Latest news with #TurtleMountain
CBC
17-06-2025
- CBC
Want to travel in Manitoba? Some restrictions may apply
The Bur Oak Trail is a one-kilometre, stroller-friendly walking loop sandwiched between the main road running through Birds Hill Provincial Park and residential homes on Mulder Drive in the Rural Municipality of Springfield. The trail is 20 metres from the nearest pavement. You'd have to walk it seven times to rack up 10,000 steps. No one would mistake this Winnipeg-area trail for wilderness — but it's off-limits right now due to sweeping provincial restrictions on backcountry travel during this unusual spring wildfire season. The curious case of the Bur Oak closure is not an isolated instance. Consider Turtle Mountain Provincial Park, which is 343 kilometres away from the nearest active wildfire in Manitoba, an 89-square-kilometre blaze under control in Sandilands Provincial Forest. It takes three and a half hours in a car to move between these two natural areas. Yet travel on most of the lakes and all the trails in Turtle Mountain is forbidden due to the same backcountry restrictions imposed upon all provincial parks on provincial parcels of Crown land. Then there's Riding Mountain National Park, which is very much in Manitoba, but falls under federal jurisdiction. All 370 kilometres of trails in Riding Mountain are open, along with with 36 backcountry campsites you can reserve right now with a couple of clicks on the Parks Canada reservation page. Similarly, the vast majority of parks, trails, wilderness areas and backcountry campsites in other Canadian provinces and most U.S. states are open regardless of the 2025 wildfire threat, save for those actually experiencing a wildfire, located close to a fire or considered unsafe due to the wobbly, charred tree trunks left behind from a recent blaze. For decades, Manitoba's practice of enacting blanket restrictions on backcountry travel by ordinary people on foot, on bicycles or in canoes or kayaks has stood out as unusual in North America. Civil servants and politicians alike have not been able to elucidate the rationale for the policy, beyond the insistence that these restrictions — which typically do not apply to licensed outfitters and resource-extraction industries — are necessary to prevent more fires from materializing. No provincial administration, regardless of whether the New Democrats or Progressive Conservatives are in power, has been able explain why Parks Canada, other provinces and U.S. states tend to draw circles around actual fires and tell people not to wander into them, while Manitoba attempts to enshroud every prairie crocus, poplar and pine cone in the province within the public-policy equivalent of bubble wrap. Efforts to get officials to explain the restrictions vary, depending on who's doing the talking. "We put them in place because of the potential for human-caused fires," said Kristin Hayward, the assistant deputy minister in charge of Manitoba's wildfire service and conservation officer service, speaking during a wildfire briefing on Monday. "We want to minimize people out on the landscape in places where fires could start." Hayward said the policy is not due to a lack of staff or other resources within Manitoba. But there are noticeable differences between the way this province manages backcountry use compared to other jurisdictions. Right next door in Ontario, backcountry travel in most provincial parks requires people to register, pay nightly fees and, usually, file a travel plan. This practice is in place in a variety of parks, including road-accessible Rushing River, relatively unvisited Woodland Caribou and the heavily-paddled canoe destination of Quetico. Registration allows Ontario's Ministry of Natural Resources to manage visitor numbers, locate paddlers and hikers in the event of an emergency and collect some revenue to support the activities of staff within these parks. Manitoba typically does not manage backcountry travel. Hayward can be correct in stating this is not due to a lack of resources when this sort of management simply has not been a priority in this province. According to Premier Wab Kinew, however, a lack of provincial firefighting resources is what he calls "the actual reason" for the backcountry travel ban. "We can not afford to pull resources into dealing with the local fire situation in different parts of the province, given the severity that we see in the north," Kinew said in a scrum on June 6. The implication here is permit-holding outfitters, logging companies and miners can be trusted not to spark forest fires, while ordinary people carrying backpacks and paddles can not. Mike Moyes, Manitoba minister of the environment and climate change, made this explicitly clear last week. "We want to ensure that the resources are being put to the areas of greatest use in fighting these wildfires," Moyes said in an interview on June 10. "If we're having folks that inadvertently cause a wildfire, that can be really catastrophic in terms of of human safety, but also in terms of pulling resources from other areas." There are times when other jurisdictions have adopted a Manitoba-style blanket backcountry travel ban. Ontario, for example, enacted one for several weeks in 2023, when forests to the north and west of Lake Superior were on fire. This 2025 fire season in Manitoba has been significant. So far, 9,012 square kilometres have burned, which works out to 1.6 per cent of the province's total land mass. In other words, it is unsurprising to see the province impose blanket backcountry restrictions in this year of all years. Such restrictions were imposed during less severe fire seasons in the recent past, including those in 2006, 2011 and 2021. The question for officials is whether Manitoba's policies governing backcountry travel can be changed in a manner that would preclude the need for these restrictions during future wildfire emergencies. Climate changes has made more severe fire seasons inevitable. It is unclear whether Manitoba can adapt.
