The Bureau of Indian Affairs will establish a new Office of Technical Assistance and Training at Brigham City, Utah, on the campus of the BIA operated Intermountain Indian School.
Interior Secretary Cecil Andrus formally approved the new unit recently. Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Forrest Gerard said that the establishment of the new Training/Technical Assistance Center is part of an overall management improvement effort for the Bureau. "The implementation of the Indian self-determination policy has resulted in increased program responsibility and authority at the local reservation level," Gerard said adding: "Consequently, the need for technical assistance and training has greatly increased at this level, also. The new office at Brigham City will be responsive to this need.''
The Office of Technical Assistance and Training at Brigham City will be part of the BIA's central office organization. It will serve more than 280 Indian tribes, 218 Alaska villages, 13 Alaska Native regional corporations, 82 BIA agencies and 12 BIA area offices. It will provide training, research assistance, needs assessment, evaluation and technical assistance services to Native Americans and BIA staff.
Gerard has stressed the need for basic, systematic changes in the BIA management approach to be responsive to Indian tribal needs under a policy OL self-determination.
On December l, 1978, he appointed John Artichoker, then the Bureau's Phoenix Area Director, to head a task force to plan needed improvements in the training and technical assistance services.
The BIA now has a small training group and an Indian police academy at Brigham City. These units, together with a planning support group from
Billings, Montana and some units of the Indian Education Resources Center, headquartered at Albuquerque, New Mexico, will be consolidated in the first phase of the plan being implemented.
Gerard said he expects the unit to be operational this fall.
