City to Take Possession of Ohlone Artifacts From Bay Street Mall

City Council Hopeful Brokers Deal on Purloined Emeryville History

School Board Member and
City Council candidate
Christian Patz (Ed.D)
We have a "shared history"
with our native predecessors.

School Board member and Emeryville City Council candidate Christian Patz announced today he is brokering a deal between the City of Emeryville and the corporate owners of the Bay Street Mall to take possession of certain Ohlone Indian artifacts, dug up when the mall was built, ultimately to offer the objects to living ancestors of the Bay Area tribe.  The mall is built upon the site of the largest Native American shell mound on the West coast and construction workers uncovered many votive and religious objects some up to 2800 years old as well as every day  tools and buried human remains in 1999 when the mall was being built.

Madison Marquette Corporation, the builders of the mall, gave over to the University of California most of the trove of artifacts in 1999 but they kept some for themselves where they have occupied a dusty corner of the corporate leasing office ever since.  It is not known if the corporate seizure of the objects in 1999 was legal.  The City of Emeryville's Redevelopment Agency is the responsible party to the final destruction of the shell mounds but Mr Patz says the pre-Columbian objects should not be in the possession of the Bay Street Mall.

The building of the mall brought much protest from the Bay Area Native American community especially at the time since the site was the burial ground for many generations of their ancestors.  The swapping of a 2800 year old sacred site to a shopping mall has been called an insult and worse to Native Americans.  Protesters still convene on the site every Black Friday before Thanksgiving.

Although Dr Patz says the artifacts should be returned to their rightful owners, he thinks City Hall should at least temporarily display them for the benefit of the people.  "The loss of the shell mounds was tragic" Dr Patz told the Tattler today. "While it cannot be undone, we can empower the few remaining decedents by letting them decide where these treasures end up.  Until then, they should act as a reminder of our shared history" he added.

The Deal brokered by Mr Patz appears to be imminent as Bay Street Mall Manager Jen Nettles has expressed interest in donating the objects to the City and City Manager Carolyn Lehr indicated she would accept them.

Below: The 2800 year old Emeryville Ohlone artifacts in the Manager's leasing office at Bay Street:

New Bike/Ped Bridge On Ohlone Indian Burial Site

Ohlone Indian Bones Found At Emeryville Bridge Site

Depiction of what's now Emeryville
before the arrival of the Spanish in
the late eighteenth century.

The Emeryville Redevelopment Agency will vote on a resolution March 1 to retain an archaeological service company after test borings for the proposed bike/pedestrian bridge connecting Bay Street and Horton Street encountered human skeletons last month.  An initial report to the city council claims the human remains are "thousands of years old" and are of native American origin.
The Alameda County Coroner was contacted and after confirming the bones were human, the bridge contractor notified the Native American Heritage Commission according to the report.  The remains were carted off the site for safe keeping and a team of "most likely decedents" will help re-inter the remains upon completion of the bridge.  The Coroner says the remains are from two individual humans.

The eastern landing of the proposed bridge is where the remains were found and a future small park there called Horton Street Landing will be the final resting place for the two individuals.  The council report says the decedents team will decide the actual final burial site within the park and it will not be publicly disclosed.

Early Emeryville residents.

A February 11 letter to the City Engineer from the archeology firm states the added work is not covered in the nearly $14 million bridge project known as the South Bayfront Bike/Pedestrian Bridge and is asking for an additional $41,567 for the excavation and re-burial work.