Families of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous People (MMIP) crisis are turning grief into motion on the water. A recent canoe journey, covered by KING 5’s Facing Race, celebrated the life of Rayan Perez, a Nisqually woman, and created space for other families to share names, photos and stories as the canoe moved between Tribal communities. The outlet reported that Perez’s family carried the canoe from Skokomish to Elwha during a previous leg, highlighting the intertribal support that powers these journeys.
The voyage draws on Coast Salish traditions that pre‑date borders and highways. Canoes become moving memorials, but also moving newsrooms; each landing pulls in local media and public officials, forcing attention onto unresolved cases. KING 5 has documented similar gatherings, including large turnouts at the Nisqually Reservation for MMIP awareness days, where red dresses and handprints symbolise lives taken or missing.
Advocates say that ceremony and travel fill gaps left by bureaucratic systems — especially where jurisdictional boundaries and poor data hamper investigations. Families repeat a common refrain: visibility keeps cases alive. The canoe journey’s choreography (prayers, songs, naming) ensures that names are said in public, often alongside calls for policy changes on data sharing, cross‑deputisation and sustained funding for tribal victim services.
In Washington, the movement intersects with state‑level reforms and tribal‑led initiatives to standardise reporting and improve rapid response – but families stress that timelines in the system still move too slowly.
Their work on the water is therefore both remembrance and pressure campaign.
And as the canoe slips into new waters, it carries messages back to lawmakers and police: that every unresolved file is a person and that the community will keep rowing until answers arrive.
Discover more from Indigenous News
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
