The Tucson City Council is moving forward with the effort to return the ancestral homelands near the base Sentinel Peak to the Tohono O’odham Nation for its continued preservation and reverence.

The city council unanimously approved the motion to transfer land ownership during a study session before their regular council meeting on April 18. The move comes after decades of conversations the City of Tucson has had surrounding what to do with the land.

Tucson Mayor Regina Romero said the piece of land near Sentinel Peak has more than 4,500 years of history and archeology that proves it is an ancestral Hohokam Village.

“This is where our city was born,” Romero said

The initiative to return the land to the Tohono O’odham “without any strings attached” has been led by Romero and Tucson Council Member Lane Santa Cruz.

Santa Cruz said over the years, many different efforts and ideas have been introduced to the city on what to do with that land. But, in the end, returning the land was the best and most respectful option.

Santa Cruz said when they started having conversations with the tribe about returning the land, they were skeptical.

“Rightly so,” she added, “they’ve never had a good relationship with the city.”

Santa Cruz said it always seemed as if the city treated the tribe separately, as if they are over there and we are over here, even though many Indigenous people live in the city.

She said it took that ongoing conversation and meeting with tribal members, listening to their stories about the land and what it meant to them. She recalls how tribal members talked about how even if the city chose to acknowledge or not that the land rightfully belongs to the Tohono O’odham, they already know it is theirs.

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