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Environmental News
Dan Gunderson

Project seeks to compensate tribal nations for national park lands

A herd of bison
Bison awaiting transfer to Native American tribes walk in a herd inside a corral at Badlands National Park near Wall, S.D.
Matthew Brown | AP 2022

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The Lakota People’s Law Project is soliciting donations from national park visitors to compensate tribal nations who previously lived on those lands.

A new project is seeking donations from people who visit national parks to compensate tribal nations who were displaced from the land now set aside for parks and monuments.

The South Dakota based Lakota People’s Law Project established the Sacred Defense National Parks and Monuments Initiative to solicit donations and educate people about the importance of the sites.

“Indigenous nations have had this ancient, ancient relationship with all of these places which are now national parks,” said Lakota People’s Law Project director Chase Iron Eyes. “Those were our sacred sites untold millennia before America, as a concept, was created.”

The goal is to raise money for tribal nations, but also to encourage people to learn about the importance of the land.

“Indigenous nations are a vehicle to defend and protect the rights of every single American to have a sacred relationship with the land that composes this country and the waters, and that is what we want to promote,” said Iron Eyes.

Education is a key component of the project and Iron Eyes said understanding the past can help tribal nations to heal from generations of displacement and distrust.

“I believe there are deep wounds, not only between what are called white people and Indian people, but there are deep wounds within the American psyche,” he said. “We want the American psyche to be able to attach itself in a very real and spiritual way to the lands and waters which nourish them and sustain them.”

a man smiles at a camera
Chase Iron Eyes is an attorney for the Lakota People's Law Project, and grew up on the Standing Rock reservation in North Dakota.
Lakota People's Law Project

The initiative just started with a focus on 14 national parks and monuments and about 90 tribal nations who have connections to those sites.

The non-profit also hopes to develop partnerships with the National Park Service, outdoor brands or other nonprofits as the project expands to cover all national parks and monuments.

Iron Eyes said all donations will go to the tribes who are part of the project.

More than 325 million people visited national parks and monuments in 2023 according to the National Park Service.