First Light

First Light is a bridge between conservation organizations and Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, Maliseet and Micmac Communities who seek to expand Wabanaki stewardship of land. First Light aspires to reciprocity: its goal is to expand Wabanaki access and stewardship of land for prosperity and to create a stronger conservation movement that includes and reflects Indigenous expertise and perspective. All will benefit from this, and it all begins with the land.

Since its first Learning Journey, begun in 2017, First Light has been raising awareness about Wabanaki history and land loss in the conservation community and building connections between Wabanaki leaders and conservation leaders. Today, First Light works in deep interdependence with the Wabanaki Commission on Land and Stewardship, an intertribal Wabanaki body that guides the work of return. You can see more about our model here.

First Light has evolved into three main focus areas:

1. Building the capacity, voice and power of Wabanaki leadership to address their needs around land stewardship by supporting the chief-appointed Wabanaki Commission on Land and Stewardship; Psiw ut skitkamiq kignumin (all the earth is our home).
2. Coordinating land trusts around contact and conversation with the Tribes: Creating a similarly sized Conservation Community Delegation for Wabanaki engagement to pool resources and coordinate the conservation community’s best skills and abilities to best collaborate and respond to the needs and requests from the Wabanaki Commission on Land and Stewardship; Psiw ut skitkamiq kignumin (all the earth is our home).
3. Continuing the Learning Journey for 50 actively committed landholding organizations, funders, and state agencies across Maine to build awareness and understanding about Indigenous land loss, develop and practice equitable principles for Wabanaki engagement, and create new tools to share land and resources.

Coordinating Land Trust Communication and Action:  The role of the Conservation Community Delegation

The Conservation Community Delegation primarily collaborates with the Wabanaki Commission on Land and Stewardship to develop processes and tools for sharing or returning land. Another important role of the Delegation is to serve as a liaison between the conservation community and the Tribes; The Delegation receives requests from the larger conservation community in Maine about Wabanaki engagement and assist in getting these questions answered by the right Wabanaki person, thus minimizing the administrative and communications burden on tribal representatives and ensuring less time away from their own priorities.

If your organization has a question about offering land for return to Wabanaki people or making a financial contribution to support Wabanaki land relationship, please visit: https://dawnlandreturn.org/first-light/lets-work-together/return or reach out to: .

The Conservation Community Delegation is currently made up of representatives from The Nature Conservancy, Maine Coast Heritage Trust, The Appalachian Mountain Club, Southern Maine Conservation Collaborative, the Forest Society, Maine Mountain Collaborative, Trust for Public Land, Land in Common, and Maine Conservation Voters/Alliance who are serving an 18-month term. All of these representatives were members of the first cohort of the Learning Journey and have demonstrated organizational commitment to the larger goals of First Light to increase Wabanaki access to and stewardship of land. Other organizations can join the Delegation with a board endorsement of this extra responsibility and assignment of work.

Collective Learning by the Conservation Community: The Learning Journey

Early in First Light, Wabanaki Leaders told land trusts that we needed to first learn about their history and culture before engaging in conversation and collaboration. Maine’s Conservation Community has stepped up to meet this request: Initially 23 Maine conservation organizations joined the first cohort of the learning journey which concluded in 2019, and in September 2020, 50 land related organizations including funders, advocacy groups, state agencies, and private landowners committed to the second cohort. The goals of the second cohort of the Learning Journey are to build awareness and understanding about Indigenous land loss, to develop and practice equitable principles for Native engagement, and to create new tools to share land and resources. Another significant goal of the Learning Journey is to build the bench of organizations who might be willing and able to step up to facilitate or convey access rights, to organize the rematriation of land, and to work alongside Wabanaki Tribal communities in acquiring new lands. Per request of our Wabanaki colleagues, the 50 organizations in this cohort demonstrated documented organizational commitment to the journey and nominated two staff or board members to attend all events and check-ins.

Learn more about First Light’s Learning Journey here. Check out the list of committed organizations here.

Want to learn more about Wabanaki history and priorities around land independently?

Check out First Light’s resource library, a compilation of hundreds of books, essays and media to help us achieve our goals of expanding Indigenous access to land and resources.