When emergencies such as wildfires, floods and rockslides caused road closures on Native American reservations in San Diego County, tribal personnel — including law enforcement, firefighters and elected leadership — couldn’t access their own land to help their community.
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This week, that changed.
The Rincon Band of Luiseño Indians, a tribe with a 5,000-acre reservation in Valley Center, partnered with the Sheriff’s Office, the county of San Diego, the county’s Office of Emergency Services and the Southern California Tribal Chairmen’s Association to launch a first-of-its-kind program Tuesday.
Rincon Tribe Chairman Steve Stallings said the idea for an Emergency Tribal Access Pass Training has been in the works for 20 years, following the East County fires.
The three-hour-long training offers authorized tribal personnel instruction on emergency access procedures, incident command, wildfire safety and first responder coordination. With these passes, they are verified at emergency checkpoints for entry. All tribes in the county can take part in the training.
The pass does not grant entry under all circumstances; whichever agency has top authority at emergency scenes will ultimately determine if it’s safe enough for tribal personnel to enter.
While Stallings said there hasn’t been a recent emergency in which tribal members have been denied access to enter their land, he said this is a solution for the future, when tribal personnel need access to help their people and protect government operations and infrastructure on the reservation.
It benefits all groups involved when everyone is on the same page during an emergency, he said.
“If we’re not part of the process, then our team of specialists and urgent personnel are operating independently of other local law enforcement when what you want is everyone coordinated in that,” Stallings said.
Sheriff Kelly Martinez said this has “been a long time coming” during her opening remarks at the inaugural training on Tuesday at the Rincon Government Center.
“It’s been long overdue that we allow you access to your critical infrastructure,” Martinez said. “I’m happy to support it.”
There are 18 Native American reservations in San Diego County — more than any other county in the United States.
Martinez said there were representatives from 16 of the 18 tribes, totaling about 260 people, in attendance at the Tuesday training.
That day, 143 access passes were distributed to authorized tribal representatives who had completed the required application ahead of the training. The other participants at the training will receive their passes once their applications have been finalized, according to a Rincon Band representative.
“This is a game changer,” said Rincon Fire Chief Chip Duncan. “When we can’t get on the reservation, we can’t provide service.”
Stallings said the hope is for the training to eventually move online, so people can take the course more quickly.
“We know that this is a change for the better — puts us on equal footing,” Stallings said.
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