The powwow ends today.Īfter the announcement, the mayor joined Sanidad in a ceremonial dance around the powwow circle. The announcement came on the second day of the 18th annual Seafair Indian Days Powwow, where thousands of people and more than 300 drummers from many Northwest tribes gather to eat traditional foods and dance in the dance arena. "It will become a Seattle landmark, and it will be a landmark of national significance," Mayor Greg Nickels said at yesterday's ceremony. It also will be a place for people of all cultures to experience Indian tradition. The lodge will serve as a cultural center, museum, theater and library for the Seattle area's 45,000 Native Americans, said Michelle Sanidad, CEO of the tribal foundation. "We got the best compromise we could," said Joe Straus, member of the board of directors of the Coalition to Save Discovery Park. Whitebear died of colon cancer in 2000.Īnd it is the culmination of a seven-year dispute between Magnolia neighbors and the Indian foundation over the size and location of the lodge. It is the realization of a dream set in motion by activist Bernie Whitebear, who led the Native American takeover of Fort Lawton 30 years ago. The agreement allows the foundation to move forward with plans to build a $42 million, 96,000-square-foot People's Lodge at the north edge of the park, formerly the Fort Lawton army base, in the Magnolia neighborhood. "That's a long time to stand on the threshold." "We've been waiting for this for 30 years," said Randy Lewis, board member of the United Indians of All Tribes Foundation. The war that raged on and off for more than three decades over the future of Discovery Park may finally have come to an end. ![]() They gathered at the edge of the powwow circle yesterday, Indians and whites, to announce Seattle's latest peace treaty.
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