In 2021, Chuck Sams became the first Indigenous director of the National Park Service. Sams, who is Walla and Cayuse from the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, served about three and a half years as the director. During his tenure, the National Park Service increased the number of parks co-managed by Indigenous nations. Now, Sams has started a new role as the director of Indigenous Programs at the Yale Center for Environmental Justice. Our Living Lands producer Daniel Spaulding spoke to Sams about his work, climate change, and what the country can learn from Indigenous land management practices.
“Native people have at least experienced three to four different types of climate change in the thirty thousand years we've been in North And South America,” Sams said.