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
North Dakota tribes ask circuit judges for rehearing of voting rights case
Jamie Azure, chair of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa, speaks during the Tribal Leaders Summit in Bismarck on Sept. 4, 2024. Turtle Mountain, Spirit Lake Nation and three tribal citizens are challenging a ruling in a voting rights case. (Michael Achterling/North Dakota Monitor) The Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa, Spirit Lake Nation and three tribal citizens this week asked the full 8th Circuit Court of Appeals to review a three-judge panel's finding that they lack standing to bring a voting discrimination case against the state of North Dakota. In a 2-1 decision earlier this month, the panel overruled a North Dakota federal district court's decision that a redistricting plan adopted by the state in 2021 diluted the voting power of Native voters. 'Turtle Mountain fought hard for a fair and legal map. When the state draws unlawful districts, Courts must step in to protect voters — not pave the way for injustice,' Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Chairman Jamie Azure said in a statement published by the Campaign Legal Center, one of the organizations representing the plaintiffs in the suit. 'We will continue to fight for fair representation.' Appeals court rules against North Dakota tribes in voting rights case The panel's decision didn't speak to whether the map itself was discriminatory; instead, the judges found that private individuals cannot use a key federal civil rights law as a vehicle to file cases under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which outlaws race-based voting discrimination. The panel in its ruling sent the case back to North Dakota U.S. District Judge Peter Welte with instructions to dismiss the lawsuit. If its ruling stands, North Dakota would revert back to the 2021 map. But if the plaintiffs' request for an en banc rehearing is granted, the case would go before all 11 judges on the 8th Circuit for review. 'Section 2 is the foundational statute that Congress enacted to fight the scourge of racial discrimination in voting, but citizens in this circuit can no longer enforce the right it provides them,' the plaintiffs argue in a brief urging the full appellate court to consider the case. Private individuals and groups previously could file discrimination lawsuits against governments under just Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act without having to invoke Section 1983, a separate civil rights statute. Then, the 8th Circuit in a controversial 2023 ruling on an Arkansas voting rights case found that Section 2 alone doesn't give private parties the right to sue. Instead, the circuit declared that it is the responsibility of the U.S. Attorney General to file Section 2 discrimination cases. Tribes, state argue redistricting case to federal appeals court For more than a year, the question remained open as to whether Section 1983 offered a viable alternative for bringing such Voting Rights Act claims. In a May 14 ruling, the three-judge panel decided it does not. In a majority opinion, the panel wrote that the language of the Voting Rights Act indicates that Congress didn't intend for citizens to file race discrimination claims through Section 1983. The lone dissenting judge on the panel — Chief Judge Steven Colloton — noted in his opinion that private plaintiffs have brought more than 400 actions under Section 2 since 1982. The plaintiffs in their brief point out that the 8th Circuit is the only appellate circuit in the country to rule that Section 2 cannot be enforced through lawsuits brought by private citizens. The circuit includes North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Nebraska and Arkansas. 'Outside of this circuit, every American citizen can rely on an unbroken line of Supreme Court and circuit precedent to enforce the individual rights given to them by Congress in the Voting Rights Act,' their filing states. 'But as a result of the panel decision here, and the prior decision in Arkansas, American citizens in this circuit are denied that right.' The lawsuit was triggered by a redistricting plan adopted by the North Dakota Legislature in 2021 that placed the Turtle Mountain and Spirit Lake reservations in new districts. U.S. District Court Judge Peter Welte in 2023 ruled that the new map was discriminatory and ordered the Legislature to implement a new map that placed the reservations in the same voting district. Three Native American lawmakers from that district were elected in 2024: Sen. Richard Marcellais and Rep. Jayme Davis — both citizens of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa — and Rep. Collette Brown, a citizen of the Spirit Lake Nation and plaintiff in the lawsuit. 