• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
The Sogorea Te Land Trust

The Sogorea Te Land Trust

An urban Indigenous women-led land trust that facilitates the return of Indigenous land to Indigenous people

  • About
    • Purpose and Vision
    • Our History
    • Staff & Board
    • Partnerships & Alliances
    • Contact Us
  • Lisjan (Ohlone)
    • Lisjan History & Territory
    • Mak Noono Tiirinikma
  • Programs
    • Cultural Revitalization
    • Himmetka: In One Place, Together
    • Mitiini Numma Youth Program
  • Rematriation
    • Land Sites
      • Lisjan, East Oakland
      • ‘Ookwe, Richmond
      • Rammay, West Oakland
      • Rinihmu Pulte’irekne, Oakland Hills
      • ‘Ištune, Oakland
      • Mugworts Cabin
    • Return Land / Land Return
    • Rematriate the Land Fund
  • Media
    • Updates
    • Resources
    • Creative Collaborations
      • Hella Feminist Exhibition
      • On Indigenous Land Field
      • Rematriate Billboard
      • RETURNS
      • Jackie Fawn Poster
      • Tule in the Sky Mural
  • Engage
    • $ Donate!
    • Make a Request
    • Get E-mail Updates
    • Land Acknowledgements
    • Other Ways to Engage
  • Pay Shuumi
    • Shuumi Land Tax
    • Institutional Shuumi Land Tax
    • Shuumi Land Tax FAQs
    • Testimonials

Indigenous Land Return Announcement by Sogorea Te’ Land Trust and Movement Generation!

June 21, 2023 by Inés Ixierda

Preview in new tab

PRESS RELEASE

Berkeley, Calif. (June 21, 2023) — Today,  Movement Generation and Sogorea Te’ Land Trust announced that they have partnered to return 43 acres of land to Indigenous care, in the unceded Bay Miwok territory of the San Francisco East Bay Area. MG and Sogorea Te’ liberated the land title from the speculative real estate market, with Sogorea Te’ now holding the deed. The organizations have created long-term agreements together for care of the land.

Sogorea Te’ Land Trust is an urban Indigenous women-led nonprofit that facilitates the return of Indigenous land to Indigenous people. For more than 20 years, its founders have been organizing to protect Indigenous lands in the Bay Area, where Ohlone people have lived for thousands of years and now Indigenous peoples of many nations call home.

“Returning land to Indigenous care is healing for us and healing for the land,” says Corrina Gould, co-founder of Sogorea Te’ Land Trust and tribal chairperson of the Confederated Villages of Lisjan. “Working together with Movement Generation to create visions and commitments into the next generations allows us to reimagine relationships to this land and multiply the possibilities of our work.” 

The nonprofit collective Movement Generation began organizing movements in the Bay Area to address the ecological crisis in 2007. Its collective members developed a Strategic Framework for a Just Transition, offering strategies to shift from an extractive economy to economies that are sustainable, equitable and just for all people. MG’s work involves political education, movement building and cultural strategy towards the liberation and restoration of land, labor and culture.

“Land is imperative to justice and liberation movements,” says Quinton Sankofa, Movement Generation co-director and collective member. “When the Movement for Black Lives started, we spoke with Black organizers about how we could support their work through ecological justice. Land reparations was a common refrain. But we asked ourselves: How can we demand land from white people who stole it from Indigenous peoples? We needed to build Black and Indigenous solidarity.”

Movement Generation envisions the land to become a Bay Area movement hub for deep political strategy, reconnecting with earth and ancestry, and practicing rematriation, with the support of Sogorea Te’ Land Trust. Here, MG will host intergenerational programs for organizers, healers, cultural workers and earth workers to engage in grassroots ecology, building their capacity to guide their own communities towards a Just Transition and an ecologically regenerative future.

When an ally brought attention to the opportunity to purchase 43 acres that had been owned by a local family for more than a century, Movement Generation and Sogorea Te’ mobilized to liberate the land. MG anchored the funding, and Sustainable Economies Law Center, the Center for Ethical Land Transition, Reimagine Real Estate, Original Blackprint, Nuns & Nones Land Justice Project, and the Occidental Arts & Ecology Center supported the process.

