Past News Items

George E. Keller, an enrolled member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, has been appointed Superintendent of the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Rosebud, South Dakota Agency.

Keller has been the Community Services Officer at the agency the past four years.

Keller is a graduate of the Chadron State Teachers College, Chadron, Nebraska and has a Masters degree in education from South Dakota State University.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs has announced the appointments of Everett Prince as Superintendent of the Bethel, Alaska agency and Irving Billy as Superintendent of the Western Navajo agency at Tuba City, Arizona. Both appointments were effective November 4.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Assistant Secretary-Indian Affairs Larry Echo Hawk will be joined by Office of the First Lady, Executive Director of Let’s Move! Initiative Robin Schepper, USDA Deputy Administrator for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) Lisa Pino, IHS Director for Improving Patient Care Program Lyle A. Ignace M.D., M.P.H., and Menominee Tribal Chairman Randal Chevalier to launch Let’s Move! in Indian Country (LMIC). This event marks the First Lady’s launch of Let’s Move! in Indian Country hosted by the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin.

Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson has assigned Curtis Geiogamah as the BIA Acting Director on the Navajo Reservation, pending the recruitment of a permanent appointee for the position.

Thompson said that the position has been advertised and that applications would be received through March 12. ''We expect to have many excellent applicants for this important position," the commissioner said. We will, of course, consult with the governing body before making a selection, but we hope to fill the vacancy promptly."

Acting Secretary of the Interior Hatfield Chilson today authorized the Bureau of Indian Affairs to offer for agricultural development lease as a unit an area of about 65,000 acres of highly fertile irrigable land on the Colorado River Indian Reservation near Parker, Arizona.

The offering is to be made under a 1955 law which authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to lease the land on behalf of the beneficial Indian owners for not more than 25 years. Under this act the lease must be consummated by next August 14.

WASHINGTON – Assistant Secretary-Indian Affairs Larry Echo Hawk was awarded the 2012 Governmental Leadership Award from the National Congress of American Indians for his leadership on behalf of the tribal nations and his work building the foundation for a new era in nation-to-nation relations.

A contract amounting to nearly $2.4 million has been awarded to Nielson's, Inc. of Dolores, Colorado, to build slightly more than 12 miles of road and a bridge over a wash on the Navajo Indian reservation about 10 miles south of Shiprock, New Mexico, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson announced today.

Award of a $40,900 contract for construction of 20 deep-pit-type circular charcos (earthen stock water tanks) in the Sells and Gu Achi Districts of the Papago Indian Reservation in southern Arizona to L. P. McCrite & Son, Gilbert, Arizona, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The McCrite bid was the lowest of 18 bids received. The others ranged from $41,600 to $193,700.

WASHINGTON – Assistant Secretary–Indian Affairs Larry Echo Hawk today issued a final determination not to acknowledge the petitioner known as the Juaneño Band of Mission Indians (Petitioner #84B) as an Indian tribe. This petitioner, located in Santa Ana, Calif., has 455 members.

Secretary of the Interior Rogers C. B Morton today announced the appointment of Marvin L. Franklin, 56, an Oklahoma City business executive and member of as Assistant to the Secretary for the Iowa Indian Tribe Indian Affairs, a new position in the Interior Department.