Tribes Say Ski Resort Desecrates Mountains

Filed in archive Winter Adventures on September 17, 2006

Southwestern Indian tribes want a federals appeals court in San Francisco to prohibit upgrades to a ski resort they say is a desecration to the sacred San Francisco Peaks in Arizona. The Havasupai tribes believe the mountains were the origins of humans and others consider them the mother of the Navajo people.

The 777-acre Arizona Snowbowl resort, built on public lands, wants to make improvements including adding a fifth lift and creating a tubing area, which would require the remove of trees on about 100 acres and increasing the size of the area from 139 acres to 205. The resort also wants to begin spraying man-made snow - generated from reclaimed waste water from Flagstaff - on the peaks.

"The peaks are a single living entity. What they are doing is poisoning that entity and disrupting the spirits that live there and the whole balance of life," said Howard Shanker, a Navajo attorney.

The tribes say the 777-acre resort in the Coconino National Forest desecrates the land and might be cause for the Sept. 11 attacks, the tsunami, recent hurricanes and the Columbia shuttle crash. The tribes want the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to block proposed resort improvements, which include the spraying of machine-generated snow, for fear of more universal ills and further desecration of their land.

As reported on MercuryNews.com, a federal judge in Phoenix has already ruled the improvements can be made.