The Southampton Town Board unanimously approved a resolution on February 15 establishing October 1 as Shinnecock Heritage Day in the town.
The resolution was spearheaded by Councilman Michael Iasilli and sponsored by the board as whole.
Iasilli noted in a release attending the vote last week that the recognition had been “a long time coming” for the Shinnecock Nation, which had been recognized as a tribe by the federal government on October 1, 2010.
Several members of the Shinnecock Nation were on hand for the vote, including Shinnecock Council of Trustees Chairman Brian Polite, who reminded the board that the very place names in Southampton, the language itself — Quogue, Shinnecock — highlighted a cultural heritage that has been “taken for granted.”
He said the October 1 designation would help explain the “true depth of our history on Shinnecock,” and that while it was overdue, it was an important step “to bridge the gap” between the town and the nation.
“Our histories melded in 1640,” when English settlers arrived on the South Fork, Polite said, but as Iasilli noted in advance of the vote, the Shinnecock have been here for 13,000 years.
The local designation arrived as Iasilli and other town officials have been working on an historically fraught relationship between the town and the Shinnecock Nation.
That dynamic was in play during the public hearing that preceded the vote last week, when a couple of residents came forward to express their dismay over land clearing being undertaken by the Shinnecock Nation as it moves ahead with plans to build a gas station and travel plaza on 10 acres of its Westwood property located off Sunrise Highway in Hampton Bays.
Shinnecock Nation member Preston Brown underscored the significance of the October 1 designation for local Shinnecock students attending area schools “whose identity is lacking as to who they are,” and that a greater emphasis on educating all students about the nation‘s history could go a long way toward addressing education gaps and substance abuse problems in his community.
Town Councilwoman Cyndi McNamara said she hoped the town and the Shinnecock Nation could “get on the same page,” and that the time had come to leave the past behind so all parties could “move forward together.”
Iasilli said that among other community benefits, the designation would allow the town to hold annual events to celebrate the nation’s cultural contributions while “underscoring our shared history, which will enhance our relationship.”
The tribe’s federal designation made the Shinnecock Nation the 515th tribe to be recognized by the United States and ended, Iasilli said in a subsequent statement, “decades of impediments to its right to self-determination and access to critical services,” by reinforcing the nation’s “long struggle for sovereignty” and opening access “to federal grants and loans for education, housing and health care.”
