 200 Cultural Sites and landscapes will have protective measures in place. Together these designations represent a highly contiguous area that captures high quality habitats for salmon, bear, moose, caribou, sheep and goats, and high percentages of important Tlingit cultural sites.

Under the shared decision making arrangement, one of the first of its kind in British Columbia, the governments of the Taku River Tlingit and the British Columbia will coordinate their respective resource management decision-making within an established collaborative process. This arrangement provides meaningful opportunities for the Taku River Tlingit First Nation to be involved in implementation of the Atlin-Taku land use plan, as well as in decision-making for fish and wildlife, parks and protected areas, and the review of applications for proposed development permits and tenures.

Together the land use and shared decision making agreements provide a very strong foundation for conservation-oriented land and natural resources management in the Taku region and represent an achievement of provincial, national and international significance for First Peoples. For these agreements to deliver long-term conservation-oriented land management requires a sustained collaboration between the Taku River Tlingit and their conservation partners.

The lands the Taku River Tlingit First Nation encompass the watersheds of the Taku and Whiting Rivers, as well as the headwaters of the Yukon River. The richness of this land and its rivers itself provides the very foundation for Tlingit kustiyixh, or ‘way of life’. The Taku River Tlingit take their name, the Takhu Quan, from the Taku River itself, the largest wilderness salmon watershed on the Pacific Coast of North America which flows through boreal, sub-boreal and temperate rainforests, from interior British Columbia mountain ranges to coastal Alaska ranges.

In the early 1990’s, the British Columbia initiated a province-wide initiative to designate protected areas, and to create a series of strategic land use plans to provide certainty for all resource users with regard to resource access, use and conservation. There was limited participation by First Nations in the LRMP processes, and in the other landscape-level planning processes that followed, due to concerns that multi-stakeholder planning was ill-equipped to deal with aboriginal rights and title issues and did not afford First Nations appropriate recognition as sovereign Nations. Nonetheless, by early 2000’s, provincial land use planning had been completed for the vast majority of British Columbia. One of the very few large and ecologically rich regions for which a strategic land use plan had not been completed however, was the Atlin-Taku, the territory of the Taku River Tlingit First Nation.

During much of this period, Tlingit conservation efforts were focused not on pro-active planning, but in reaction to a proposed 99-mile road to assess a mine in the very heart of the Taku. In response to a decision by the British Columbia government to approve this mine and road, the Taku River Tlingit Nation filed a lawsuit arguing that Tlingit interests had not been appropriately considered in the environmental assessment process. The Taku River Tlingit Nation challenge, heard in the Supreme Court of Canada, led to the landmark Taku/Haida rulings to reshape the nature of First Nation consultation and accommodation in Canada. As part of this ruling, the Court stated that further efforts were necessary to accommodate the interests of the Taku River Tlingit Nation, in part through the creation of a land use strategy.

In 1998, the Taku River Tlingit First Nation also partnered with Round River Conservation Studies to lay the groundwork for a comprehensive land planning process, including information gathering, mapping, research, and interviews with Tlingit members. Through its association with Round River the Taku River Tlingit Nation were able to prepare themselves for engaging in a joint planning process by bringing together a range of quality products unlike any other First Nation.

Prompted by the Supreme Court of Canada ruling in the Taku case, the Taku River Tlingit First Nation entered into exploratory discussions with the Government of British Columbia in 2005 regarding a joint land use and wildlife management planning process. In March 2008, the two governments signed the Framework Agreement for Shared Decision Making Respecting Land Use and Wildlife Management and government-to-government (G2G) negotiations began in earnest.

In July, 2004, the Taku River Tlingit First Nation ratified through a Joint Clan Meeting the creation of the T’akhu  Tlèn Conservancy, a non-profit entity that secured charitable status from Revenue Canada in 2009.  The stated purpose of the Conservancy is to “ensure the traditional territory of the Taku River Tlingit Nation remains a landscape where the needs of the Taku River Tlingit Nation people are satisfied in harmony with the continued long term viability of its native plants, fish, wildlife and natural ecosystems.”

Working in a cooperative partnership with the Taku River Tlingit Lands and Fisheries Departments, the Conservancy was created as a vehicle to develop, fund, and facilitate implementation of programs required to fulfill the intent of the Hà t_átgi hà khustìyxh sìti.  As completion of the government-to-government negotiations near, the Conservancy is uniquely positioned to assist with the implementation of Atlin Taku Land Use Plan, and provide for the capacity needed for the next phase of this work.

The Work Ahead

To date, conservation work in the Taku region has focused on three separate but related areas: (i) providing a framework for culturally and ecologically sustainable land management, (ii) establishing new arrangements for ‘shared decision-making’ and (iii) ensuring that the Taku’s remarkable wildlife populations are managed sustainably.

Round River Conservation Studies has supplied the technical aspects of these efforts in close collaboration with the TRT Lands and Resources and Fisheries Departments, under direction from the elected leadership of the Taku River Tlingit First Nation. These activities were principally supported through foundation grants to Round River with additional funding supplied by federal and provincial funding to the TRT Departments.

The scope and nature of this work is now changing from being substantially ‘product driven’ to implementing the agreements and building an even greater conservation vision and competence for the Taku River Tlingit First Nation. Activities now include participating in the newly established G2G Forum overseeing land and resource management decision-making, producing park and other conservation area management plans, developing a TRT Wildlife Policy and Wildlife Advisory Group, engaging in a collaborative wildlife management program and implementing ecological and land use research and monitoring regimes.

Similarly, financial mechanisms are changing whereby the Taku River Tlingit First Nation and the T’akhu  Tlèn Conservancy will directly receive much of the funding to implement the land plan agreements.  The BC government will annually support the Nation’s participation in the G2G Forum and in the collaborative wildlife-working group.  Additionally, the T’akhu  Tlèn Conservancy, as a charitable organization will develop its own grant applications and establish a long-term funding endowment, the Tlatsini Conservation Fund.  Round River, will continue to solicit grants to support its services to the Taku River Tlingit First Nation, as well operate under contractual agreements with the T’akhu  Tlèn Conservancy.