Terry Williams (Tulalip) has served Since 1982 as a Fisheries and Natural Resources Commissioner for the Tulalip Tribes. In this role, he directs pre-season fisheries negotiations, governmental planning and cooperative habitat management. Since 1985, Williams has served on the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission. He has also represented the Tulalip Tribes on the Pacific Fisheries Management Council since 1985 and served on the Pacific Salmon Commission since 1997. Appointed by Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator Carol Browner, Williams served as the director of the EPA American Indian Environmental Office in Washington, D.C. from 1995 to 1996. This office addressed specific environmental issues of Indian tribes nationwide. From 2003 to 2004, Williams served as Chair of the Tribal Committee of the National Environmental Justice Advisory Committee. This year, he was a participant in the EPA Tribal Trust Program that addressed cultural sustainability via restoration and protection of endangered species.

Billy Frank, Jr. (Nisqually) has been Chairman of the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission (NWIFC) for 22 years. In this capacity, he “speaks for the salmon” on behalf of 19 Treaty Indian Tribes in western Washington. Under his leadership, the tribal role over the past 30 years has evolved from that of activists, fighting the state to secure fishing rights reserved in treaties with the United States government, to managers of the resource. NWIFC was formed in 1975, to support tribal fisheries management activities and to enable the tribes to speak with a united voice. In addition to helping the tribes develop cooperative fisheries plans, the NWIFC board of commissioners and the commission staff help coordinate such programs as enhancement and habitat management. This example of state/tribal cooperation has had its challenges, but it has been fundamentally successful and has inspired similar efforts in other parts of the U.S. and the world. With Frank’s leadership, the NWIFC and the tribes it serves are working to protect and restore the salmon resource for Indians and non-Indians alike.

Dr. Zoltan Grossman is a member of the faculty in Geography and Native American & World Indigenous Peoples Studies at The Evergreen State College, in Olympia, Washington. He edited the 2006 NIARI report “Climate Change and Pacific Rim Indigenous Nations.” He was a co-founder of the Midwest Treaty Network, which coordinated the Witness for Nonviolence program monitoring the Wisconsin Ojibwe spearfishing conflict, and which later brought together Native Americans with their former adversaries in sportfishing groups, to protect the fish from mining projects. Zoltan earned a Ph.D. in Geography with a minor in American Indian Studies in 2002 at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His doctoral dissertation studied Unlikely Alliances: Treaty Conflicts and Environmental Cooperation between Native American and Rural White Communities Zoltan taught human geography at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire in 2002-05. Website: http://academic.evergreen.edu/g/grossmaz

Working Groups Documents - Climate Change

Possible Climate Change Responses for a United League of Indigenous Nations

Zoltan Grossman Senior Research Associate Northwest Indian Applied Research Institute