Past News Items

WASHINGTON, D.C.—Deputy Secretary of the Interior David J. Hayes today announced Billings, Montana as the location for the first of six regional government-to-government tribal consultations regarding the Trust Land Consolidation component of the Cobell Settlement.

Ronald L. Esquerra, an enrolled member of the Chemehuevi Indian Tribe, has been appointed Director of the bureau of Indian Affair’s Albuquerque Area, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson announced today.

Esquerra, 31, has been Executive Assistant to Commissioner Thompson the past two years. He will report Albuquerque in mid-June. He succeeds Walter O. Olson retired in 1974.

"Ron has been my right hand," Thompson said. "I know he has the ability to handle the important responsibilities of the Albuquerque Area. He has proven his competence."

Secretary of the Interior Fred A. Seaton today announced the Bureau of Indian Affairs has awarded contracts totaling $51,582 to furnish transformers, substation equipment and steel framework for a substation at the Portneuf pumping station of the Michaud Irrigation Division near Pocatello, Idaho.

The contracts were for $31,187 to the R. E. Uptegraff Manufacturing Company, Scottdale, Pennsylvania, and for $20,395 to Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Portland, Oregon.

The Uptegraff and Westinghouse combination bid compares with the next lower acceptable bid of $60,300.

RAPID CITY, S.D. — The fourth government-to-government tribal consultation regarding the Indian Affairs Administrative Organizational Assessment Draft Report and Bureau of Indian Affairs and Bureau of Indian Education streamlining plans starts Thursday, May 3, 2012 at the Holiday Inn Rapid City – Rushmore Plaza, S.D. The two-day consultation is the fourth of seven that will take place around the country in Arizona, Florida, Washington, Oklahoma, California and Alaska. The first was held in Miami on April 12 and 13, 2012.

Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson has announced the appointment of Joe M. Parker, a Chickasaw Indian, as Superintendent of the Bureau of Indian Affairs Tahlequah, Oklahoma Agency. Parker, who has been Acting Superintendent at the Agency since January 12, replaces Joe Ragsdale who has retired.

Secretary of the Interior Fred A. Seaton has submitted a proposed bill to Congress that would equalize the value of tribal property divided among members of the Ague Caliente Band of Indians on the Palm Springs Reservation in California.

The legislation was developed after numerous conferences with the Ague Caliente Band. It would affect 92 Indians, 31 adults and 61 minors," who live in and around the resort community of Palm Springs. Also affected would be undivided tribal properties estimated to be worth over $12,000,000.

WASHINGTON – Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar and Attorney General Eric Holder today announced the settlement of lawsuits filed by 41 federally-recognized tribes against the United States, in which the tribes alleged that the Department of the Interior and the Department of the Treasury had mismanaged monetary assets and natural resources held in trust by the United States for the benefit of the tribes.

Plans for the use and distribution of $4.9 million awarded by Indian Claims Commission to the Western Apache Indians are being published in the Federal Register, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson announced today.

The award, for lands taken by the United States without compensation between 1873 and 1902, will be divided equally between the White Mountain Apache Tribe and the San Carlos Apache Tribe as present-day successors of the Western Apaches.

Award of a contract for grading, draining and crushed-gravel surfacing of 13.4 miles of road on the Lower Brule Indian Reservation in Lyman County, S. Dak., to R. C. Van Houten and Sons, Rapid City, . S. Dak., was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

Van Houten's bid of $112,882.94 was the lowest of eight received. The others ranged from $115,985.94 to $168,140.82.

WASHINGTON, D.C.— Bureau of Indian Education-funded schools can now apply for the U.S. Department of Education’s Green Ribbon School program (ED-GRS), which provides national recognition for schools using outstanding environmental programs and techniques, BIE Director Keith Moore announced today.