WESTWIN RESISTANCE HALTS LAWTON CITY COUNCIL MEETING IN OPPOSITION OF WESTWIN ELEMENTS’ PROPOSED COBALT & NICKEL REFINERY, DEMANDS PRE-CONSTRUCTION STOP
Tuesday, 27 February 2024, Lawton OK – Today, members of Westwin Resistance and other community members concerned about the proposed Westwin Elements experimental cobalt/nickel refinery in Lawton held a press conference and rally leading into the Lawton City Council meeting at City Hall. During the limited public comment period, Kiowa tribe/American Indian Movement (AIM) Indian Territory Elder Lavetta Yeahquo shared her concerns about the “strange things going on in the City of Lawton” and lack of information available about the refinery. Yeahquo was a participant in the Occupation of Wounded Knee, which began 51 years ago today – known as Liberation Day. Following her testimony, many in the crowd chanted “shut it down!” “they need to stop” “there are burial sites down there” and “we need a public meeting” as police escorted them out the door.
Westwin Resistance shared copies of this letter outlining the coalition’s demands to the Lawton City Council, which opens,
Westwin Resistance and concerned citizens of Lawton and other surrounding areas are coming together to demand that the Lawton City Council adjourn this meeting and stop making decisions about the proposed refinery from Westwin Elements until Free, Prior, and Informed Consent is honored between the council members and the citizens.
The letter goes on to say,
Instead of backdoor meetings and shady votes, we demand the council hold and host an open public input meeting to legitimately hear impacted community concerns and consent or lack thereof around the refinery, announced in the newspaper at least two weeks in advance. Instead of assumptions and experimental research we want fact-based evidence. This is why we are demanding the COL perform and pay for an Environmental Impact Study – including impacts of earthquakes, tornadoes and floods – with the unaltered results released to the public and press.
It’s no secret that the state of Oklahoma has a history of committing atrocities against Indigenous people in the name of industrial expansion, and once again with this refinery, there was no consent from the local tribes. We demand the City Council have an archaeological dig done on the proposed refinery site and the unaltered results to be released to the public and media.
Due to the lack of experience of the CEO of Westwin Elements, the fact this would be their first project and the first U.S. refinery of its kind, and many other shared concerns, we demand that a study be done on the health impacts similar refineries had on community members living in and near the town of the refinery sites. We demand the unaltered results of this study be released to the public and media. We also demand that this comes along with a guarantee that the COL will cover any medical costs of illnesses caused by this refinery from this day (02/27/24) forth for all citizens of Lawton, Ok.
The letter closes with this statement,
If the city cannot meet the demands of the people or give a reasonable substitution that will guarantee the safety of the people who live here then we demand the COL drop the contract with Westwin immediately! We will not stop until our voices are heard, WE ARE THE RESISTANCE!
Westwin Resistance members and supporters were escorted from the meeting by local police, who followed the group outside. After hearing people explain their reasons for concern about the refinery, the officers went back inside.
Earlier in the meeting, Mayor Stan Booker found occasions to state, “We are a military community. We are very patriotic. We are very proud.” Westwin Elements plans to pursue federal funding from the U.S. Department of Defense as well as the U.S. Department of Energy, which would carry tribal consultation requirements. During the February 14th Kiowa Comanche Apache (KCA) Intertribal Land Use Committee meeting, Westwin Elements CEO KaLeigh Long told KCA leaders she will not respect tribal sovereignty, will not pause or stop pursuing her refinery, and will continue no matter what the tribes say.
QUOTES
“I’m here representing Westwin Resistance. I’m informing you today, I seen a lot of strange things going on in the City of Lawton. I’m a resident here. I lived here for 10 years… I worked here for the City of Lawton with the Lawton police department, and were not shoddy. We did our job. I’m telling you today to shut Westwin down. Because things has to be looked into. I’m an elder. I’m retired. And I want to see my City of Lawton do better.” – Lavetta Yeahquo, Kiowa tribe/American Indian Movement (AIM) Indian Territory Elder
“How much is my life worth. Do I nor my children matter.” – Nicole Reyna, Comanche, Kiowa, Choctaw; Westwin Resistance
“It’s important in situations like this to ask ourselves which side of history we want to be on. We are proud today to be on the side that stood up for what’s right for our people and stood against settler colonialism.” – Kaysa Whitley, Kiowa and Absentee Shawnee tribal citizen; Westwin Resistance
“Our people, with the oil and gas pipelines, the mineral gigs, the refineries that are coming to Lawton, this causes problems for the [Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women] movement, because it brings in man camps. Man camps make our people – our women especially – vulnerable. People that are homeless, domestic abuse and drug abuse victims, it makes them prime targets for trafficking. Of course we don’t want [Westwin] here, because we’re fighting this MMIW battle tirelessly.” – Gen Hadley, Comanche; American Indian Movement-Indian Territory; MMIP State Chapter; Westwin Resistance
“I grew up out south of Cache and when I was growing up here, we had some of the best food in the country. This is an agricultural community, first and foremost. The City Council we have doesn’t see anything wrong with a rubber factory being across the street from a meat packing plant, so I don’t think they have properly fully analyzed the actual impacts of their economic development. Every farm, every ranch, every homestead out there is a business. This is going to cost us a lot more than we stand to gain. ” – David Reeves, Westwin Resistance
“Just like her settler ancestors who stole land to build ranches in Bartlesville, Westwin CEO KaLeigh Long is continuing that legacy of settler colonialism, land theft, & disregard of tribal sovereignty but in a new form: green colonialism. Indigenous peoples already know these so-called ‘green energy transition’ mines & refineries are not real solutions to the climate crisis and only exacerbate already-existing problems. Mayor Booker and the City of Lawton are complicit in this disregard of the Free, Prior, & Informed Consent of the tribal communities in the region. We will continue demanding those in power recognize and regard tribal sovereignty and consent. The Kiowa, Comanche, & Apache tribes said NO to Westwin. It is incumbent upon KaLeigh Long & Mayor Booker to understand NO means NO. Our sovereignty is very much at stake. The time to stand is now!” – Ashley LaMont (Absentee Shawnee/Oglala & Sicangu Lakota), Honor the Earth National Campaigns Director
During the last Lawton City Council meeting on Feb 13, public testimony against the refinery was constrained to 9 minutes for 8 speakers, though more people wanted to participate. In a possible violation of the Open Meeting Act (OMA), Title 25, Oklahoma Statutes 301-314, Mayor Stanley Booker recently instituted a rules change limiting “Audience Participation.” The mid-day meeting time may also be in violation of the OMA.
Slated for Kiowa, Comanche, Apache, Wichita, Caddo, and Delaware homelands in Lawton, Oklahoma, near the sacred Wichita Mountains, Westwin Elements – a start-up company with no experience – hopes to build the first-ever cobalt/nickel refinery in the United States.
Westwin Resistance supports the tribal Resolutions and community members challenging Westwin Elements’ risky refinery. We will not back down. We will continue this fight. For the land, for the people, for the ancestors, and for all future generations.
Email westwinresistance@gmail.com,
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