Newest national monument near Grand Canyon protects Native American sites in Arizona

President Joe Biden has designated a new national monument designed to preserve Native American cultural sites and prevent new uranium mining on nearly 1 million acres near the Grand Canyon National Park.

The Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni Grand Canyon National Monument will conserve about 1,562 square miles in three separate areas north and south of the Grand Canyon. It's intended to protect thousands of sites considered sacred by the Havasupai, Hopi, Hualapai, Paiute, Navajo, Yavapai-Apache, Zuni and Colorado River Indian tribes, the administration said.

“Baaj Nwaavjo” means “where Indigenous peoples roam” for the Havasupai people. “I’tah Kukveni” translates to “our ancestral footprints” for the Hopi tribe.

In addition to honoring Native American tribes with connections to the Grand Canyon, the monument prohibits new mining operations for uranium in the area. Tribes and environmentalists have sought permanent bans on uranium mining, which they say will pollute the Colorado River watershed.

Biden signed the monument designation, his fifth since taking office, at a ceremony Tuesday in Tusayan, Arizona. He invoked the Antiquities Act of 1906, a measure that provides legal protection of cultural and natural resources of historic or scientific interest on federal lands.

The monument encompasses 917,618 acres of federal forest and range lands, including the Marble Canyon area in the northeast and Kaibab National Forest lands south of Grand Canyon. It includes land around the Kanab Creek to the west of the Kaibab Plateau.

_______

CONTRIBUTING Brandon Loomis, Arizona Republic

SOURCE USA TODAY Network reporting and research; Associated Press; National Park Service; Department of the Interior