Past News Items

Acting Secretary of the Interior Hatfield Chilson today announced awarding of two contracts totaling $276,803 for road and bridge construction on the Yakima Indian reservation in the State of Washington.

The contracts are as follows:

C &E Construction Company of Yakima, Wash., a contract for $226,995.63 for the construction of a total of 11.059 miles of road; engineer's estimate $242,969.90.

Hans Skov Construction Company of Yakima, $47,807.80 for the construction of four timber pile concrete deck bridges totaling 242 linear feet; engineer's estimate $57,400.80.

WASHINGTON – Assistant Secretary Larry Echo Hawk expressed his deepest condolences to the family and friends of the late Richard M. Milanovich, the Chairman of the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians, praising him as a great American Indian leader who represented his people with heart and soul.

To participate in the Energy Conservation Program, Bureau of Indian Affairs Area Directors have been authorized to extend Christmas vacation in any school under their jurisdiction 14 days -- or until January 21, Morris Thompson, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, announced today.

Time lost if a school is closed until January 21 is to be made up by extending the school year, week, or day, Thompson indicated, adding that he must be informed of whatever program a school that remains closed an added 14 days elects to compensate for time lost.

Because of the warmly sympathetic interest which your National Society has taken in the welfare of our Indian citizens over a period of many years, I consider it a real privilege and an honor that you have invited me to speak to you here today on my favorite subject.

WASHINGTON – Bureau of Indian Affairs Director Michael S. Black today announced that the BIA’s Office of Justice Services (OJS) has created a training program for tribal court judges, prosecutors, clerks and administrators in an effort to improve the administration of justice in Indian Country. The program was developed in collaboration with the University of New Mexico School of Law’s Institute of Public Law (IPL) and Southwest Indian Law Clinic (SILC) and the American Indian Law Center, Inc. (AILC) in Albuquerque, N.M.

Theodore B. White, 52, an enrolled member of the Oglala Sioux and Oneida Indian tribes, has been named Chief Tribal Operations Officer in the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Washington, D. C., the Department of White has already assumed the duties of the Interior announced today his office.

He came to the Washington, D.C.,office from the post of Superintendent of the San Carlos Agency of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Arizona. This agency has jurisdiction over the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation.

Proposed revisions to regulations dealing with the tribal purchase of certain property interests of decedents under special laws applicable to the Yakima Tribes of Washington, the Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation of Oregon, and the Nez Perce Tribe of Idaho are being published in the Federal Register, the Department of the Interior's Office of Hearings and Appeals announced today.

Washington, D.C. – Assistant Secretary-Indian Affairs Larry Echo Hawk today announced he has named Dr. Sherry R. Allison, who is currently the acting president of the Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute located in Albuquerque, N.M., as SIPI President. Dr. Allison, who is an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, had been serving as acting president since January 5, 2009. The appointment is effective December 6, 2009.

A number of gifted American Indian students will be given the chance to go with some of the Nation's leading scientists on world-wide expeditions under an Exploration Scholarship Program of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Marvin L. Franklin, and Assistant to the Secretary of the U. S. Department of the Interior for Indian Affairs, announced today.

"The program began on a pilot basis last year, when 11 American Indian and Alaska Native high school and college students were chosen to participate," Franklin said. "We hope to have as many selected this year."

Awarding of a $40,880 contract to Erhardt Dahl Andersen of Pocatello, Idaho, for preliminary construction work on the Michaud Unit of the Fort Hall (Idaho) Indian Irrigation Project was announced today by the Department of the Interior.