Around the time the cultural survey work began, Dakota Access took its plan public. See
Howard Decl., ¶ 12. On September 30, 2014, it met with the Standing Rock Sioux Tribal
Council to present the pipeline project as part of a larger community-outreach effort. Id., ¶ 22.
Personnel from Dakota Access also spoke with the Tribe’s Historic Preservation Officer
(THPO), Waste’ Win Young, several times over the course of the next month. Id., ¶¶ 23-27. At
one related meeting, a DAPL archaeologist answered questions about the proposed survey work
and invited input from Young on any areas that might be of particular tribal interest. Id., ¶¶ 25-
28. The company agreed as well to send the centerline files from its cultural survey to her for
review, and did so on November 13. Id., ¶ 28. It never received any response from Young. Id.

...

The writing was on the wall, however, that many DAPL permitting requests would
eventually land in the Corps inbox. The Corps’ Tribal Liaison, Joel Ames, accordingly, tried to
set up a meeting with THPO Young beginning around September 17, 2014, without success. See
ECF No. 21-17 (Declaration of Joel Ames), ¶¶ 5-6; see also ECF No. 21, Exh. 9 (Corps Tribal
Consultation Spreadsheet) at 1 (documenting five attempts by Ames to coordinate a meeting
with Young in September 2014). On October 2, other Corps personnel also sought to hold an
arranged meeting with the Tribal Council and Dakota Access on the Standing Rock reservation.
See Chieply Decl., ¶ 9. But when the Corps timely arrived for the meeting, Tribal Chairman
David Archambault told them that the conclave had started earlier than planned and had already
ended. Id. Ames nevertheless continued to reach out to Young to try to schedule another
meeting throughout the month of October. See Ames Decl., ¶¶ 5-6. When the new meeting was
finally held at the reservation on November 6, though, DAPL was taken off the agenda because
Young did not attend. Id., ¶ 7.

She added that many protestors appeared to be living off the native Americans, and were taking full advantage of the donations that people had been sending in for the cause. This was a trend noticed by another Twitter user, who witnessed one protestor turn down tap water to spend donations on “fluoride free” water.

“They are literally subsisting entirely off of the generosity of the native people... who are fighting to protect their water just because they can,” Smith wrote. “Some literally will not even prepare food but will take food that is prepared, again, having not done anything else all day.”