Two weeks ahead of the next legislative session, Arizona Democratic state lawmakers held a Tuesday town hall on MMIP — or missing and murdered Indigenous peoples — for input on the problems facing families, advocates and victims.
Indigenous Peoples Caucus chair Sen. Sally Ann Gonzales (D-Tucson), who is Pascua Yaqui, made no promises, stressing: “We will not have solutions for you today.” But she and others, like Reps. Brian Garcia (D-Tempe) and Mae Peshlakai (D-Cameron) spent three hours listening.
“Listening without action has become a pattern,” said Reva Stewart, who is Diné and founder of the Turtle Island Women Warriors group. “Legislation without enforcement is not protection. Task forces without authority or accountability are not solutions. Meetings without funding are not justice.”
She believes families relive their trauma by testifying with no results.
Volunteer victims advocate Chelsa Seciwa, who is Zuni, came to a similar conclusion while sharing disappointment in the MMIP task force established by Gov. Katie Hobbs by executive order in March 2023.
Although Seciwa respects “the intention behind its creation,” she contends that families in search of lost loved ones “have been misled” for almost three years by claiming task force appointees say it’s not a “direct service.”
“Grassroots advocates are already doing this work. We are the moccasins in the ground. We are answering those late-night calls,” added Seciwa. “We are showing up to the hospitals and funeral homes without any funding or support. Yet public dollars continue to fund offices that are not providing direct services.”
Roxanne Barley, who is from the Cocopah Indian Tribe near Sommerton along the California border, complained that the criteria changed for the state’s Turquoise Alert, originally designed to notify the public of Indigenous disappearances.
It was even named Emily’s Law, honoring the slain San Carlos Apache teen who went missing from a Mesa group home earlier this year. The Arizona Department of Public Safety issued its first alert in July.
A few months later, another Indigenous girl, Challistia “Tia” Colelay from the White Mountain Apache Tribe, went missing. No Turquoise Alert had been made, and her remains were found in November, less than a mile from her home in Whiteriver.
“I attended that funeral service. I sat with the family, I ate with them, and I sat with her by my side, listening to the stories of what happened,” said Barley, who helped organize a candlelight vigil for Colelay.
Of the five alerts this year, only one has been for a Native American: Maria Acedo, a 17-year-old in Yuma. She was safely located shortly after the Turquoise Alert went out earlier this month.
“That was the lie that we were promised, that was the hoax that we were told,“ added Barley. But Sen. Theresa Hatathlie, who is Diné and chairs the governor’s MMIP task force, explained how lawmakers negotiated and compromised: “And that is the ugly truth of politics.“
This story was produced by KJZZ, the NPR station in Phoenix, and published by KNAU as part of the Arizona Public Media Exchange.
