Forty-eight years ago come October, John Carlos and Tommie Smith stood at the 1968 Olympics, accepted their gold and bronze metals and when the Star Spangled Banner began, they bowed their heads with humble hearts each lifted one fisted arm. Not for Black Power, but as a statement of hope that all people could unite as a people.

That fall while a student at Black Hills State College in South Dakota, an officer in the Lakota Ominiciye Club on campus, I was an outsider. Those years were full of protests around the country, against racism and against the war in Vietnam and the American Indian Movement was getting set to be a real movement.

At a campus basketball game one of our club members, Marty Waukazoo who the previous year had been named the first American Indian in South Dakota to be selected All American had not been  put into the game. We believed he could have added points our team needed, I stood up, fist in the air and the other tribal classmates stood with me. I had long since forgotten that moment, only to be reminded by Faith Spotted Eagle, one of those classmates when seeing her years later at the Rosebud Reservation.

The reservations in South Dakota are much like they were when I attended college in the state. Isolated with plenty of poverty but perhaps because they are isolated culture and beliefs in old ways are alive. My son and I went up to the Moccasins on the Ground Training organized by Faith Spotted Eagle. We knew when pipelines neared the reservations in South Dakota there would definitely be moccasins on the ground in a big way.

The Dakota Access Pipeline received their permit from the Army Corps of Engineers to take oil from North Dakota to Illinois. The tribe and allies have led rallies in Bismarck, North Dakota at the capitol and have a growing prayer camp along the banks of the Missouri River where construction of the pipeline threatens their water and sacred cultural sites.

Weeks ago 30 tribal youth ran a 2,000 mile relay against the pipeline to deliver nearly 200,000 petitions to the Army Corps of Engineers. Think about that.

A month ago the Standing Rock Sioux took the Army Corps of Engineers to court using Nation Wide Permit 12 and the Clean Water Act, the National Historic Preservation Act and importantly using the Treaty of Fort Laramie signed in 1851.

The United States District Court for the District of Columbia will make a decision September 9.
In the meantime, the Standing Rock Sioux are gathering peaceful activists ready to stand with them, moccasins on the ground, ready to be arrested, ready to protect the water. Thousands are there and more will come. It is the first time since Crazy Horse's time that all of the Sioux nations have been together taking a stand. Bus loads, vans and horses are coming.  Ninety tribes with many from Oklahoma.

Those who are not there are making announcements of support, like the Cherokee Nation. Tribes in Oklahoma? Our tangled history with oil made it impossible for them to stand against the Keystone XL in mass in this state*. But standing anytime gives me hope, a great hope for the future and how we make the change from fossil fuels to clean energy that is sustainable and safe for the environment.

This will come. The end of these pipelines is coming and one of them may end on that lonely place in the Dakotas as people who stand for water will not be standing alone. Pipelines leak, it is just a matter of time. And as we all know even one drop of oil in water is hazardous.

Just a few days ago, with pride two images from the Standing Rock Reservation: arms in the air young and old standing against the Dakota Access Pipeline. The other image 3 young children, the sun setting a teepee nearby, each with an arm in the air.

None of the tribal people doing direct actions at the Standing Rock Reservation or anywhere in the protest site are armed with anything more than hope for the protection of the water, their ability to stand and their arm to uplift together as a sign of hope.

David Archambault II, chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe quoted Chief Sitting Bull of the Hunkpapa Lakota, “Let us put our minds together and see what life we can make for our children.”
 
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*The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit based in Denver, Colorado - decided not to grant the Sierra Club and Clean Energy Future Oklahoma a temporary injunction on the construction of the southern half of Transcanada's Keystone XL tar sands export pipeline.
 

Baton Rouge (Red Stick in French) is the capitol of Louisiana and her capitol building is an art deco beauty. My son and I went last year and walked to their capitol building and from the observation deck we could see the area is flat as far as you can see, the Mississippi River with barges, but all along the river evidence of the oil industry. Two feet of rain fell this week in 2 days with 10 parishes (what they call counties) flooded. Over 40,000 homes flooded even the governor's mansion with he and his family evacuated. While thinking back to that panoramic view, it is hard to imagine over 6 trillion gallons of rain fell in a week in this 1,000 year rain event.

This will be quite a lot of work for the Southern Baptist Disaster Recovery Team. They have already arrived and if you lived through the Miami disasters, their arrival can make a real difference, hot food, showers, washing machines and teams of people who can gut a house of its waterlogged sheet rock in a matter of minutes.
There is a deep hurt flood victims feel, profound loss, as many who have experienced the flooding in the Miami area can attest.

EPA held an open house in Ottawa County and as they say, "all the usual suspects" attended. Juli Matthews enticed her environmental science students to attend. Days later I got Bob Sullivan's hugs from Emma and Elaine when they heard the decision their yard issues would be completed.

