Where Water Flows, Healing Grows: The Feather River Advocacy Project Begins!
- Redbud Resource Group
- Apr 16
- 3 min read
When my Uncle Jimmy was just 16, he volunteered to fight in the Vietnam War. He left his Maidu homelands in Oroville, California, caught a bus to San Francisco, then San Diego, and was soon shipped overseas. After multiple tours, he hitchhiked his way back—through the oil fields of Bakersfield, across the Central Valley—and finally arrived home on his mother’s front porch.
Oroville in the late 1950’s and 60’s was booming. Celebrities played in packed bars, and workers from across the country poured in to take part in a monumental project: the construction of the Oroville Dam—the largest earth-filled dam in the United States. The dam would reroute water south through a vast network of aqueducts and canals known as the State Water Project. The land and water my uncle knew as a child would never be the same.
While the state celebrated, tribal communities mourned. The creation of the reservoir meant the forced removal of Native people from their ancestral homelands. Villages, ceremonial grounds, gathering sites, and burial places were drowned. Families were displaced through eminent domain, given pennies for their land, and told to leave. Tribes received no water rights, no reparations, and thousands of ancestral remains and sacred items were stolen—many of which have still not been returned.
The dam didn’t just flood land—it severed relationships that had been nurtured since time immemorial. It widened the physical and cultural distance between families and communities. As more Native people were pushed out of Oroville, fewer remained to defend our rights to water, land, and culture. And Oroville’s dam is just one of more than 14 dams in the Feather River watershed. Imagine trying to maintain your traditions when the waters that sustain them are blocked, sold, and redirected.
Today, the entire region is feeling the consequences. Wildfires rage across the hills. Salmon populations are near collapse. Tribes are fighting to protect what little land remains accessible—to maintain our identity, uphold our responsibilities, and continue practicing the cultures passed down to us from our ancestors. Removing Native people from land and water, and ignoring the consequences of damming the ecosystem, is life-threatening to everyone—not just Tribes.
Knowing this, Tribes must step up and speak out for the future of our waters and homelands.
The Feather River Advocacy Project offers a path forward. Through water policy education, cultural revitalization, and land-based learning, we’re reconnecting with our rivers and with each other—reclaiming who we are so we can fight for a healthier, more just future for everyone in Maidu country.
On April 10th, we gathered with Maidu leaders and the Department of Water Resources to begin a dialogue about returning ancestral remains and sacred items taken during the dam’s construction.
On April 11th, we hiked to Feather Falls to learn about its sacred power, the scars left behind by the Gold Rush and North Complex Fire, and the healing underway through tribal restoration efforts.
This work continues through October 2025, culminating in the Fall Salmon Run, where we will welcome our relatives home in ceremony and celebration.
Though the dam still stands as a symbol of loss and disruption, we are committed to understanding its legacy and doing the work to heal what we can. Our movement is rooted in love for our ancestors and responsibility to future generations—and we will continue to rise in their honor.
To learn more about the Feather River Advocacy Project, click HERE!
To show your support for the Feather River Advocacy Project, consider a donation HERE!
Sending you all good thoughts this Spring season!
Sincerely,
Taylor Pennewell
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