Those interested in learning more are encouraged to engage with the resources offered by both organizations and support their local Indigenous-led land return work. To support Sogorea Te’ Land Trust’s critical work of rematriation, non-Indigenous people residing on the Confederated Villages of Lisjan’s territory in the East Bay can make a voluntary annual contribution to Sogorea Te’s Shuumi Land Tax.

***

For media inquiries, contact Dana Viloria, Movement Generation, at dana@movementgeneration.org.

About the partners:

Movement Generation Justice & Ecology Project is a nonprofit collective that inspires and engages in transformative action towards the liberation and restoration of land, labor, and culture. Rooted in the wisdom of our ancestries and the principles of ecological justice, we strengthen our shared politic, practice and movement ecosystem through political education, movement building and cultural strategy for a Just Transition.

Sogorea Te’ Land Trust is an urban Indigenous women-led land trust, based in the San Francisco Bay Area, that facilitates the return of Indigenous land to Indigenous people. Through the practices of rematriation, cultural revitalization and land restoration, Sogorea Te’ calls on Native and non-native peoples to heal and transform the legacies of colonization, genocide, and patriarchy and to do the work our ancestors and future generations are calling us to do. 

Primary Sidebar

Our work of rematriation, returning Indigenous land to Indigenous people, is only possible with your support.

Donate Now

SIGN UP FOR UPDATES

The Shuumi Land Tax is a voluntary annual contribution that non-Indigenous people living on traditional Lisjan Ohlone territory make to support the critical work of the Sogorea Te’ Land Trust.

Pay Shuumi

Footer

Pawnee eagle corn harvest at Heron Shadows with @c Pawnee eagle corn harvest at Heron Shadows with @culturalconservancy 🌽. 

📷Bernadette 

[a glorious spread of purple to white colored Indigenous corn harvest] 

#pawneeeaglecorn #ancestralfoods #maiz #projectprocess #sogoreatelandtrust #urbanindigenous #womenled #Rematriation
Rinihmu Pulte'irekne 🌳 "The long term vision f Rinihmu Pulte'irekne 🌳

"The long term vision for Rinihmu is to restore the land and recreate a thriving, beautiful, ceremonial gathering place where Indigenous people and their guests can come together, and share cultural information, celebrations, and ceremony.” 

[ID: a group of Indigenous women and two spirit people working under a huge old Oak tree]

#Indigenousvisions #Rinihmu #sequoiapoint #oaklandhills #landback #landreturn #rematriation #regeneration
Summers End! Seasons change is a great time to re Summers End!

Seasons change is a great time to reflect on all the amazing things that took place. 

Thank you to our land team for keeping up with the hot summer days, to all the artists and creators we have been working with, everyone who has contributed to the efforts off screen, and the Indigenous women who are holding this community down! Summer would not have been as fun as it has without them. 

As Fall approaches we are planning our next wave of the Mitiini Numma youth program, the land is getting ready to rest, and we are getting ready for exciting projects to come. Stay tuned!

Reel by Namixtulu.

Video Id:

[ Clip 1- Blue and purple intro image with the Sogorea Te’ logo, top center reads “Sogorea Te’ Summer recap.” Clip 2- Mitiini Numma Youth Program with images of the youth in the land and at Run 4 Salmon and a video of the youth planting seeds. Clip 3- Seed Rematriation with Bernadette- the seed queen, with a video of tobacco seeds being harvested and a picture of seed balls being made. Clip 4- Run 4 Salmon video and picture of folks out on the water, and a picture of the youth holding up flags at the closing ceremony. Clip 5- Tabling events, Images of our stand set up at Red Market and a video clip of printmaking. Clip 6 (last clip) -  a video of the garden growth in Lisjan and another video of the Pinnantak Site, and a picture of a turkey perched up on a metal fence.] 

