The Southern Ute Indian Tribe has no migration story. They were placed in the Rocky Mountains by their creator and have been there since time immemorial. With an acute sense of geography and ecological knowledge of the land, they followed the movement of animals throughout their homelands, from the Great Basin of Central Utah, to the Rocky Mountains and the Great Plains. Their way of life was, and still is, intrinsically connected to the mountains and the beings that inhabit them. Today, this same landscape provides wealth and prosperity to the tribe, albeit in a much different way.
By 1880, the U.S. Government had forcefully removed the Southern Utes from their homelands, placing them on a small portion of agriculturally unproductive land, which is now only 1% of Colorado in the Southwest corner of the state. Their severance from their ancestral homelands and traditional food sources left the Southern Ute impoverished. Indian reservations are known for their remoteness, resulting in a lack of economic opportunities, social services, and access to nutritious foods. Until recently, the Southern Ute reservation was no different.
A state-of-the-art museum surrounded by lush, artfully-designed landscaping was hard to miss when the Westies arrived at that same reservation to meet with tribal councilman Andrew Gallegos. A large steel structure towered above the entrance, an exaggerated version of the tribe’s traditional teepees. Inside, natural light poured in as Gallegos recounted the story of his people and how they changed the tribe’s economic trajectory.
This modern museum reflected a wealth that the tribe achieved through the entrepreneurial efforts of their Southern Ute Growth Fund, which oversees a portfolio of companies and investments in real estate, construction, and most importantly, oil and gas. Unbeknownst to the U.S. government, the small strip of land that the tribe was forced onto would contain abundant reserves of oil and gas. There are now more than 2,000 producing wells on the reservation, and although only a tiny fraction of Colorado land, 15% of the state’s major oil development facilities are located there. These businesses have propelled the Southern Ute tribe to become the largest employer in the county. As of 2024, their assets are estimated at four billion dollars.
This prosperity equipped the tribe to develop a world-class environmental program dedicated to protecting air and water quality on the reservation. Joaquin King, a member of the Navajo Nation and a Southern Ute Descendant, works for the program’s water division. He is a young, bright-eyed environmental scientist, passionate about his work collecting aquatic bugs and water samples, checking pH levels, and tagging fish. “I definitely just want to be a steward of the land… As well as the tribes downstream, I think we are all collectively shooting for one goal, and that’s to protect Mother Earth.”
Listening to Andrew Gallegos about the tribe’s economic development and Joaquin King about their environmental work, I grappled with this seemingly paradoxical relationship. The scope of Joaquin’s environmental stewardship work is only possible because of the tribe’s profits from fossil fuel extraction. The tribe’s relationship with the land, one of reverence, stewardship, and deep ecological knowledge, is now complicated by their energy extractions that contribute to climate change.
I was reminded of a landscape more than 3,000 miles away that at first glance is starkly different from the arid Southern Ute Reservation, but is quite similar beneath the Earth’s surface. My hometown of Anchorage, Alaska is known for its mountain landscapes, nearby glaciers, and ecological richness. Simultaneously, my city’s economy is fueled by oil and gas drilling and production. Many of the wealthiest people in our community work in oil. When the industry is doing well, our public schools, hospitals, businesses, and social programs benefit. As Alaskans, we profit from the industry that is warming our climate, melting glaciers, and harming our healthy ecosystems, the very things that make the state special.
Alaska and the Southern Ute tribe participate in a lucrative industry that is causing environmental catastrophe. However, through oil and gas development and investment, the tribe has pulled its community out of poverty. The industry is employing and feeding their people, providing a quality of life that they otherwise wouldn’t have on the land that they were forced onto. Can anyone blame the tribe for taking advantage of the opportunity to bring their people out of economic, cultural, and political marginalization by participating in the fossil fuel industry? All of us are entrenched in systems of extraction.
We often approach the fight against climate change as a black and white issue: fossil fuels versus green energy, greenhouse gas emissions versus carbon neutral. The paradox that the Southern Ute tribe uses their fossil fuel profits to provide first-rate environmental stewardship demonstrates that it’s not black and white. To acknowledge these complexities and the gray area is to approach climate work more realistically and comprehensively.