Winter 2020 Newsletter

Letter from Chairman Lopez

Dear Friends,

 As we look back on 2020 we can surely say it has been a year like no other.  We first had to deal with the Covid-19 crisis and all of its challenges that continue today. Then we were hit by the CZU lightning complex fire which brought devastation to so many of our friends and neighbors. I’m sure we’re all looking forward to 2021 hoping and believing it will be a much better year. 

 Our Amah Mutsun Land Trust is certainly looking forward to the new year.  First of all, we look forward to announcing our next Executive Director. We have conducted interviews for this position and are honing in on a final candidate. We look forward to having our new Executive Director join us very soon. 

Our Land Trust has certainly changed since we hired our first Executive Director in 2016. For example, our Native Stewardship Corps has matured and shown itself to be quite capable at fuel reduction, firefighting, ethnobotany, archaeology field surveys, and understanding their responsibility to learn and restore our culture so they can pass it on the future generation. In all honesty, we could not be more proud of our Stewardship Corps. Soon our stewards are going to return to stewarding coastal and ocean resources. Our initial focus will be on mapping, restoring our relationship with the coast, relearning the traditional ecological knowledge of our ancestors and much more. 

 Another program we look forward to developing in 2021 is our food sovereignty program.  Because of Covid our Tribe developed a GoFundMe to help meet the needs of our members. The GoFundMe is still $4,000 away from their goal, feel free to share and donate if you are able—the link is here.  The overwhelming request of our members was for food. Seeing this, our Land Trust is considering developing  an organic garden to help meet the needs of our members.  At the same time, our Land Trust will continue with our goal of growing our native plant foods including seeds, bulbs, corms, nuts and berries.  Our native food plants will be included in the foods we provide to our members. 

 Some of the MOU’s our Land Trust established were set to expire after 5 years and we’ll be revisiting those MOU’s and working to renew them in the coming year.  This includes MOU’s with Pinnacles National Park, Cotoni Coast Dairies National Monument, and Pie Ranch.  These MOU’s are very important to our Tribe as they are designed to allow our Tribe access to the lands for ceremony, prayer, tribal gatherings, research, education and stewardship and in most cases, gathering of our native plants.  Our land trust will also work to establish other MOU’s with property owners with whom we have a strong relationship.

 In 2021, we hope to begin the Land Trust Alliance’s accreditation process. Our accreditation will demonstrate to land owners, partners, funders and donors that our Land Trust is operating at the highest ethical and legal standard and following best practices. Achieving accreditation is not easy. The accreditation staff looks at all of our documents, including our governance, easement and employee hiring, record keeping processes, long term management plans and much more. The accreditation process will tell us a lot about our  organization and show us how we can improve.  

As you can see, we have a lot of work planned for the coming year. It is because of your help and support that we are confident that 2021 will be a successful year. Please know that every day we are grateful for your friendship and support.

Ho

Valentin Lopez

President, Amah Mutsun Land Trust

Chair, Amah Mutsun Tribal Band