[Vision2020] Tribe files lawsuit over pipeline

[Moscow Cares]

Courtesy of the Bismarck Tribune (Bismarck, North Dakota) at:

http://bismarcktribune.com/bakken/tribe-files-lawsuit-over-pipeline/article_38080995-0680-5e53-9ee5-19eab963b82a.html#utm_source=bismarcktribune.com&utm_campaign=%2Femail-updates%2Fbreaking%2F&utm_medium=email&utm_content=6018563F5ADE416EB6BC5DE029040538E8428A87

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Tribe files lawsuit over pipeline
  
The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe has filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers over the Dakota Access Pipeline

The tribe, represented by Earthjustice, alleges the corps violated the National Historic Preservation Act and other laws, after the agency issued final permits this week for the 1,172-mile crude oil pipeline stretching from North Dakota to Illinois.

The complaint, filed in U.S. district court in Washington, D.C., Wednesday, says the corps effectively wrote off the tribe’s concerns and ignored the pipeline’s impacts to sacred sites and culturally important landscapes. The pipeline travels through the tribe’s ancestral lands and passes within half a mile of its current reservation.

“The corps puts our water and the lives and livelihoods of many in jeopardy,” Tribal Chairman Dave Archambault II said in a statement. “We have laws that require federal agencies to consider environmental risks and protection of Indian historic and sacred sites. But the Army Corps has ignored all those laws and fast-tracked this massive project just to meet the pipeline’s aggressive construction schedule.”



The corps’ approval of an easement allows the Energy Transfer Partners, the company developing Dakota Access, to dig the pipeline under the Missouri River, just upstream of the reservation and the tribe’s drinking water supply. The tribe says an oil spill at this site would "constitute an existential threat to the tribe’s culture and way of life."

“There have been shopping malls that have received more environmental review and tribal consultation than this massive crude oil pipeline,” Jan Hasselman, an Earthjustice attorney, said in a statement. “Pipelines spill and leak—its not a matter of if but when. Construction will destroy sacred and historically significant sites. We need to take a time out and ensure that the Corps follows the law before rushing ahead with permits.”

Despite objections by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and other organizations, construction of the pipeline has already begun in areas not under corps authority.

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Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho
  
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