Students ask Saratoga council to advocate for indigenous tribe recognition

Ohlone advocates

Four students on Feb. 4 asked the Saratoga City Council to formally recognize the Muwekma Ohlone tribe.

The students were affiliated with the Indigenous Justice Coalition, a student-run nonprofit that was founded in 2023 to support local indigenous tribes.

The students said the Muwekma Ohlone tribe was wrongfully denied equal protections under the law after its members were declared extinct and lost their federal recognition and land rights. Federal recognition would give them access to educational and political opportunities and land equity, they said. The tribe has about 600 members who descended from the Verona Band of Alameda County, a tribe that gained federal recognition in the early 1900s but lost it in 1927.

The students argued that Saratoga must support the tribe because the city rests on its ancestral homelands, which stretches throughout several counties in the Bay Area. They added that Union City and Livermore recognized the tribe.

The council took no action on the matter at last Wednesday’s meeting.

SVCE grant

Saratoga will be using a grant from Silicon Valley Clean Energy to aid in their transition to zero-emission vehicles by 2040.

The use of the grant was approved with several consent calendar items at the Feb. 4 city council meeting.

SVCE awarded the $184,537 grant on Nov. 10 to support the first phase of the Corporation Yard Electrification Project, which involves installing four dual-port chargers and preparing make-ready infrastructure for future dual-port chargers. The full cost of this phase is $196,500. The city will use funds from its Capital Improvement Program budget to cover the remaining cost.