Past News Items

WASHINGTON – Assistant Secretary – Indian Affairs Kevin K. Washburn issued a positive Secretarial Determination for a tribal gaming application for the Kaw Nation of Oklahoma. The determination now goes to the State of Oklahoma for their consideration.

Members of eight Washington State Indian tribes will be provided an extra day each week, under long standing treaty rights, to fish for sockeye and pink salmon this season which begins June 26, the Department of the Interior reported.

Acting Secretary of the Interior Clarence A. Davis today announced that a public hearing will be held at the Osage Indian Agency, Pawhuska, Okla., on September 6 to consider four proposed amendments to the Federal regulations governing the leasing of Osage Reservation lands for oil and gas development.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell will visit South Florida this week for a series of events focused on restoring the health of the Everglades. While there, Jewell will also meet with the Seminole Tribe of Florida to announce a milestone in increasing self-determination and economic development for Native American tribes.

The tribal plan for the use and distribution of $4.5 million awarded to the Yankton Sioux Tribe by the Indian Claims Commission is being published in the Federal Register.

The plan has been approved by Congress and is effective February 7, 1975.

It calls for a per capita distribution of 80 percent of the award to tribal members as of the effective date. It is expected that the tribal roll will have been brought current within 60 days of that date.

After great deliberation and reflection, I have determined that it is in the national interest of the United States to grant a right-of-way for the Trans -Alaska Pipeline which will transport crude petroleum from State lands in northern Alaska to the south coast port of Valdez.

WASHINGTON – The Bureau of Indian Affairs Office of Justice Services (OJS) will hold the second of three training sessions to improve the trial advocacy skills of tribal court judges and prosecutors in dealing with driving-while-intoxicated (DWI) cases. The session, which will provide advanced training in DWI cases, is being held May 1-3 in Flagstaff, Ariz.

The final environmental impact statement on the proposed Navajo-El Paso/Consolidation Coal Lease and Mining Plan on the Navajo Reservation, San Juan County, New Mexico has been completed. Copies of the statement have been filed with the Council on Environmental Quality and a notice of availability published in the Federal Register by the Department of the Interior.

“The machinery we now have for carrying out our trusteeship responsibilities to Indians is inadequate," Interior Secretary Rogers C. B. Morton told a Senate subcommittee today. He urged prompt action on a bill that would establish an Indian Trust Counsel Authority.

WASHINGTON – Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Indian Affairs Larry Echo Hawk joined Rosebud Sioux Tribe President Rodney Bordeaux and a gathering of students and community members on September 27 at a groundbreaking ceremony for the Interior Department’s 4,000th project funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) at the St. Francis Indian School, a Bureau of Indian Education funded school on the Rosebud Sioux Reservation in South Dakota.