'The fair map we secured led to a historic first — a Spirit Lake Nation member elected to the North Dakota Legislature,' Spirit Lake Nation Chairperson Lonna Jackson-Street said in a Wednesday statement published by the Campaign Legal Center, one of the organizations representing the plaintiffs in the case. 'This decision threatens that progress and weakens our voice in state government.' Marcellais had previously served 15 years in the statehouse until he lost his bid for reelection in 2022. He was reelected in 2024. Davis was first elected in 2022, then reelected last year. If the 2021 map is reinstated, three state lawmakers would move to different districts, according to the North Dakota Secretary of State's Office. Rep. Colette Brown, D-Warwick, would go from representing District 9 to District 15. Rep. Donna Henderson, R-Calvin, would switch from District 15 to District 9B, while Sen. Kent Weston, R-Sarles, would switch from District 15 to District 9. They would all have to seek reelection in 2026. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Washington Post
07-05-2025
- Climate
- Washington Post
Wildfires burn thousands of acres on tribal lands in North Dakota
BISMARCK, N.D. — Crews have been fighting at least 16 wildfires throughout North Dakota in the last several days, including several large fires still burning Tuesday across wooded areas and grasslands on the Turtle Mountain Reservation near the Canadian border. Dry and breezy conditions before the spring green-up haven't helped the situation. Much of the state is in some level of drought, including a swath of western North Dakota in severe or extreme drought, according to a recent map by the U.S. Drought Monitor. Numerous agencies including the North Dakota Forest Service and fire departments have responded to the fires. National Guard Black Hawk helicopters have dropped water, saving homes. Officials requested fire engines from as far as Montana and South Dakota. Tribal members with buckets and hoses sprang into action to fight the flames. 'It's inspiring that our people can rise up and help each other out like that,' Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Tribal Chair Jamie Azure said Tuesday. Three distinct fires that have been joining and separating have burned about 6.5 square miles (16.8 square kilometers) in the Turtle Mountain area, according to the state Department of Emergency Services. Most of the fires have been north of Belcourt, in the northern part of the Turtle Mountain Reservation, said Jenna Parisien, recruitment and retention coordinator and spokesperson for the Belcourt Rural Fire Department. 'We have several locations where areas have burned, so places were lit up all at once, and with the unfavorable weather conditions that we have had, areas keep relighting, embers are causing spread to surrounding areas as well,' Parisien said. The fires steadily kicked off on Friday, she said. It wasn't clear how much of the fires were contained. Three firefighters were treated for exhaustion, dehydration and smoke inhalation, but were doing well, Azure said. One vacant mobile home was believed to be lost, but there were no other injuries or homes lost despite fires in people's yards, he said. About 10 families evacuated from their homes, he said. Crews were battling high winds with the fires on Monday, but rain overnight, moderate winds and firefighters' great efforts have improved the situation, Azure said Tuesday. Seventy-five to 100 firefighters responded on Sunday, the busiest day, Parisien said. Local businesses and tribal members have helped, Azure said. Advertisement Causes of the fires are thought to be accidental, potentially sparks escaping from residents' trash-burning barrels, Parisien said. Advertisement But some people have been taken into custody in connection with intentionally starting a fire, she said. She declined to elaborate. The Associated Press emailed the Bureau of Indian Affairs for comment. Nearly all of the 16 fires around the state are 100% contained. A fire in Rolla on Sunday led to evacuations.