DEQ's team and the State and County Health Department teams came lined up ready to meet the public and let them know they are going to do their parts to make our environment better and protect our children from lead poisoning.
LEAD did have a bake sale for DEQ and delivered our earnings, well over three dollars, which by consensus, they donated back to our youngest volunteer Hayden Daugherty, who at eight had pretty much run the sale. We'll do better during the 18th National Environmental Tar Creek Conference which will be held at the Miami Civic Center September 13 & 14 with your help and the brownies you bring for the sale.

I visited a 2 year old child this week who is one of the children all these agencies are lined up to protect. Her blood lead level has been rising and now is at 10 ug/dL. She told me all about having her venous blood test done in baby language, but the motions she used showing me her concern on her face as she indicated her arm and where the blood test was taken, taken again and yet again.

A grandmother asked me, why do they have to take so much blood? Why a finger stick AND a venous draw? The finger stick shows either positive or negative for lead. The venous is done to figure out how high the lead level is in the child's blood.

In recent decades blood lead levels across the U.S. have declined drastically. At the same time, evidence that relatively small amounts of lead in the blood can cause significant damage has mounted.

Researchers now know, blood lead levels in children as low as five micrograms per deciliter — the Centers for Disease Control's "level of concern" — can lead to IQ deficits and increases in behavior problems like ADHD and conduct disorder.  In adults, low-level exposure of 10 micrograms per deciliter can cause high blood pressure and kidney problems.

When your child is checked for lead now at the health department, in only a few minutes, the nurse will be able to give results and if positive, a venous blood draw right then while you are already there which will determine the child's lead level!

Then the detective work begins. Where is that lead and how is it getting into your child? Lead poisoning is preventable. And to prevent it, you have to find out if your child is being poisoned. Proceed undaunted. It can be found and removed from your child's world.

It might be outside your home, perhaps in your yard, or your very driveway. DEQ will be able to step in and dig contaminated soil from your yard, replace it with clean soil or dig out a chat drive way and replace it with limestone gravel. Free. The best number to call is the DEQ Hotline 1-800-522-0206.

Southern Baptist Disaster Relief has gained national and international recognition for their work in crisis situations across the country. They stand ready at a moment’s notice to help the hurting and bring hope during a catastrophe. These volunteers respond to disasters. They are people who put words into action. And our health and environmental teams are here for us in this man-made disaster.

As one of the latest flood victims said, "If they give us help, fine. Not a handout. Just a hand."

We are asking parents to allow your children and your yards to get tested. Our yards are dry, our homes are dry, the hope for your child is alive with you.

Respectfully Submitted ~
Your Tar Creekkeeper,
Rebecca Jim

As school starts, there is an excitement with new crayons and blunt pencils that must be brought to a sharp point. We used to stand in line waiting our turn to sharpen the point, taking it out over and over to check the sharpness, until perfection. Perfection got me my only tattoo.

There weren't many children in the neighborhood where I grew up. So I was glad when Nora O'Bannon moved in across the street. She was older but in my grade because she had had polio and it delayed her school. One day while in second grade Nora turned around after sharpening her pencil, probably to show me she had succeeded, only to poke me with her pencil point braking off  below my eye and near my nose. My mother didn't have the heart to dig the lead out of me, and I probably wouldn't have let her. So we went to a dermatologist located in Big Spring, Texas and he got it out, but it left the mark since there wasn't an eraser made to erase lead marks in open wounds.

Last week the Waterkeeper Alliance sent Bruno Navasky to spend a few days in Oklahoma, see firsthand the issues in the Tar Creek Superfund site and to write a story about one of their newest "keepers." LEAD Agency has had Earl Hatley serving as our Grand Riverkeeper for thirteen years, and I am now officially your Tar Creekkeeper. Bruno came in from New York City after having his interview with Robert Kennedy, Jr. accepted for the September issues of Vanity Fair. He is a poet, a writer and a teacher, with years of experience, and it felt as if another world had lit gently into ours, whirling and absorbing, intent to sense this place, our ways and thoughts. Martin Lively, Jill Micka and Damon Montgomery were gracious enough to be part of the chorus heard.

Bruno had reported, "Members of the Waterkeeper Alliance patrol local waterways and prosecute polluters. Essentially, they act as the community’s coast guard, according to Robert Kennedy Jr. and they serve the role of an independent ombudsman that forces government to do its job, that forces polluters to stop polluting."

I had already learned after attending a couple of their conferences Waterkeepers are fearless, scattered around the country and now around the world,  Men and women speaking out for their watersheds, coasts, rivers, even aquifers. And one of the traditions has been the annual tattoo challenge.

Tattoos are very popular.  Most tattoos are voluntary with no one forcing you to get one. Most of the 120 million tattooed people worldwide have inked themselves for fashion. The trend is up for young adults, especially women, who now have more inked body art than men in Italy, Denmark and the U.S.

Some of the inks on the market weren’t intended for tattooing. The main risks identified are polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, primary aromatic amines, microorganisms, heavy metals, and preservatives.”

