Valley residents join effort to stop Dakota pipeline threatening native American land

YOUNGSTOWN

Local native Americans and supporters joined others across the country in a national day of action calling for rejection of the Dakota Access Pipeline and asking President Barack Obama to permanently stop the project.

The supporters carried signs with messages including “We stand with Standing Rock” and “In solidarity with Native Tribes.” Ronda Smith of Youngstown, among them, said: “I’m here to do whatever I can to straighten the government out, whether it is the pipeline or fracking.”

The proposed Dakota Access Pipeline would carry fracked oil from North Dakota through Iowa and Indiana to Illinois, cutting under the Missouri River less than a mile upstream from the Standing Rock Sioux’s drinking water supply, as well as disrupting the tribe’s sacred and historical land pipeline, opponents say.

Protesters say the pipeline not only would endanger the Standing Rock Sioux’s drinking water but also that of several million other people downstream.

An encampment of several thousand protesters has emerged in North Dakota at the confluence of the Cannonball and Missouri rivers near the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota. They’ve gathered to try to stop the oil pipeline being built by Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners, according to reports.

The Youngstown rally, from 4 to 6 p.m. Tuesday in Central Square, drew about 30 people, several with native American roots.

Read more about the situation in Wednesday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.