Northern to vote on opposing Dakota pipeline

The Dakota Access Pipeline has been the subject of passionate protest and debate for several months, and Wednesday Montana State University-Northern students will get a chance to weigh in on whether Northern should join other campuses in the Montana State University system in throwing to support the rights of peaceful protesters.

The open town hall forum hosted by the Montana Association of Students Montana State University-Northern Student Senate will be held at 6 p.m. in the Student Union Building Ballroom.

The meeting will seek input from students and the general public on whether the association should vote on whether the university system as a whole should back one resolution supporting the rights of people peacefully protesting at the site,or whether any resolutions should be decided on a campus- by-campus basis.

Once all public comment is completed, the Student Senate will take a brief recess, sit down and discuss how they will vote on the matter.

“So we are bringing it back to our students to see which way our students want to vote on this issue,” Northern Student Senate President Randy Roeber said.

He said other issues on the agenda will also be taken up.

A resolution about the pipeline protests was put forth at a meeting of the Montana Associated Students, the coalition of all student governments within the university system, at its Nov 16 meeting in Missoula.

Roeber said a representative from one campus proposed a resolution on the matter with the support from two others. He declined to identify which campuses they were from.

For months demonstrators have gathered near Cannon Ball, North Dakota, to protest construction of the $3.7 billion pipeline that would span 1,172 miles from the Bakken region of North Dakota through South Dakota and Iowa down to southern Illinois. Energy Transfer Partners, the Texas-based energy company behind the pipeline said on daplpipelinefacts.com, an informational website about the project, that the pipeline would transport up to 570,000 barrels of crude a day.

Backers of the pipeline say the project is safe, but opponents, including the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, say any oil spill could affect the drinking water supply and the pipeline could damage sites of cultural significance to the tribe.

Roeber said the debate has made its way onto the campus, when multiple students informed the student vice president, who in turn told Roeber Monday of last week, that #NODAPL, the hashtag logo used on social media by pipeline opponents, was painted on an unclaimed step of the Hello Walk, the staircase leading down to the Student Union Building.

The staircase is painted each year by students with names and messages from student organizations.

“When we found out, we painted over it,” Roeber said.

Roeber said he, the student vice president and their advisors made the decision to paint over the step because the Hello Walk is not meant for political messages.

Roeber said he has not heard of anyone claiming responsibility for the message, but added that he has been told different things.

“There has been talk around campus, but it is just hearsay, so until it’s actually brought to me who did it, I don’t know,” he said.