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BCWMC Adopts Water & Land Acknowledgement Statement

At their meeting in May 2024, the BCWMC Board of Commissioners adopted a water and land acknowledgement statement. The statement represents one step toward honoring, remembering, and acknowledging that the lands and waters throughout the watershed were cared for by Indigenous people for generations and, in turn, the land and water nurtured them as relatives. Acknowledging the complex past and present traumas and triumphs is a step toward healing for the land, waters, and peoples who live in the watershed today.

BCWMC Water and Land Acknowledgement Statement

We acknowledge that the waterways of the Ȟaȟá Wakpádaŋ, located in Mnisota Makoċe, the homeland of the Dakota peoples, are living waters which are part of a larger living ecosystem.

Historically, the Ȟaȟá Wakpádaŋ provided material, nutritional, and spiritual sustenance to the Dakota peoples. We acknowledge the forced removal of the Dakota from the lands and waterways that nurtured them as relatives. And, we recognize the environmental degradation that continues in the watershed today.

The living waters of Ȟaȟá Wakpádaŋ remain significant to the Dakota and other Native peoples, including many who presently live in the watershed. The Bassett Creek Watershed Management Commission seeks to identify and integrate Native wisdom by collaborating with Indigenous peoples and communities to reduce the impacts of climate change and improve the ecosystem health for all living beings in the watershed.

Acknowledging the complex past and present traumas and triumphs is a step toward healing for the land, watershed, and peoples who live in the watershed today.

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