Workshops eye Bennett Freeze
recovery plan

By Kathy Helms
Diné Bureau

WINDOW ROCK — Navajo Nation Design and Engineering Service and planning consultants from WHPacific Inc. are conducting workshops in nine chapters designed to create a regional “Recovery Plan” for chapters affected by the former Bennett Freeze.

The first workshops got under way Tuesday at Tonalea and Tolani Lake chapter houses and are scheduled to continue today. Another workshop is set for today and Thursday at Bodaway/Gap Chapter House; Thursday and Friday at Leupp Community Center and Cameron Chapter House; and Friday and Saturday at Coalmine Canyon Chapter House.

Hours are 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day. The public is encouraged to stop by 5-6 p.m., each evening to review progress and give input.

“We are excited to partner with the Navajo Nation in finding solutions with people and communities to begin the healing process and develop the former Bennett Freeze area,” said John Rupley, project manager for WHPacific.

In 2007, a federal court approved an Intergovernmental Compact between Navajo and Hopi leaders, lifting the Bennett Freeze on development and ensuring access to sacred sites for both tribes.

During the 40-year freeze, many residents moved to areas outside the freeze area for work or housing. The recovery project is intended to identify unmet needs for current, past, and future residents, and to plan for regional development.
Ultimately, the regional recovery plan will include a list of priority projects for funding, some of which will be requested as a special appropriation by Congress.

During recent testimony before the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs regarding legislation to repeal the law that instituted the freeze, Navajo-Hopi Land Commission Chairman Raymond Maxx told the committee that his family was relocated twice by the federal government and now lives in the former Bennett Freeze area.

“I have first-hand knowledge of what conditions are like,” he said. “When we relocated to the Bennett Freeze area in the late 1970s, I don’t think my parents fully understood that you could not fix your home in the Bennett Freeze; that you could not make additions; that no federal, tribal or state programs could assist your community through the building of infrastructure essential to the health and well-being of any community.”

As a result, families in the Bennett Freeze area were locked into the poverty of 1966, when the freeze was imposed. Maxx said that as long as the authority for the freeze remains in the U.S. Code, there also remains a fear that it could be reimposed.

He encouraged the committee to hold a field hearing on how the Bennett Freeze area can be redeveloped and what level of federal support should be provided.

In the meantime, current and past residents, family members, agency officials and special interest groups are invited to attend the ongoing workshops and provide input about what projects are needed.

The first set of workshops will continue June 6-7 at Coppermine Chapter House and June 10-11 at Kaibeto Chapter House.

A second set of workshops will take place in July and will be conducted for one full day each, with an open house from 5 to 6 p.m. The schedule is: Coppermine and Coalmine Canyon, July 8; Kaibeto and Leupp, July 9; Tolani Lake, Bodaway/Gap, July 10; Tuba City and Tonalea, July 11; and Cameron, July 12.

The Leupp meeting is scheduled at the community center; all others are at the chapter houses.

A regional kickoff summit meeting for all nine affected chapters is set for 10:30 a.m. June 4 at Tuba City Boys and Girls Club, formerly the community center. Further meetings will be held Aug. 6 in Tuba City to finalize the regional recovery plan.