KRIV holds public meeting on preservation
By Lee Coleman
The Knife River Indian Villages National Historic Site held a public meeting last week to get input to help guide managers in preserving the park’s nationally significant archeological resources.
There are 68 known sites and five village sites spread out over 1,758 acres.
“We are trying to address some of the threats to the archeological resources in the park,” said Park Superintendent Wendy Ross. “What we decided to do was a comprehensive approach to the threats and to address them and really bring it to the public and ask what do people want us to do.
“It is their national park and this is public land. We are a preservation agency and we are charged with taking care of the area. What that means to us is to preserve these archeological resources.”
The purpose of the plan is to protect, interpret and research the resources and Ross said the plan could take up to three years to complete.
The park was created in 1974, and now four main threats to the archeological resources have been identified; river mitigation, vegetation, burrowing animals and infrastructure.
Ross pointed to a 1968 feasibility study that noted the Knife River as a threat of concern.
