Roundtable and Training Addressing Mercury Contamination Impacting Indigenous and Tribal Peoples

in Northern California, August 21-22, 2025 

Recommendations and Commitments

From August 21-22, 2025, representatives of 17 Tribal Nations, Peoples, and communities impacted by mercury exposure from legacy gold mining and other sources in California as well as in Alaska, New Mexico, Arizona, Oklahoma, and South Dakota met at the historic homelands of the Big Valley Band of Pomo Indians, Konocti Vista Casino and Resort, Xa Batin (Clear Lake) in Northern California.

We came together for a Roundtable discussion and training addressing the impacts of mercury contamination on our Peoples, lands, waters, intergenerational health, and food sources in the context of the historic and continued genocide carried out against our Peoples.

We thanked the hosts and organizers — the International Indian Treaty Council, Indigenous Justice, and Big Valley Band of Pomo Indians — and all the participants who shared their concerns and the important work they are doing to address them. The hosts and participants also thanked the Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation Community Fund which provided the primary source of support for this gathering.

After many very impactful presentations and heartfelt sharing and discussion addressing continued impacts, challenges, and self-determined initiatives to address study and resolve mercury contamination, we have reached consensus on the following commitments and recommendations for next steps and ongoing work. We agreed to:

• Use all opportunities to hold governments and other responsible parties accountable for restoration, restitution, and compensation for the ongoing environmental and health impacts of mercury from abandoned and legacy gold mines and the failures to ensure adequate clean up;
• Continue to call attention to the tribal, local, county, state, national, and international levels to the ongoing impacts of mercury contamination from multiple sources of exposure in our waters, lands, intergenerational health, and food systems;
• Support impacted Indigenous Peoples to have an effective voice and participation in decision-making and policy-setting bodies at all levels;
• Defend our sacred places, our rights, and our sacred Mother Earth from continued and new sources of toxic contamination including from so-called transition mineral mining (i.e. lithium);
• Reactivate, revitalize, and strengthen our networks of solidarity and information-sharing among impacted Indigenous Peoples and all those fighting for environmental justice in Northern California, throughout the US and around the world;
• Monitor and oppose development projects in contaminated areas which could reactivate, reintroduce, or exacerbate mercury contamination in our homes, communities, food sources, and bodies, including dam and road building and construction projects, without first ensuring that contamination has been effectively remove;
• Advocate for additional community-led studies about the impacts of multiple sources of mercury exposure, including legacy gold mines, dental amalgams, and coal-fired power plants, as well as the combined impacts with multiple and combined sources of toxics including pesticides affecting our lands, waters, food sources, and reproductive/intergenerational health;
• Develop and utilize our own methods for data collection and monitoring for cleanup of our lands, waters, traditional foods, and bodies while we also continue to push for government and corporate action;
• Call for additional community-led studies and research on the impacts of mercury contamination on our children’s development and demand the expansion of medical and educational resources serving impacted Indigenous Peoples, families, and children;
• Ensure that impacted Indigenous tribal and community representatives have a meaningful, decision making “seat at the table” when studies are carried out and policies are developed to address mercury and other environmental contamination;
• Ensure that government studies and policy recommendations focus on certifiable, measurable and timely action for clean-up and halting of ongoing and new exposures;
• Ensure that actions for remediation include the full and effective participation of the impacted Indigenous Peoples, including in planning, implementation and ongoing monitoring of outcomes, so these actions do not produce additional human exposures or environmental damage;
• Demand that tribal data sovereignty is respected and protected, including tribal community-led research documenting health and human rights impacts through direct Indigenous/tribal community testimonies;
• Call for prioritization of human rights and the rights of Indigenous Peoples, including rights to traditional means of subsistence, intergenerational health, and Free Prior and Informed Consent over economic and business interests regarding plans for remediation, prevention, and clean up;
• Ensure effective tribal input into the creation of environmental, fish, and other traditional food source consumption standards that incorporate the best known science (Indigenous and non-Indigenous) as well as Indigenous Peoples’ traditional knowledge and lived experiences, and focus on prevention and the precautionary principle regarding exposure to mercury and other toxics;
• Ensure that consumption and exposure standards take age and body weight (including stages of development for prenatal exposures), account for multiple sources of exposure, and challenge “acceptable risk” formulas – there is no “acceptable risk” for our children and future generations;
• Support and recognize Tribally driven and controlled studies, including through community member’s testimonies and case studies, to assess and confirm the links between pre-natal and early childhood exposure to mercury and learning disabilities, neurological and developmental impacts, and other health effects in children exposed to active or legacy gold mines and other sources;
• Utilize the Minamata Convention and UN human rights bodies and processes as part of our strategy to hold states (countries) accountable for exposure reduction and clean up and request that the IITC provide capacity building to impacted Indigenous Peoples for our effective participation which can include collecting and submitting testimonies and case studies from our Peoples;
• Demand that our tribal dental clinics and all Indian Health Services dental clinics serving our Peoples stop the use of mercury-based dental amalgam fillings, and insist that our Tribal Health clinics and hospitals provide up to date information about mercury and its health impacts to everyone that uses these services, but especially parents, pregnant women, and women of childbearing age as well as their right to Free Prior and Informed Consent in this regard;
• Conduct trainings for our tribal members, youth, and students about their rights including to Free Prior and Informed Consent as well as the effects of mercury contamination on human and environmental health, children’s development, and traditional food systems, including through continued dissemination of the “Gold, Greed and Genocide” videos and study guide;
• Carry out advocacy efforts on all levels to impact action and policy change and collect testimonies from our tribal members about their lived experiences for dissemination to tribal, national, and international decision-makers.

Agreed by consensus for the defense and protection of Mother Earth and future generations on August 22, 2025.