Planning has been underway to fence off a municipal airport near Tule Lake, a historic WWII American concentration camp in California (sometimes called an *”internment camp”). The plans would include fencing off nearly two-thirds of the site, where some 19,000-24,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated during the war. If the plans go through, it would close off access to the barracks where people lived. The Tule Lake National Historic Landmark is part of the National Park Service (though the historic site is only a portion of the entire camp) and every other year, people make pilgrimages to the site to learn about the history. Grandparents and parents bring their children to visit where their relatives slept during the war. Tule Lake was the most controversial of all of the camps because it housed those deemed “disloyal” to the U.S.
CAAM recently funded a film by Konrad Aderer, which premiered at CAAMFest 2017, called Resistance at Tule Lake. The film chronicles the history of resistance during the war and connects issues from the past to the current political climate.
The Tulelake Municipal Airport has applied to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to build the fence, and the FAA is taking public comments until October 10, 2017. Instructions on how to do so are here. There is also a Change.org petition, which currently has 35,000 supporters, with the goal of 100,000.
For more information, read this article from Reappropriate or visit the Save Tule Lake Facebook page for updates.
*See the Japanese American Citizens League preferred language (pages 10-13).
