Federal legislation that would transfer land from a former boarding school to the state’s 19 pueblos unanimously cleared a congressional committee Tuesday, members of New Mexico’s delegation said.
The U.S. House Natural Resources Committee also passed a bill to memorialize the state’s downwinders.
The rare show of bipartisanship means both bills have a path forward and could go to the floor as soon as next month, U.S. Rep. Melanie Stansbury said during a virtual news conference on Tuesday with all three of the state’s representatives in the U.S. House of Congress, all Democrats.
“It’s a big deal because not a lot of things happen in Congress these days, and certainly, not a lot of things happen on a bipartisan and a unanimous basis,” she said.
H.R. 6162, sponsored by Stansbury, would transfer 10 acres of a former boarding school to the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center in Albuquerque – which is operated by New Mexico’s 19 pueblos – and includes a museum, cultural programming and events.
Albuquerque Indian School was part of a network of federally-run schools that took more than 18,000 Native American children from their families in an effort to strip them of their cultures and language between 1819 and 1969. Children faced forced labor, assimilation, abuse or death, including Zuni, Navajo and Apache children who were buried in unmarked graves in Albuquerque. The Albuquerque Indian School closed in the 1980s.
U.S. Rep Teresa Leger Fernández, who co-sponsored the bill, said the land transfer is a form of justice. “That land used to be a place of trauma, it was a boarding school and now, it’s a place of celebration of pueblo culture,” she said.
Monique Fragua (Jemez Pueblo), the president and CEO of the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center, in remarks during the news conference called the bill “absolutely monumental,” and noted that its passage coincides with the celebration of American Indian Week. She said the land would be used as an entrepreneur complex, and include light industry and manufacturing spaces.
“We have a history of transforming these lands here, the former site of the Albuquerque Indian School, into a place of cultural recognition,” she said. “It will be a place of growth, a place of economic development. New Mexican businesses can come and place their roots on our campus and build that next generation.”
A second bill, H.R. 2490, would install memorial plaques at Holloman Air Force Base, the White Sands Missile Range and White Sands National Park recognizing New Mexicans exposed to radiation from the Trinity test by the federal government.
U.S. Rep. Gabe Vasquez said the plaques are a means to “never forget the story,” which he said is more relevant than ever as the Trump administration seeks to restart uranium mining and other nuclear activities.
“We, again, owe it to the downwinders, but also to the entire New Mexico community that felt the impacts of the nuclear testing to have these memorials placed,” Vasquez said.
Stansbury said the bills could move to the House floor vote by May, and then would have to clear the U.S. Senate.
“Basically, these bills are ready for passage,” she said.
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