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Bad River tribal chairman Robert Blanchard was the first to take the stand and chairman thanks very much for being here. Thank you for having me. So what did you most want the judge to know about the impacts of line five and it's reroute around the bad river reservation but through nearby wetlands and waterlands what did you most want the judge to know about those impacts.
Well you know this is going to impact quite a bit of our seated territories that the reroute is going within the seared seated territories of the ban and impact is going to be over a hundred acres of wetlands which you know will get disturbed.
There's some acres that will not be usable again or will be present and you know there's a lot of impacts there some of it will be through horizontal direct drilling blasting which is going to you know a lot of it's going to impact our water resources.
I know the tribe wanted the pipeline removed from your land. Why isn't rerouting it around the reservation proper enough?
Well all I will do is shift the risk upstream exposing more of the environment to be put at risk than what is now.
You know like I said before we have seated territories where we do a lot of hunting and fishing and gathering of medicines and other other stuff.
So I mean that's just going to it's just moving the problem upstream you know we don't stream from that and there's somewhere to happen you know it's really impact us as people in our way of life.
Enbridge and the DNR say that the permitting process was extensive and thorough. Why are you and others worried?
Well you know I wish I could really you know answer that in detail but I think part of the problem was the way it was presented to the people like it was I don't know I think I think it didn't give the people a chance.
To really get into the nuts and bolts of it and be able to ask the questions that needed to be asked and it just wasn't right. I felt it wasn't right.
I'm circling back to something you spoke to a moment ago during your testimony you spoke about the wild rice harvest.
Why is that and hunting and fishing rights you hold so key to your community?
Well we've been harvesting wild rice in the cacao and sloughs for over 100 years you know my grandparents harvested down there and they made rice camps down there and you know so that's deer and deer to my heart and a lot of other people also
it identifies us as people you know that we were brought here for a reason and one of those reasons is to go where the food grows on the water and that was the wild rice.
And that is quite dear to us and as far as other things hunting, fishing and gathering you know there's a lot of people today that use that resource to provide and put food on the table for their families.
So it's very important to us.
And what is the connection chairman between the land and water to those rights?
Say could you repeat that again?
What is the connection? Why are the waters and the land so important to the protection of those rights?
Well we also feel that you know everything out there is sacred.
You know we use that those resources and when we go on harvest and we go hunting our fishing we take only what we need to do for our families.
So and we also believe that everything out there has a spirit.
Every living thing out there has a spirit you know and that's what we're protecting is the spirit of that medicine the spirit of that wild rice and the spirit of those waters and lands to be able for our future generations to be able to enjoy that.
For its part Enbridge states that they have learned what they do today impacts the next seven generations and that it has a responsibility to care for the land.
What's your response to that statement from the CEO of Enbridge?
Well I don't think Enbridge really understands you know they look at it a lot different than we do you know.
They're there for different reasons and we're there to protect the land truly protect the land and the resources.
Your bad river band is fighting hard over this.
What will you do if the Line 5 project is allowed to proceed in this way?
Well that's a that's the big question.
I'm not sure what we'll do you know we will keep fighting but I don't know what the next step would be should they be allowed to put the reroute in place.
You know that that's a question that we are we are still trying to come up with some some answers and and some.
Probably some some way what what what are we going to do?
We will be watching Chairman Robert Blanchard. Thanks very much.
Thank you very much for having me.
Sure.
That was great.
We really appreciate your time on this.
Yes I appreciate you for having me.
Not that I can think of right now but like I said we're just going to keep moving forward and keep fighting.
Thank you very very much.
We really appreciate your time.
Thank you.
Bye.