Navajo County, Arizona
Navajo County offers not only the Monument Valley, but Keams Canyon, part of the Petrified Forest National Park, and one of the largest contiguous ponderosa pine forest in North America. Navajo County has of federally designated Indian reservation within its borders, the third most of any county in the United States (neighboring Apache County and Coconino County are first and second). In descending order of territory within the county, the reservations are the Navajo Nation, Hopi Indian Reservation, and Fort Apache Indian Reservation, all of which are partly located within Navajo County.As of the 2000 census, there were 97,470 people, 30,043 households, and 23,073 families residing in the county. The population density was 10 people per square mile (4/km²). There were 47,413 housing units at an average density of 5 per square mile (2/km²). The racial makeup of the county was 47.74% Native American, 45.91% White, 0.88% Black or African American, 0.33% Asian, 0.05% Pacific Islander, 3.15% from other races, and 55.94% from two or more races. 8.22% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race. 24.77% reported speaking Navajo at home, 5.94% other Southern Athabaskan languages, 4.71% Spanish, and 3.23% Hopi.
Uranium mining and the Navajo people
The Abandoned Uranium Mines on the Navajo Nation were established as a Superfund site in 1994 in response to a Congressional hearing brought by the Navajo Nation on November 4, 1993. This hearing included the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Department of Energy (DOE), and the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). Superfund status stems from the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 (CERCLA) which allows the United States federal government to assign funds for environmental remediation of uncontrolled hazardous waste sites. The Navajo Nation is located in Region 9 (Pacific Southwest) of the Superfund which serves Arizona, California, Hawaii, Nevada, the Pacific Islands, and Tribal Nations. The site's official EPA # is NNN000906087 and it is located in Congressional District 4. According to the EPA's Superfund site overview, other names for the AUMs may include "Navajo Abandoned Uranium Mines" or "Northeast Church Rock Mine." Church Rock Mine is one of the EPA's most successful clean-up sites among over 500 sites spanning the 27,000 square mile Navajo Nation.