#summersend #equinox #Fall #sogoreatelandtrust #urbanindigenous #womenled  #landback #landreturn #rematriation
Over 250 Years of Resistance and Still Here Calif Over 250 Years of Resistance and Still Here

California Native Day is a day of recognition of over 250 years of ongoing colonialism, remembrance of those passed, and celebration of our communities today.

In Lisjan territory and much of the Bay Area and California, the colonization of this land began with the reign of terror inflicted by Spanish soldiers and missionaries in the late 17th century, who sought to convert all Indigenous people into Catholic subjects of Spain and steal their land. The Missions were plantations, built by slave labor and sustained through brutal physical violence and extractive land practices. The Spanish brought deadly diseases, invasive species and Christian ideology based on human dominion of the natural world with devastating consequences for the Lisjan people and all living beings they shared the land with.

Today, we continue to inhabit our ancestral homelands, fight for our sacred sites and revitalize our cultural practices.

Graphic by @tamitnicill 

[ID: Images of California Native dancer among the stars, with words “Over 250 Years of Resistance And Still Here”] 

#californiaindianday #californianativeamericanday #honoringourancestors
The sounds of a Tobacco seed harvest along with th The sounds of a Tobacco seed harvest along with the 880 freeway. Hopi Tobacco was one of the first plants we tended to in 2018. The upcoming year we grew a few hundred and shared with our Native community.  Folks came to Deep East Oakland to swoop up a few for their gardens all over the Bay Area. 
Tobacco is a cultural significant plant for many tribes all over Turtle Island and it continues to be aside from it being one of the first capitalized plant by settlers. 
#SeedRematriation #UrbanRez #UrbanNatives #throwback
Digital camera flicks from our youth in Mitiini Nu Digital camera flicks from our youth in Mitiini Numma ☀️

Youth learned photography skills this past summer and got to use cameras to document our time together and progress of the land. These are from a day at Pinnantak 🐝

ID: (1) Close up shot in the greenery, behind some plants is a youths hands holding a black digital camera. (2) Picture of ladybug poppies in the garden, flowers are red with black dots. (3) Close up photo of yellow flowers in the garden, there are garden beds in the background. 

📸: Mitiini Numma youth 

#mitiininumma #youthprogram #sogoreatelandtrust #picturesontheland #joinus #applicationsopen
Every Seed is the Past. Every Seed is the Future Every Seed is the Past. 

Every Seed is the Future.

Saving seeds connects us  to everything that came before and everything yet to come. 

[ID: a woman in shades of purple is reaching up to collect seeds from a tall sunflower, all around her is California Chia in bloom, there are some green plants, blue butterflies and a pink to purple gradient in the sky.  the text reads Every Seed is the Past.  Every Seed is the Future.]

#ancestralpractice #seedsaving #Nativeseeds #summersend #projectprocess #sogoreatelandtrust #urbanindigenous #womenled #landtrust #landback #landreturn #rematriation
Youth on the land 🌱 Photos from our Summer Mit Youth on the land 🌱 
Photos from our Summer Mitiini Numma program at Pinnantak. ☀️ 

Come grow the truth with us this fall in our wave 3 cohort starting this October! Fill out our interest form, link in bio ✨

ID: (1) Three youth participants planting in a native plant garden. Surrounded by green and kneeling on the soil. (2) Youth participant watering the native plants. (3) Two participants walking around garden, one next to a garden bed, and one next to a plum tree. 

#MitiiniNumma #growthetruth #sogoreatelandtrust #youthleaders #afterschoolprogram
🪶Women Warriors 🪶 Chief Caleen Sisk, (Winne 🪶Women Warriors 🪶

Chief Caleen Sisk, (Winnemem Wintu), Tribal Spokesperson Corrina Gould, (Lisjan Ohlone) and Kumu  Pua Case (Kanaka Maoli)  at the closing ceremony for Run for Salmon this summer. 

Through their respective and collective work, they protect their ancestral Sacred sites: the McCloud River in Northern California,  the West Berkeley Shellmound located in the Bay Area, California and  Hawaiʻi’s Mauna Kea. These Indigenous women leaders are culture bearers in Indigenous-led movements that center Indigenous knowledge and protocols, land rematriation, and Indigenous cultural practices. Through their work they build and inspire intergenerational, multi-racial, local, and global movements to protect the Sacred in their various homelands. 

