Wiyot Plaza & Indigenous Garden

• In July 2022,  the FSL received an exterior space allocation at Cal Poly Humboldt, which has since been officially named ‘Wiyot Plaza’. The Wiyot Plaza arose thanks to the actions and resilience of the Lab’s faculty, staff, students, community, and partners. Since the envisioning of the Food Sovereignty Lab, a Native Plant Landscape and exterior space has been conceived as a critical element to our Institute. Wiyot Plaza surrounds the Behavioral and Social Sciences Building (BSS), and extends down to General Parking Lot 15 on Cal Poly Humboldt’s campus- this includes open areas and a redwood woodland. We are so grateful for the continuing and vocal support of the Wiyot Tribe to the Food Sovereignty Lab, including their representation on the Steering Committee and actions such as the Wiyot Tribe Natural Resources Department’s letter of support submitted to USFAC regarding the request for an external space allocation. It is the driving goal of the Lab to be a space of collaboration and mutual support between Cal Poly Humboldt and the tribal community- the exterior space allocation enables us to further realize this goal.
• Originally, the BSS building was designed to include campus and community-facing spaces for basket weaving, regalia making, cooking using traditional methods, and traditional arts. The FSL chose the location of the BSS 168 in consideration that the BSS building was originally designed to honor Native peoples and create space for Indigenous programs on campus. We envision a continuity of Indigenous space near the Native Forum, Goudi'ni Gallery and NAS Department, creating the 'Wiyot Plaza'. This space integrates educational opportunities outside of the BSS building as part of a Native Plant Landscape that is connected to and cared for by the Food Sovereignty Lab- an extension of the classroom space focused on learning Indigenous sciences through land-based pedagogies. This includes the revitalization of the area originally designated to be a salmon cooking pit to become an acorn processing area, the establishment of a salmon cooking pit behind the Native American Forum, and the design of a Native Plant Landscape that incorporates Native artwork patterns and local Native Languages, and the Indigenous Garden, which will include an ADA compliant 'Elder Garden', greenhouse, and shed constructed to mirror a traditional Wiyot Plankhouse. The Food Sovereignty Lab’s exterior space has the core objectives of supporting food sovereignty and community engagement with traditional foods and management practices. As the FSL enters into relationship with this landscape, we are building stewardship and Rou Dalagurr in a generational lens. Read more about our vision for the Outdoor Classroom in the 'Exterior Space Report'! This vision will continue to be shaped by community feedback and collaboration as we build and implement our Phased Plan.

• To define the relationships between campus stakeholding entities and the FSL, our staff, and members of the Steering Committee have worked with the Landscape and Tree Subcommittee to USFAC to develop a ‘Shared Maintenance and Co-Management Agreement’ (Read it here!). This agreement inscribes our shared commitments to caring for the space, entering into a relationship with the landscape, it’s more-than-human inhabitants, and between partners, to return tribal community access and sovereignty to landscape. Of emphasis in this agreement is collaboration and insight of tribal knowledges and cultural stewardship practices, facilitated primarily through the Steering Committee of the FSL.
• This co-managed agreement is the first in CSU and UC history! We hope that this agreement serves as a forward-looking model for other higher institutions looking to collaborate with Indigenous scholars and communities on similar endeavors, increasing access of Indigenous community to their aboriginal territories and landscapes, and supporting Indigenous self-determination and sovereignty over those territories and landscapes through such co-management agreements.

