What We Are Doing

Tulalip Tribes is conducting several research projects that will enable us to better understand what we face in a future with climate change. We are working with partners along our coast, in our forest and across our Treaty lands. These projects include a review and measurement of past aerial imagery and digital measurements of our coast so that we know the rates of past erosion. Then we can compare those rates to numbers being modeled by another one of our research partners, the United States Geologic Survey, who is modeling sea level rise and storms to estimate future rates of erosion and threats to coastal development.

We are working with the University of Washington to review how the forests throughout our Treaty lands will change with wetter winters and dryer, hotter summers. We want to understand how to manage these lands so enhance our Treaty resources. We also want to know how fire risk will change so that we can adjust our response plans.

Technology is also part of our response to climate change. We are working to model our forests and rivers so that we can propose possible scenarios into the future. The models will help us to understand how different scenarios might affect the fish, wildlife and plants. Then, again, we can adjust our management schemes.

Tulalip Tribes is currently revising our Hazard Mitigation Plan, our Salmon Restoration Strategy and the Comprehensive Plan for the Reservation. For the first time climate is a consideration in all of these plans.

At Tulalip, we are also working to develop more improved outreach efforts and materials to better make available relevant climate change information to the community. Our climate outreach efforts will include curriculum development for schools, engaging tribal membership and youth, and education for government. Stay tuned for more information to come.

The Tulalip Tribes is a co-chair for the Puget Sound Climate Preparedness Collaborative (PSCPC). As a regional network, PSCPC focuses to ensure that the environment, people, and economy in the Puget Sound region are resilient to the impacts of climate change. As a co-chair to this regional effort, Tulalip brings a tribal voice dedicated to preserving and strengthening our treaty rights through climate change mitigation and adaptation planning. For more information on the PSCPC, please visit https://sustain.org/program/puget-sound-regional-climate-preparedness-collaborative/.

Contact

• Phil North

  Climate Adaptation Coordinator & Conservation Scientist

• Aaron Jones

  Treaty Rights Protection Specialist

• Steve Hinton

  Conversation Scientist