Amy Bowers-Cordalis
Amy Bowers Cordalis is a mother, fisherwoman, attorney, and a member and former General Counsel of the Yurok Tribe—the largest tribe in California.
Formerly a staff attorney at the Native American Rights Fund, she is the currently the Co-Founder and Co-Director of the Ridges to Riffles Conservation Indigenous Group, a nonprofit representing Native American tribes in natural and cultural resource matters where she works on advancing tribal sovereignty, water rights, fisheries issues and what will be the largest river restoration project in history—the undamming of the Klamath River—when it takes place in December 2024.
Bowers-Cordalis’ family is from the village of Req-woi (Requa) which sits at the mouth of the Klamath River in Northern California just south of the Oregon border. Since colonization, every generation of her family has fought for Yurok Rights. Her family’s Supreme Court case, Mattz v. Arnett, reaffirmed the status of the Yurok Reservation as Indian country, laying the foundation for the exercise of the Tribe’s sovereignty and the enjoyment of its federally reserved water and fishing rights.
She is working on her first book, THE WATER REMEMBERS which will be published by Little, Brown/Hachette in 2025.