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• Across Northern California, Native communities, including but not limited to the Wiyot, Karuk, Yurok, Tolowa Dee-ni, and Hoopa Tribes share a deep cultural connection to salmon. This ultimately led to the development of a salmon cooking pit behind Cal Poly Humboldt’s Native American forum that allows for cultural fire, traditional salmon cooking, community gathering, and hands-on education. 
• This is the first salmon cooking pit formalized on Cal Poly Humboldt campus, as well as CSU history. The salmon cooking pit is a central educational point to Wiyot Plaza as it enables students and visitors to understand traditional food and cooking as a cornerstone to our work with food sovereignty, from the landscape to the kitchen. It has been employed for numerous events in many different modalities, including visiting youth and current students, FSL celebrations and events, and as an accessible space for community partners to enact cultural programming. This has included partnerships with the NCIDC Da’luk Youth Program, the Native Women’s Collective, INRSEP, ITEPP, as well as in conjunction with the visits of Tribal leaders and cultural practitioners
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  In Fall 2022, the FSL, Mckinleyville Healthy Relationships Coalition, the Center at Mckinleyville, Open Door, and the Native Women’s coalition held an Indigenous Girls, Young Women, and Femmes Volleyball and Empowerment Camp.  Bubba Riggins, who runs the Da’Luk program at NCIDC guided youth on the preparation of the fire pit for traditionally cooked salmon. The youth from programming gathered around the fire pit, sharing stories and songs with community members, connecting with each other through food, nutrition, and a care for our delicate ecosystems. Volunteers from Project Rebound were working the event and were given salmon to provide for Indigenous youth within Juvenile Hall. Humboldt County Juvenile Hall has an overrepresentation of Indigenous youth incarcerated at any given time and this small gesture from FSL staff brought instant connection to home. 

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  The salmon cooking pit is currently in redevelopment, with a restoration project to start in Fall 2026. In 2025, it came to our attention that Native plants were becoming ill due to the management before the Food Sovereignty Lab and various environmental factors such as compact soil and water retention. The restoration project will include a fire-resistant cultural plant landscape, tables and chairs for enhanced gathering spaces and cultural practitioner needs, an ADA accessible pathway, a more clearly organized space for salmon cooking within sand, and educational signage.

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Phase 1 & 2:

• The Food Sovereignty Lab is moving through Phase 1: Reconnection of our long-term relationship building and restoration planning within Wiyot Plaza. To build this space, and to approach Phase 2: Restoration while ensuring well being of both human and more-than-human relatives in the landscape, we are seeking comprehensive environmental site assessment and suite of testing. The submission of soil, water, and plant samples for testing will inform on the concentration and composition of any pollutants, pathogens, and toxins, and their gradation and patterns in the landscape; this will enable planning for strategic mitigation and landscape restoration. This includes testing of the water and soil in and around the experimental greenhouse space on campus, which is also a facility used by the Food Sovereignty Lab. See our site testing report for our progress regarding site testing, including estimates for comprehensive baseline soil, water, and plant testing, a site history, and environmental site assessment. As we work to establish site testing pathways for Wiyot Plaza, we aim to concurrently establish pathways and coalitions to make site testing more accessible to our community.
• We are also compiling an Indigenized phase 1 environmental site assessment, establishing a history of the landscape through archival methods, GIS mapping, and oral stories. Please see the Place-Based Learning Practices project for more information.
• With successful site testing, FSL orientation to Wiyot Plaza can move to planning for Phase 2: Restoration, which includes bringing fire back to the landscape through cultural burning, and engaging in Indigenous science-based restoration planning and landscape remediation. We also look to begin installations throughout Wiyot Plaza, including signage, Indigenous artwork, and larger infrastructure.
• Wiyot Plaza will be receiving soil testing through professor Dr. Chelsea Obeidy on February 20th, 2025. This project will assess heavy metals and pollutants. A report will be shared with the Food Sov Lab team. Results will support the FSL as we move into Phase 2. 

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Within Phase 1, one example is Dr. Daniel Lipe's NAS 332: Environmental Justice Class in 2023, which engaged in discussions in this space, grounded in land-based learning pedagogies, around the return of cultural fire to the land, as well as the preparative steps to reach this objective. Students in NAS 332, under the guidance of the FSL Research Associate, engaged in fuel load aggregation on the landscape, actively increasing the accessibility and engagement capacity of the Experiential Learning Space. This culminated in the rental of a trailer, and the removal of over 1.5 tons of accumulated fuels from the landscape in May of 2023 by FSL Staff and volunteers.