Europe is paying attention to tattoo risk, not just of infections but also the chemical risks. Inks from the U.S. were responsible for two-thirds of the tattoo-related alerts sent to European authorities. The rest came from China, Japan, and some European countries with some unknown sources.

During the annual Waterkeeper conferences, Robert Kennedy Jr., the founder of the organization foots the bill for any new Waterkeeper tattoos. As the newest keeper, I have a full year to consider that first tattoo or if I will skip it, and after reading the latest on the inks that are used, the plan is to skip it. 

We received what is called a RED ALERT the other night with the news of a prison escapee. Descriptions of him and his tattoos and even a photo were released. The next day I encountered a man on the lonely dirt road leading to my property. He was walking in the heat with a walking stick, a torn shirt and a great thirst due to the extreme heat. My water jug was empty and I couldn't help him. I just knew to treat him with respect and silently hope the best. It's funny, I never noticed tattoos.

He was the prison escapee who was later apprehended nearby.  You might not have known but lead has been linked to criminal behavior, hear more about this at the Tar Creek Conference from Dan Clark graduate of Western Illinois University when he speaks about the relationship between criminal behavior and exposure to lead. This is yet another reason to reduce lead exposures for children. Get your child screened for lead and if positive use all means to remove any and all sources. Lead can have long term effects on that child and our society at large. 

Don't blame the tattoo.

This summer it seemed as if all the neighborhood ants had decided to move into the LEAD Agency office and were not planning to leave. Why they came, we couldn't figure out, but having them gone became a goal. If the borax recipe had not worked and quickly, I had arsenic on my mind, surely that would work.

I bought a box of 20 Mule Team Borax and last Friday afternoon, used
a simple recipe of sugar, borax and water and cut it make only enough to fill two Mexican Coke bottle caps, the kind you have to pry off with an opener. An hour later the caps were full of ants and I began to wonder if I hadn't enticed even more to come before leaving for the weekend. Monday morning the trails of ants were gone, no lingering ants near the sink. The siege had ended as quickly as it had begun and   I can use the rest of the borax as the box recommends.
 
Every siege should end as quickly.
 
I am not sure how many milligrams of borax it took to take care of my ant problem but One milligram of dust --that’s all the lead it takes to poison a child—the equivalent of three granules of sugar.
 
There are still a half a million children between the ages of one and five being poisoned each year in the U.S and probably more since not all children are being screened through the voluntary programs run in the country. Some of those children are ours, perhaps your very own child or grandchild.
 
In most cities and communities around the country the "culprit" causing most children's lead poisoning is the old deteriorating lead paint in their own home or apartment. They are sleeping with the enemy.
I got to go on a Lead Based Paint inspection with the Miami Tribe's Environmental staff this week and it got me thinking and looking up and down the streets in Miami, Commerce, Vinita of all the older homes in our neighborhoods that could have lead base paint, some obviously did. That paint is old,  since it  was banned from being sold in the U.S. in 1978. Almost 4 decades ago.  We replace refrigerators, buy new cars and most marriages haven't lasted that long.  But the very house surrounding our families and neighbors are still wrapped in a known toxic substance. And in Ottawa County, even the yard outside could be covered with chat containing lead and other metals, including my old standby, arsenic.
 
Arsenic, lead and manganese we don't want them in our houses or yards. We especially don't want these heavy metals in our children. I have been delivering notices about the upcoming Tar Creek Conference which will be held September 13 and 14 this year at the Miami Civic Center and one of the women I handed a stack to was a MATCH mom, with 2 of her children participating in the study the Harvard School of Public Health conducted here.
 
That very day an article was published in the Environmental Health Perspectives about the arsenic in children living near a superfund site, Our children, our superfund site. The study's conclusion prenatal arsenic can adversely affect birth outcomes is of considerable public health importance. I say It should be especially important to those who are exposed and to the EPA, the agency tasked with the cleanup of this site. 

In  a 2009 study from the Economic Policy Institute found taxpayers actually receive a $17-$221 return on investment for every dollar invested in controlling lead hazards. The reason is simple: Keeping children safe from lead hazards can prevent future health issues, reduce criminal activity, limit the number of kids who end up in special education programs, and improve individual IQs and lifetime earnings—all of which reduce stress on the economy. “There is no other public health program in the country that has that kind of dollar return,” said Ruth Ann Norton, the president and CEO of the Green & Healthy Homes Initiative.
 
It costs money to cleanup a Superfund site and our kids are worth it. Let's make this happen, let's demand it be done and while we are at it let's push for assistance for homeowners and even landlords to get the housing units free of lead paint.
 
With a lead based paint housing issue in Baltimore, Maryland their Health Commissioner Leana Wen.
"The poisoning of our children is a health issue, but it’s also a civil justice issue and an economic development issue."
 
Our issues at the Tar Creek Superfund site are our siege and we have to pay attention to make sure it is done right. EPA's meeting is August 16 at the Civic Center. See you then and at our Tar Creek Conference in September.
 
Respectfully Submitted ~
Rebecca Jim