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in Fish from the St. Louis River on and near the Fond du Lac 

 Reservation . October-1992 , is attached. The information is 

 proving valuable as it shows the changes in mercury levels 

 in walleyes throughout much of the watershed, and its 

 relationship to contaminated sediments and also runoff from 

 forested watersheds. The current problem is mainly the 

 ongoing airborne fallout of mercury, which increases mercury 

 concentrations in game fish by 3% to 5% per year! At this 

 rate the public will be unable to safely consume these fish 

 in a matter of years. 



Our Natural Resource Program in cooperation with the 

 University of Minnesota/Duluth is proposing to conduct 

 ground-breaking research on the means to mitigate for 

 mercury contamination in aquatic ecosystems to prevent the 

 uptake of mercury into the food chain and thereby decrease 

 the mercury levels in game fish. If an economical and safe 

 way is found to accomplish this, the fish will again be safe 

 for subsistence use and will also save a multi billion 

 dollar recreational industry in this region. One problem is 

 that the funds available in the EPA Region 5, Great Lakes 

 Program Office are quite inadequate to fund all of the 

 assessment research needed in the Great Lakes area for the 

 States and Reservations research proposals. The Si Million 

 now available should be substantially increased and 

 mitigation research should become a major focus in order to 

 clean up these ecosystems and not just continue endless 

 assessments. Our research proposal to EPA-GLNPO is 

 attached. 



The Fond du Lac Environmental Program is one of the newly 

 funded "Multi-Media" Tribal environmental programs funded by 

 the EPA. Although this is a relatively new program is has 

 greatly expanded our capabilities to address the many 

 environmental problems on our Reservation. We therefore 

 urgently request that this entire program be fully funded by 

 the EPA, and that Native American staff be employed to 

 oversee this program in the Washington D.C. office. In 

 addition to this the BIA Environmental Office should meet 

 the needs of environmental problems on reservations, by 

 expanding its objectives and by providing meaningful 

 funding. 



The Fond du Lac Community College is a Tribal college which 

 is jointly funded by the State of Minnesota. The new campus 

 is now complete and some 650 students attend classes there. 

 The Community College and the Fond du Lac Reservation are 

 working on developing an Environmental Institute which would 

 contract for environmental research and also provide a major 

 educational role at the college. We will be seeking 

 assistance in the near future to help with the development 

 of this concept. 



FOND DU LAC, R.B.C.' 



