The Ute Indian Tribe of the Uintah and Ouray Reservation is suing Colorado for discrimination in federal court, alleging that a recently passed law denies the Tribe equal access to its ancestral lands.
That law, Colorado Revised Statute § 33-12-103.8, provides free access to Colorado’s state parks for the Southern Ute Indian Tribe and the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, but does not include the Ute Indian Tribe of the Uintah and Ouray Reservation.
Colorado officials “acknowledge that the Southern Ute Indian Tribe and the Ute Mountain Ute Tribes’ members have rights in — and granted access to — these sacred sites, but wrongly discriminate against the Ute Indian Tribe — which has these exact same rights in the sacred sites,” the lawsuit filed Dec. 19 in U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado states.
By excluding the Ute Indian Tribe, Colorado’s law violates the Brunot Agreement of 1874, a federal agreement that says all Ute tribes have the right to hunt, fisher and gather on lands that now include many Colorado state parks; the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause, which says federal law supercedes state law; the 14th Amendment and the American Indian Religious Freedom Act, according to the lawsuit.
“Colorado’s parks bill is a broken promise codified into law,” Ute Tribal Chairman Shaun Chapoose said in a statement. “It is shameful. It acknowledges the profound ties to our homelands while demanding our exiled Tribe pay an entrance fee to visit our own sacred grounds from which they drove us.”
“We will not stand idly by and pay for the same privilege to access our places to pray, to hunt, to fish,” Chapoose’s statement continued. “We will not be erased by Colorado from these lands.”
Beyond violating federal treaties and laws, Colorado’s statute also infringes on the Ute Indian Tribe’s religious freedoms by making it harder to access sacred sites within the state parks, the Tribe’s attorneys allege in the lawsuit.
Colorado officials’ “enactment and enforcement of the Statute unlawfully ignores the Ute Indian Tribe and its history,” the lawsuit states. “It also ignores the reality that most lands covered by the Statute fall within the historic aboriginal lands of the Ute Indian Tribe’s bands, descendants of which Defendants are unlawfully discriminating against.”
Tribe officials requested to be included in the bill’s drafting as it made its way through the legislative process, but were ignored, the lawsuit alleges.
They wrote a letter to Colorado lawmakers in March, warning elected officials that the drafted bill “perpetuates the erasure of the Ute Indian Tribe and its history within the State of Colorado.” The letter also proposed amendments that would have included the Ute Indian Tribe in the legislation.
The letter was addressed to state Rep. Katie Stewart, who represents Archuleta, La Plata, Montezuma and San Juan counties in District 59; state Rep. Rick Taggart, who represents Mesa County in District 55; state Sen. Dylan Roberts, who represents District 8 in northern Colorado; and state Sen. Cleve Simpson, who represents District 6 in southern Colorado. Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, Department of Natural Resources Director Dan Gibbs and Colorado Parks and Wildlife Director Jeffrey Davis were all cc’d on the email, according to a court copy of the letter.
Polis and Gibbs are both named in the lawsuit, under fire in their capacities as state officials. Davis stepped down in November and his acting replacement, Laura Clellan, was named in the lawsuit in his stead.
“The bill passed without acknowledging, much less addressing, the discriminatory impact it has on the Ute Indian Tribe, perpetuating a violent history seeking to erase its people and its culture,” the lawsuit alleges.
The lawsuit seeks a judicial declaration that the Colorado law must be revised to include the Ute Indian Tribe.
The Governor’s Office, Colorado Department of Natural Resources and Colorado Parks and Wildlife did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Wednesday.
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