<div dir="ltr"><h2 class="entry-title" style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 0.5rem;padding:0px;font-family:"Source Serif Pro",Georgia,Cambria,"Times New Roman",Times,serif;color:inherit;font-size:2.5rem;line-height:1.111;max-width:640px">This Thanksgiving, join Native Americans in fighting for the future of salmon</h2><p class="gmail-lead" style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 0.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.25;max-width:640px;font-family:"Source Sans Pro","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(72,74,76)">Like the Pilgrims who landed on Plymouth Rock, the early colonizers of San Francisco relied on Native Americans for food and water.</p><ul class="gmail-author-meta" style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px 0px 0.5rem;padding:0px;list-style-position:outside;line-height:1.6;list-style-type:none;max-width:640px"><li style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;font-size:0.85rem;display:inline;font-family:Play,"Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(91,91,91)"><a class="gmail-byline" href="https://www.sfexaminer.com/author/robyn-purchia/" rel="author" style="box-sizing:inherit;background-color:transparent;line-height:inherit;color:rgb(11,128,128);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(230,230,230);text-transform:uppercase">ROBYN PURCHIA</a></li><li style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;font-size:0.85rem;display:inline;font-family:Play,"Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(91,91,91)">Nov. 26, 2019 5:10 p.m.</li><li style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;font-size:0.85rem;display:inline;font-family:Play,"Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(91,91,91)"><a class="gmail-byline" href="https://www.sfexaminer.com/news-columnists/" style="box-sizing:inherit;background-color:transparent;line-height:inherit;color:rgb(11,128,128);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(230,230,230);text-transform:uppercase">NEWS COLUMNISTS</a></li></ul><ul class="gmail-social gmail-story gmail-top" style="box-sizing:inherit;padding:0px 0px 17px;list-style:none;line-height:1.6;overflow:hidden;font-size:0px;max-width:640px;border-bottom:1px solid rgb(230,230,230);margin:17px 0px"><li style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 6px 0px 0px;padding:0px;font-size:inherit;display:inline-block;zoom:1"><span tabindex="1" title="" class="gmail-has-tip" style="box-sizing:inherit;display:inline-block;border-bottom:none;font-weight:bold"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.sfexaminer.com%2Fnews-columnists%2Fthis-thanksgiving-join-native-americans-in-fighting-for-the-food-of-the-future%2F" class="gmail-social gmail-fa gmail-fa-facebook-f" target="_blank" style="box-sizing:border-box;background-color:rgb(54,100,162);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-weight:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:34px;font-family:FontAwesome;color:rgb(254,254,254);text-decoration-line:none;display:block;overflow:hidden;text-align:center;width:34px;height:34px;border-radius:100px"></a></span></li> <li style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 6px 0px 0px;padding:0px;font-size:inherit;display:inline-block;zoom:1"><span tabindex="1" title="" class="gmail-has-tip" style="box-sizing:inherit;display:inline-block;border-bottom:none;font-weight:bold"><a href="https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?text=This+Thanksgiving%2C+join+Native+Americans+in+fighting+for+the+future+of+salmon&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.sfexaminer.com%2Fnews-columnists%2Fthis-thanksgiving-join-native-americans-in-fighting-for-the-food-of-the-future%2F" class="gmail-social gmail-fa gmail-fa-twitter" target="_blank" style="box-sizing:border-box;background-color:rgb(85,172,238);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-weight:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:34px;font-family:FontAwesome;color:rgb(254,254,254);text-decoration-line:none;display:block;overflow:hidden;text-align:center;width:34px;height:34px;border-radius:100px"></a></span></li> <li style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 6px 0px 0px;padding:0px;font-size:inherit;display:inline-block;zoom:1"><span tabindex="1" title="" class="gmail-has-tip" style="box-sizing:inherit;display:inline-block;border-bottom:none;font-weight:bold"><a href="https://reddit.com/submit?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.sfexaminer.com%2Fnews-columnists%2Fthis-thanksgiving-join-native-americans-in-fighting-for-the-food-of-the-future%2F&title=This+Thanksgiving%2C+join+Native+Americans+in+fighting+for+the+future+of+salmon" class="gmail-social gmail-fa gmail-fa-reddit-alien" target="_blank" style="box-sizing:border-box;background-color:rgb(255,87,0);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-weight:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:34px;font-family:FontAwesome;color:rgb(254,254,254);text-decoration-line:none;display:block;overflow:hidden;text-align:center;width:34px;height:34px;border-r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:rgb(254,254,254)"><div id="gmail-fsk_splitbox_4087" class="gmail-fsk_splitbox_4087" style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;max-width:603px;height:0px;text-align:center"></div></div><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">Even today, violence plagues American Indians on reservations and in cities. Native American women experience some of the nation’s highest rates of murder, sexual violence, and domestic abuse.