California Native American Tribal Relations

The State Coastal Conservancy (SCC) is committed to early, often, and meaningful consultations with California Native American tribes with the goal of collaborative partnership and meaningful inclusion of tribal governments’ priorities and interests throughout the Agency’s work. SCC seeks to advance programs, policies, regulations, and laws to strengthen working relations with California Native American tribes and to coordinate tribal affairs policies and programs.

SCC can support tribes through direct grant funding and tribal consultation on the projects in tribes’ ancestral and/or current territories. Please feel free to reach out for inquiries or technical assistance — project examples are listed below.

The Conservancy has a Tribal Consultation Policy and agency goals to partner with Tribes, which include:

• Support Tribes regaining access to their ancestral lands on the coast through acquisition, easements, or cooperative agreements.
• Ensure early consultation with Tribes in project development and throughout project implementation.
• Build capacity building for Tribes.
• Ensure Tribal archaeological and cultural resources are protected.
• Work with Tribes to enable traditional stewardship and cultural practices on ancestral land.
• Support land co-management initiatives.
• Ensure programs include indigenous voices, leadership, and perspectives.

Tribal Consultation Policy

The policy sets out procedures for consultation and meaningful engagement between staff and tribes and requires considering tribal cultural resources in Conservancy funded projects.

Grant Program

The Conservancy holds periodic grant rounds related to specific topics, but many of the Conservancy’s grant programs have open solicitations. Tribes are welcome to apply at any time and may also do so by reaching out to us and/or filling out our general pre-application. Examples of grant rounds include Explore the Coast, Explore the Coast Overnight, Coastal Stories, Wildfire Resilience, Coastal Wetlands, Water Quality, and Sea Otter Recovery.

Project Examples

Ancestral Land Return

Hupa Mountain Land Acquisition
Hoopa Valley Tribe reclaims more than 10,300 acres of their ancestral territory. Hupa Mountain now extends along the western border of the Hoopa Valley Indian Reservation, totaling to 240,000 acres. The Hoopa Valley Tribe plans to enhance and restore habitat for species of concern on the property, including listed salmonids, northern spotted owl, Pacific fisher and Roosevelt Elk. The total purchase price was $14.1 million, with $4.5 million of Conservancy Support.

Explore the Coast Grant Program

Amah Mutsun Land Trust Summer Camp
The Conservancy provided a grant to Amah Mutsun Land Trust for their summer camp for Native American youth that offers a meaningful and fun experience for Tribal youth to enjoy their coastal ancestral territory and learn about coastal conservation and traditional ecological knowledge. Attendees participated in recreational activities along with cultural activities like jewelry making, learning coastal ethnobotany, and sharing tribal stories about the coast.

Wildfire Resilience Program

Tamien Nation Cultural Fire Stewardship Program
This project led by the Tamien Nation was funded by the Conservancy in June 2023, and will start and train a 6-person native fire crew and support its first two prescribed fire projects at Henry Coe State Park on the tribe’s ancestral homelands, in partnership with California State Parks. The project team collaborates with State Park personnel, CalFire, and cooperating fire agencies in fire training, vegetation management, shaded fuel breaks and prescribed fire projects. The program is a multi-partner cooperative capacity-building and implementation project to restore cultural burning and wildfire resilience on ancestral lands while improving fire protection, enhancing ecological function and tribal cultural resources, and promoting community education.

Contacts