Thank you for your work.

#tbt #womenwarriors #Indigenouswomenrising #run4salmon #sogoreatelandtrust #protectthesacred
“As we reclaim our land in this urban area, it’s important to understand that we are doing that work as Indigenous people from many tribes, working together to create healing on this land.”

-Corrina Gould, Lisjan tribal chairperson, Co-Founder/Director of Sogorea Te’ Land Trust

[ID: a deep blue background sprinkled with stars, a  silhouette of a cityscape, and the above text in white.]

#manytribes #sogoreatelandtrust #urbanindigenous #womenled  #landback #landreturn #rematriation #BayArea #indigenousland
Amaranth, Huaútli, Quihuicha 💜 Indigenous gra Amaranth, Huaútli, Quihuicha 💜

Indigenous grains once outlawed by colonizers, now growing on rematriated land in East Oakland. 

ID: a slow motion reel of two brown hands processing deep burgundy colored amaranth with seeds cascading an abundance. 

#ancestralfoods #outlawgrain #process #sogoreatelandtrust #urbanindigenous #womenled #landtrust #rematriatetheland
“Do you think in 100 years they’ll refer to th “Do you think in 100 years they’ll refer to this as “the time right before California became uninhabitable?”

Oh sh*t

No. 

Because the US is going to cede the land to Indigenous Stewardship. 

Speaking it into existence.”

🙌🏽🙌🏽🙌🏽

… 

Three years ago today wildfire smoke darkened the daylight to an dusk in the Bay Area and beyond. 

Since then many of our relatives have continued to suffer fallout from environmental crisis and many continue to work towards another world. 

It’s not too late to rematriate! Speak it, deed it, build it, plant it, nurture it, grow it into being. 

Pics are from 9/11/20, 1pm, Oakland. 

Text thread Repost from  @stephgervacio . 

#climatechaos #stillonlyoneplanet  #rematriatetheland #returntheland #cedetheland #unsettle #landback #indigenousstewardshipnow
We invite BIPOC youth ages 13-18 in Huchiun to joi We invite BIPOC youth ages 13-18 in Huchiun to join us for Mitiini Numma Wave 3 starting this fall! 🍂
Join us as we combine youth leadership, community, liberation, and ecological knowledge on rematriated land! Program will be held after school starting early October, limited spots available. 
Fill out our interest form by September 21st via this link https://forms.gle/En8xH313WYhBQdNS9 also available in our bio! ✨

#joinus #mitiininumma #youthprogram #rematriatedland #growthetruth
The very first elderberry harvest at ‘Ookwe Park The very first elderberry harvest at ‘Ookwe Park in so called Richmond in 2021
From the land / For the land 🌿 Freshly bundled From the land / For the land 🌿

Freshly bundled white sage from Rammay Garden, West Oakland, Ohlone land. 

ID: a small stack of White sage bundles wrapped with red thread with sage in the background.

#rammay #medicinegarden #fromtheland #fortheland #sogoreatelandtrust
Shuumi means gift. Shuumi is a voluntary land ta Shuumi means gift. 

Shuumi is a voluntary land tax that non-indigenous residents living on the confederated villages of Lisjan Nation pay that contributes to the return of Indigenous land to Indigenous people. 

The Land Tax supports cultivating urban gardens, building community centers and sacred arbors, purchasing and managing land, engaging in public education and advocacy, and developing community resilience. 

For more faqs on the Shuumi Land tax visit the Sogorea Te’ website and click the Pay Shuumi tab. 

Design by media fellow Namixtulu. 

ID:
[Blue color bordering an image with a ladybug on some leaves. On top of the image is written out “On Indigenous Land Pay Shuumi” in black and redish-orange] 

#onindigenousland #shuumi #voluntarytax #honortax #sogoreatelandtrust
Follow on Instagram

Copyright © 2023 · Log in