</p><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">Thanksgiving celebrations rarely recognize these realities. Instead of limiting gratitude for the gifts bestowed on the Pilgrims and Costansó’s men in the past, San Franciscans can also lift up Native Americans’ efforts today. One way to do this is by joining the fight to protect a nutritious and traditionally important food: salmon.</p><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">The culture of many California tribes is built around this once abundant fish. For generations, festivals and stories celebrated the return of salmon from the ocean. According to the Winnemem Wintu, salmon took pity on the first humans and offered to give them speech if they promised to always speak for the salmon. Others believe that when salmon die, so do we.</p><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">“That’s not just native people, that’s all people,” April McGill, a Mission resident of Wailaki, Yuki, Little Lake Pomo and Wappo descent, told me. “They do so many things for us and nourish our bodies — they’re the healthiest fish out there. It’s our job to take care and fight for them.”</p><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">But despite Native American efforts, the salmon are disappearing. At least 10,000 Coho salmon once swam through the Lagunitas Creek watershed in Marin County. Last winter there were 648. A 2017 report by researchers at the University of California, Davis, and conservation group, California Trout, found that 23 of California’s 31 genetically distinct kinds of salmon and trout are at risk of vanishing in the next 100 years.</p><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">“No statistics can express what losing the salmon has done to our culture and well-being as communities,” Morning Star Gali, the tribal water organizer for Save California Salmon and a member of the Pit River Tribe, recently wrote. “Unlike many other salmon states, very few of California’s tribes have established rights to a harvestable surplus of salmon and a land base, and no California tribes are actually able to catch enough salmon to feed their families.”</p><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">California’s tribes should not have to fight alone to exercise their sovereign rights and protect such a culturally critical food. San Franciscans can, and should, do more.</p><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">Supervisor Hillary Ronen introduced legislation to establish the first-ever American Indian Cultural District in San Francisco last week. The step supports the local community in securing resources to help protect cherished cultural assets. It could also lead to the establishment of an American Indian Cultural Center — the first in 50 years.</p><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">Individuals can also help protect the water salmon need. San Franciscans should conserve the resource and avoid using plastic bottled water. The Winnemem Wintu tribe has filed multiple lawsuits around the approval a new Crystal Geyser plant near the city of Mount Shasta.</p><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">Instead of simply saying thanks for receiving food in the past, San Franciscans can give thanks by joining Native Americans to fight for food in the future.</p><p style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px 0px 1.5rem;padding:0px;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.875rem;max-width:640px;width:640px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;background-color:rgb(254,254,254)">Robyn Purchia is an environmental attorney, environmental blogger and environmental activist who hikes, gardens and tree hugs in her spare time. She is a guest opinion columnist and her point of view is not necessarily that of the Examiner. Check her out at <a href="http://robynpurchia.com">robynpurchia.com</a></p><div style="box-sizing:inherit;margin:0px;padding:15px;color:rgb(10,10,10);font-family:"Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Roboto,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:16px;background:rgba(0,0,0,0.03);border-radius:25px;display:inline-block"><br class="gmail-Apple-interchange-newline"></div></div><a href="https://www.sfexaminer.com/news-columnists/this-thanksgiving-join-native-americans-in-fighting-for-the-food-of-the-future/?fbclid=IwAR2TGpsJhyTsUaijN6D24_80lk8QOOLJf4rOXbxTcNFe9ssnHYZmThWFrQo">https://www.sfexaminer.com/news-columnists/this-thanksgiving-join-native-americans-in-fighting-for-the-food-of-the-future/?fbclid=IwAR2TGpsJhyTsUaijN6D24_80lk8QOOLJf4rOXbxTcNFe9ssnHYZmThWFrQo</a><br></div>