UPDATE: Since the publication, Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek confirmed Kola Shippentower’s appointment to the Oregon Commission for Women.

MISSION — Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation (CTUIR) member Kola Shippentower was among the list of Gov. Tina Kotek’s nominations to the state’s boards and commissions.

Shippentower was one amongst the 70 executive nominations from the governor’s office for September, one of four to be appointed to the Oregon Commission for Women (OCFW). The state has more than 260 different boards and commissions, including transit, forestry, tourism, Black affairs and more.

The OCFW serves the people of Oregon by building partnerships between state government and women in rural and urban spaces. Its mission is to work for the implementation and establishment of economic, social, legal and political equality for women and to maintain a continuing assessment of issues and needs and needs for Oregonian women and girls.

Core goals and priorities for the OCFW include advocating for women’s issues, promoting equity for women and girls, studying issues women face and recommending new policies to state lawmakers, developing leaders among women at the state level and increasing the visibility of women’s contributions and achievements in the state.

Shippentower is a business owner, public speaker and Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and People (MMIWP) advocate who also serves on the Women’s Foundation of Oregon board. She is also the creator of the Wisáwca Project, a safety initiative for Indigenous women aimed at preventing the MMIWP Crisis.

“I’m pretty proud of the fact that a lot of the things that I’ve done throughout my journey, whether it be through advocating for MMIWP, speaking on Indigenous issues, being a hunter and gatherer for First Foods and also being an athlete, I feel like everything I’ve done has been in service to my people,” she said.

Shippentower said she found a post advertising the open position on social media and applied. Following the governor’s nomination, the Senate Committee on Rules will consider the nominations during the upcoming September Legislative Days. The next scheduled meeting for the OCFW is on Sep. 18.

With her position on the commission, she said she hopes to shed light on the perspective of what Native communities struggle with regarding legislation specific to domestic violence and the impacts on victims and their families. She said stepping into this new role is simply another outlet of doing what she’s been doing up to this point.

“Regardless of if the governor said, ‘Oh, this is the perfect candidate for this position,’ the work that I do doesn’t stop because unfortunately the violence against Indian women and Indian people doesn’t stop, and the people that are in these jobs that are supposed to be taking care of us aren’t doing it,” Shippentower said.

She said that, unfortunately, it is the family members who have experienced this kind of violence that are trying to cultivate a change that could make a difference.

Aspects of the commission that stood out to her included the advocacy for women in the state, but more specifically being able to provide the perspective of an Indigenous woman in Oregon and being able to share that perspective with the governor.

“We do have Indigenous women that work with Gov. Kotek directly, but they don’t provide the experiences or the background that we do, because most are living in the Portland metro area or bigger cities; they don’t get the vantage point of Indigenous women living on reservations,” Shippentower said.

She added that she was proud of the fact that she’s motivating younger Indigenous people to do and be better, that this was another outlet to be able to do that and that her goal at the OCFW would be to bridge the gap in the work that’s been done to address MMIWP in state legislation.

Shippentower said she never had much interest in politics save for a Board of Trustees vice chair campaign in 2023. Despite losing that election, she said she wanted to continue providing for the CTUIR.

“I’ve never seen myself going into this level of work, especially at the state capital,” Shippentower said. “This just seems like an appropriate move considering I’ve hit all of the other areas. At the end of it, my goal is to continue that.”