Member Education Sessions: Healing the Land

Valerie Nuvayestewa is Hopi/Tewa from the Tewa Corn Clan, Tewa Village, First Mesa, Arizona. Valerie is the Project Coordinator for Tutskwat Oqawtoynani (helping the Earth to gather its strength), a fiscally sponsored, Hopi and Tewa-led environmental, grassroots organization. Her community and family join in this meaningful work as they come together to cultivate awareness of land stewardship within their villages.  An avid environmentalist, writer, forager, mother, grandmother, and student in life, she finds that her most important and fulfilling work comes from spending time in the fields and garden with her family.

Margo comes from the traditional Yurok village of Morek, and is an enrolled member of the Yurok Tribe. She is the co-founder and Executive Director of the Cultural Fire Management Council, co-lead of the Indigenous People's Burn Network, and board member of the Indigenous Stewardship Network. She graduated from Humboldt State University in 1987 and resides on the Yurok reservation in far northern California.

Julia Bernal (they/she) is an enrolled Tribal member of Sandia Pueblo and has lineage to the Yuchi peoples in Oklahoma. They are the Executive Director of the Pueblo Action Alliance. They are pursuing dual master’s degrees in Water Resources and Community and Regional Planning. She advocates for Water Back, Land Back, the rematriation of all stolen water resources and ancestral lands, and the decommodification of all that is sacred. She has served on the Natural Resources Committee for the All Pueblo Council of Governors, and is the board chair of the Native Lands Institute and board member of the Middle Rio Grande Water Advocates.

As a former Tribal leader, Joel has served as Vice Chairman of the Nez Perce Tribe Executive Committee. In 2013, he was also elected to lead the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission (CRITFC) as its chairman. Most recently, Joel was the Natural Resources Policy Coordinator for the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians (ATNI).  Joel currently lives in Suquamish, WA with his children.