Photo: From indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com

Charmaine White Face of Rapid City has been commended as a Giraffe Hero, an award given to people around the world who stick their necks out for the common good.

White Face was honored for her lifelong actions on behalf of her fellow Oglala-Sioux. She has fought against corruption that has left too many Oglala-Sioux in extreme poverty.

In recent years, she has sounded the alarm on the dangers of ambient radiation from abandoned uranium mines in the area.

Her efforts have been opposed by many who benefit from the corruption she’s worked to stop; White Face has been repeatedly threatened and the brakes on her car have been cut.

Information about the international non-profit Giraffe Heroes Program is available here and from Press Director Bonnie Stinson (stinson@giraffe.org).

The mission of the Giraffe Heroes Project is to move people to stick their necks out for the common good and to give them tools to succeed. The Project’s tagline is EnCouraging Today’s Heroes & Training Tomorrow’s.

The award information follows:

“Charmaine White Face lives in Rapid City, South Dakota, near Mt. Rushmore. Also “living” near Mt. Rushmore are 169 abandoned uranium mines—AUMs—and open extraction pits. White Face, a scientist and journalist, is sure that the radioactive pollution from these sites is dangerous, and she’s been doing everything she can to remedy the situation.

White Face is the official spokesperson of the Sioux Nation Treaty Council, but not everyone in the US power structure listens to Native Americans with a receptive mind.

White Face is used to being threatened for speaking out. She formed Defenders of the Black Hills, an organization committed to educating the Lakota people about their treaty rights; that did not automatically win her friends. As the elected Treasurer of the Oglala Sioux Tribal Council, she fought to maintain those treaty rights, but other council members—not wanting to disturb the status quo— didn’t see it her way. For years, she was harassed; someone even cut her car brakes. She was also suspended from the Council so that they could sign an illegal agreement with a Nebraska bank; the agreement indebted the tribe for 12 years and compromised its sovereignty. White Face’s son was imprisoned twice for the same “crime,” once before and once after an appellate court exonerated him.

Much of this acrimony stems from White Face’s resistance to the Indian Reorganization Act of 1935, the upshot of which was massive funds going to council members and a dearth of services for the larger community. She describes the community conditions and her fight against the council in her book, Testimony for the Innocent.

What is currently foremost on White Face’s mind is air and water pollution from uranium and thorium (another radioactive metal): “Native American nations of North America,” she says, “are the miners’ canaries for the United States, trying to awaken the people of the world to the dangers of radioactive pollution.” The AUMs, three quarters of which are located on federal and Tribal lands, could affect the health of more than 50 million people who live near these sites.

White Face has met with officials from across the country, and some of them are beginning to listen. The key questions are whether those people can do anything about the situation, and whether they can do anything about the situation in time.

No matter what happens, White Face, now 69 years old, says she’ll keep speaking out: “This is an invisible national crisis. Millions of people in the United States are being exposed as nuclear radiation victims on a daily basis. Exposure to radioactive pollution has been linked to cancer, genetic defects, ‘Navajo Neuropathy,’ and increases in mortality. We . . . believe that as more Americans become aware of this homegrown radioactive pollution, then something can be done to protect all peoples and the environment.”