(Image courtesy of Friends of Puvunga)
On the campus of Cal State Long Beach is a 22-acre stretch of land sacred to local tribes. Puvungna, as it’s known, is revered as the origin site for peoples who have inhabited this part of California for millennia.
Today it is at the center of a legal battle brewing between the university and tribal leaders who accuse school officials of acting in bad faith.
“I don’t trust the university. I’ve been working with them since 1993. They don’t keep their word. They don’t keep their commitment,” says Joyce Stanfield Perry, cultural resource director with the Juaneño Band of Mission Indians, one of several Southern California tribal groups for whom Puvungna holds cultural and spiritual importance.
She adds, the university “just doesn’t seem to be genuine.”
Once spanning 500 acres, Puvungna was an ancient village sacred to local tribes, including the Tongva and Acjachemen, inhabiting the Los Angeles Basin. The area is revered by these and other tribes as the birthplace of creation.
In the 1950s, the Long Beach City Council purchased the land and soon after began construction on what would become Cal State Long Beach. Numerous archaeological discoveries were announced in subsequent years, including sacred burial sites, leading to Puvungna’s designation on the National Register of Historic Places.
In 1993, tribal groups scored a legal win, successfully preventing the university from demolishing what remains of the site—negating its historical designation—to build a strip mall and adjoining parking lot.
In 2019, months after Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an apology to California Native Americans for the state’s complicity in genocide, the school dumped 6,000 cubic yards of potentially toxic debris over the area. Tribes sued, and in 2021 the sides reached an agreement that gave the university two years to relinquish stewardship over the land.
“The settlement included an agreement that the university would be obligated to make a good faith effort to put Puvungna under a conservation easement within two years of the execution of the agreement,” notes Sarah Lucey, an attorney representing the Juaneño Band and the California Cultural Resources Preservation Society (CCRPA), which joined in the 2019 suit.
A conservation easement would entail CSULB ceding rights over the parcel to the holder of the easement.
(Photo: Joyce Stanfield Perry, cultural resource director with the Juaneño Band of Mission Indians, standing on the grounds of Puvungna, considered sacred by Native tribes in Southern California. (Photo courtesy of Friends of Puvungna)
“The purpose of the easement is to protect Puvunga in perpetuity,” explains Lucey, describing how over the course of nearly two years school officials, tribal leaders and CCRPA representatives met regularly to discuss the agreement’s implementation and care for the site.
Part of those discussions involved the design and issuance of a Request for Proposal (RFP) from groups interested in taking over the easement. When the RFP was finally released by CSULB in 2024, a joint application was submitted by the Friends of Puvungna and Tongva Taraxat Paxaavxa Conservancy (TTPC), which works to reclaim formerly Indigenous lands.
It was the only application submitted, and while Stanfield Perry says the groups were selected by the tribes, and despite working hand-in-glove with the university during the preceding two years, it was rejected.
According to CSULB, the problem lay in part with the RFP itself, which school officials say did not sufficiently detail the requirements that needed to be met by any group seeking to take over management of the site.
“CSU believes the RFP was insufficiently clear about the role and the requirements that a qualified Conservation Easement Grantee must meet to successfully deliver the required services and obtain the award,” the university wrote in a letter following its decision.
University officials also cited concerns over potential conflicts of interest involving Friends of Puvungna and TTPC. Facing a near 8% reduction in state funding this year, CSULB maintains an annual budget of $60,000 for the care and preservation of the site.
Stanfield Perry has dismissed the allegations as “nonsense,” describing a proven record over decades by both groups of land stewardship and a clear separation between tribal governance, on the one hand, and organizational leadership at Friends of Puvungna and TTPC.
(Photo: Archival photo from 1970 declaring Puvunga a sacred site. (Courtesy of Friends of Puvunga)
“I do believe the university is being misleading,” she said. “I think they understand they have an obligation. But I also believe they want… to be able to have economic stability for this space.”
Indeed, school officials have acknowledged their desire to secure long-term funding for Puvungna’s care.
The fight over Puvungna, meanwhile, is playing out against the backdrop of a global Land Back Movement where tribes are actively reclaiming lost or stolen land. Last year, California awarded $100 million to 33 tribal land back projects as “part of a first-in-the-nation effort to address historical wrongs committed against California Native American tribes.”
Stanfield Perry is careful to distinguish between land back efforts and the standoff over easement rights with the university. The case is unique in the state in that it is the only one involving sacred land on campus property.
Lucey says there has been little communication from the university since the RFP’s rejection, and that efforts to restart dialogue have gone nowhere. “It’s been very, very difficult to get anything from them. It’s really just stalled out completely.”
In the interim, questions remain, including what new requirements will be added to any future RFP and when it might be released.
“From the tribe’s perspective, there is a sense of mistrust,” says Stanfield Perry, before adding the dispute presents “a golden opportunity for the university to demonstrate leadership and take pride in the fact that they are one of the only universities to have a sacred site on their campus.”
“This could be a win-win for everyone.”