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Phase 1: Restoring the Land

FSL Exterior Space

• July 2022- Co-Managment
  • Signed the first ever Shared Maintenance and Co-Management Agreement at Cal Poly Humboldt
• Ceremonial Land Reconnection
  • Wiyot Plaza Naming; Spiritual and Cultural reorientation to the landscape, invite tribal community for prayers, songs, and tobacco offerings
• Infrastructure Planning
  • Greenhouse (Facilities), Shed (Mirroring Traditional Wiyot Plankhouse), ADA Pathway from FSL to Garden (Facilities), Signs and Art Installations
• Indigenous Garden
  • Tribal community surveys, Site preparation, Starts planting
• Site Health
  • Return site to and more-than-human community to health and care
• Tanoak-Centered Space
  • Planning Tanoak-centered space; research in SOD mitigation

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Phase 2:

Wiyot Plaza

• Cultural Burning
  • Cultural Burning Proposal, Start of Process
• Native Plant Mapping & Planning with Extensive Community Feedback
  • Grid-based field indexing; Planting schedule by site following extensive community outreach and collaboration
• Native Plant Landscape Implementation
  • Planting and landscaping Native Plant Landscape
• Signage
  • Community input and collaboration determining signage inclusion and format
• Art Installation
  • Planning the back walkway (FSL and Native American Forum) Art Installation of Salmon life cycle; Other installations
• Large-scale Projects
  • Watershed Management 

• The Campus Center for Appropriate Technology (CCAT) donated the uphill part of their exterior space to the Food Sovereignty Lab, which has become the FSL Indigenous Garden. The soil pH of the beds is averaged at 6.3, is dominantly clay, and is rich in organic matter. The garden is partially shaded during most of the day. Planting in the beds (has been and will continue to be) decided by tribal community stakeholders and the FSL Steering Committee. In 2022, following a community survey, the information was analyzed and collated with previous input from community members, which generated an initial plan for implementation of the Indigenous Garden. The feedback from the surveys suggested that the Garden will have a primary focus on Native plants, with additional plantings of non-native (to the North California Coast bioregion) plants. Some of these non-natives can be food producers/crops, while others can be massed with native plants that share traditional uses and niche. 
• Planting plans continue to be formed based on community feedback, including In consideration of the unknown site history and the possible presence of pollutants, toxins, and pathogens in the space that could impact the safety of our plant relatives for human consumption and interaction, in the Spring '23 growing season we focused our planting in three raised beds. These beds were built using reclaimed redwood from the deconstructed CCAT yurt, raised off of the soil surface, and filled with soil donated by Royal Gold. 
• The planting plan implemented in 2023 included the dedication of one raised bed to vine tea, one to massed Indian potatoes, and a dedication to medicinal, herb, and grain plants in the third bed. In 2024, we achieved the installation of a shed at the top of the garden.
• In 2025, garden beds have been dedicated to a native plant bed, non-native veggie bed, and vine tea bed. Through the support of CCAT’s community garden, the FSL obtained a full-sun plant bed. As well, staff and volunteers supported removal of a cobb bench that was previously made by CCAT. Removal of this led to a open space where we’d like to put seating and the development of a Jasmine trellis, where the plant was living on the cobb bench. 
• In 2026, we have big plans for Wiyot Plaza! This includes a reconstruction of garden beds made in 2023, the development of an elder garden, remembrance MMIP flower garden, stair construction, the painting of the Wiyot Plaza shed to reflect a traditional long house (Artist - Michaela Rain from Hoopa), cultural burning, and much more.
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• We look forward to the day we can safely work with those relatives as food and medicine. These in-ground beds also serve in augmentation of our growing seed bank. Looking forward, we will be constructing an ADA compliant path which will allow the top two beds of the Indigenous garden to be accessible, which will be constructed into raised beds, creating an 'Elder Garden' corner of the indigenous Garden. We will also look to construct a plant propagation area.