Political action committees funded by technology companies, the state’s major utilities and other corporate interests have spent several million dollars more to pass a ballot measure that would greenlight major development projects with minimal environmental or public review than public interest and labor groups have spent opposing it. Developers and other corporate interests aim to…
Source
The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) repeatedly requested Enbridge keep its Line 5 pipeline shut down following the largest oil and gas spill in state history on Aug. 25. Enbridge defied the requests. Without receiving the required permits, it built a new pipeline to bypass the rupture and restarted Line 5’s operations. Enbridge’s actions raise serious questions about the state’…
Source
In 2004, Microsoft’s future chief sustainability officer, Melanie Nakagawa, co-edited a law journal issue on Indigenous peoples’ right to prior informed consent. This month, as a data center developer routed around exactly that standard in New Mexico, she didn’t answer whether it applies to her own company’s work. Ask Google, Amazon, and Microsoft whether they consult Native nations before…
Source
The University of California (UC) is circulating its first-ever systemwide framework governing tribal access, co-stewardship, and land-use agreements across 80,000 acres of UC-managed land. The framework was developed by UC Tribal Lands Workgroup, composed entirely of UC staff with no Tribal government representatives, and Tribal advisory bodies were only invited to review the document after it…
Source
The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case that could determine the future of a beach with cultural and ecological importance to the Indigenous CHamoru people of Guam. The case is an appeal from the U.S. Air Force, which wants to continue the open detonation of obsolete munitions on Tarague Beach in northern Guam — a site located directly above the sole-source aquifer providing 80 percent of…
Source
The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments on Tuesday about whether state or federal court will have the final say on the future of the controversial Line 5 pipeline, which carries crude oil and natural gas liquids across the Straits of Mackinac in Michigan. The case dates to a 2019 lawsuit by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, who moved to shut down the pipeline by revoking the easement that…
Source