Associated Press
06-05-2025
- Climate
- Associated Press
Wildfires burn thousands of acres on tribal lands in North Dakota
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — Crews have been fighting at least 16 wildfires throughout North Dakota in the last several days, including several large fires still burning Tuesday across wooded areas and grasslands on the Turtle Mountain Reservation near the Canadian border. Dry and breezy conditions before the spring green-up haven't helped the situation. Much of the state is in some level of drought, including a swath of western North Dakota in severe or extreme drought, according to a recent map by the U.S. Drought Monitor. Numerous agencies including the North Dakota Forest Service and fire departments have responded to the fires. National Guard Black Hawk helicopters have dropped water, saving homes. Officials requested fire engines from as far as Montana and South Dakota. Tribal members with buckets and hoses sprang into action to fight the flames. 'It's inspiring that our people can rise up and help each other out like that,' Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Tribal Chair Jamie Azure said Tuesday. Three distinct fires that have been joining and separating have burned about 4,200 acres (1,700 hectares) in the Turtle Mountain area, according to the state Department of Emergency Services. Most of the fires have been north of Belcourt, in the northern part of the Turtle Mountain Reservation, said Jenna Parisien, recruitment and retention coordinator and spokesperson for the Belcourt Rural Fire Department. 'We have several locations where areas have burned, so places were lit up all at once, and with the unfavorable weather conditions that we have had, areas keep relighting, embers are causing spread to surrounding areas as well,' Parisien said. The fires steadily kicked off on Friday, she said. It wasn't clear how much of the fires were contained. Three firefighters were treated for exhaustion, dehydration and smoke inhalation, but were doing well, Azure said. One vacant mobile home was believed to be lost, but there were no other injuries or homes lost despite fires in people's yards, he said. About 10 families evacuated from their homes, he said. Crews were battling high winds with the fires on Monday, but rain overnight, moderate winds and firefighters' great efforts have improved the situation, Azure said Tuesday. Seventy-five to 100 firefighters responded on Sunday, the busiest day, Parisien said. Local businesses and tribal members have helped, Azure said. Causes of the fires are thought to be accidental, potentially sparks escaping from residents' trash-burning barrels, Parisien said. But some people have been taken into custody in connection with intentionally starting a fire, she said. She declined to elaborate. The Associated Press emailed the Bureau of Indian Affairs for comment. Nearly all of the 16 fires around the state are 100% contained. A fire in Rolla on Sunday led to evacuations. Fires on the Fort Berthold Reservation burned at least 2,000 acres (810 hectares). An 1,800-acre (728 hectares) fire on the reservation is 40% contained. No structures are believed lost to it, state Department of Emergency Services spokesperson Alison Vetter said.
The Independent
06-05-2025
- Climate
- The Independent
Wildfires burn thousands of acres on tribal lands in North Dakota
Crews have been fighting at least 16 wildfires throughout North Dakota in the last several days, including several large fires still burning Tuesday across wooded areas and grasslands on the Turtle Mountain Reservation near the Canadian border. Dry and breezy conditions before the spring green-up haven't helped the situation. Much of the state is in some level of drought, including a swath of western North Dakota in severe or extreme drought, according to a recent map by the U.S. Drought Monitor. Numerous agencies including the North Dakota Forest Service and fire departments have responded to the fires. National Guard Black Hawk helicopters have dropped water, saving homes. Officials requested fire engines from as far as Montana and South Dakota. Tribal members with buckets and hoses sprang into action to fight the flames. 'It's inspiring that our people can rise up and help each other out like that,' Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Tribal Chair Jamie Azure said Tuesday. Three distinct fires that have been joining and separating have burned about 4,200 acres (1,700 hectares) in the Turtle Mountain area, according to the state Department of Emergency Services. Most of the fires have been north of Belcourt, in the northern part of the Turtle Mountain Reservation, said Jenna Parisien, recruitment and retention coordinator and spokesperson for the Belcourt Rural Fire Department. 'We have several locations where areas have burned, so places were lit up all at once, and with the unfavorable weather conditions that we have had, areas keep relighting, embers are causing spread to surrounding areas as well,' Parisien said. The fires steadily kicked off on Friday, she said. It wasn't clear how much of the fires were contained. Three firefighters were treated for exhaustion, dehydration and smoke inhalation, but were doing well, Azure said. One vacant mobile home was believed to be lost, but there were no other injuries or homes lost despite fires in people's yards, he said. About 10 families evacuated from their homes, he said. Crews were battling high winds with the fires on Monday, but rain overnight, moderate winds and firefighters' great efforts have improved the situation, Azure said Tuesday. Seventy-five to 100 firefighters responded on Sunday, the busiest day, Parisien said. Local businesses and tribal members have helped, Azure said. Causes of the fires are thought to be accidental, potentially sparks escaping from residents' trash-burning barrels, Parisien said. But some people have been taken into custody in connection with intentionally starting a fire, she said. She declined to elaborate. The Associated Press emailed the Bureau of Indian Affairs for comment. Nearly all of the 16 fires around the state are 100% contained. A fire in Rolla on Sunday led to evacuations. Fires on the Fort Berthold Reservation burned at least 2,000 acres (810 hectares). An 1,800-acre (728 hectares) fire on the reservation is 40% contained. No structures are believed lost to it, state Department of Emergency Services spokesperson Alison Vetter said.
