If you could travel back in time to visit the Macon Plateau of more than a thousand years ago, you’d see a community made up of ancestors of the Muscogee people living, meeting, growing food and burying their dead in earthen mounds, some of which are still around today. Soon, some of that land could be preserved in America’s newest national park, and the first one in the state of Georgia.
A bipartisan group of Georgia Congressional legislators from both chambers are backing a new bill that would designate the area as the Ocmulgee Mounds National Park and Preserve.
Tracie Revis, a citizen of the Muscogee Nation and the director of advocacy for the Ocmulgee National Park and Preserve Initiative, said she’s especially pleased that the proposed legislation gives the nation a say in creating the park’s management plan and allows for co-management with the National Park Service.
“We built our homes here,” she said. “We built these ancient civilizations in these lands here in Middle Georgia, and given the history of the country, we were removed into Oklahoma. So this legislation gives us the opportunity to not only come back and be in the land but help manage and maintain our home again. It allows us to restore our voices for our people that are buried here and for all of those stories all across the state. So from the nation standpoint and from an indigenous person standpoint, it truly is an incredible opportunity for us, and it is a humbling one, and we’re so grateful for our members who have stood beside us, who’ve listened to us, to put us back in that position.”
Revis, the first woman to serve as Chief of Staff to the Principal Chief of the Muscogee Nation, said only four national parks have similar arrangements.
