Past News Items

Secretary of the Interior Douglas McKay today said the Department has submitted for congressional consideration a series of bills providing for orderly termination of Federal administration of Indian Affairs in eight tribal jurisdictions.

WASHINGTON – The National Park Service has proposed to modify the regulation governing the gathering of plants in national parks. The rule would allow members of federally recognized Indian tribes with traditional associations to areas within specific units of the National Park System to gather and remove plants or plant parts for traditional purposes.

Secretary of the Interior Cecil D. Andrus today announced two top Indian Affairs appointments in the Department of the Interior.

George Vincent Goodwin, Jr., a member of the White Earth Chippewa Tribe now a Bureau of Indian Affairs Area Director at Minneapolis, was named Deputy Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, and Thomas w. Fredericks, a member of the Mandan-Hidatsa Tribe, was appointed Associate Solicitor for Indian Affairs.

Secretary of the Interior Rogers C.B.Morton, expressed "concern" today over recent events in Gordon, Nebraska, following the death of Mr. Raymond Yellow Thunder, an Oglala Sioux of the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota.

The Secretary noted that five persons were arrested and charged under a State law by local officials in Gordon, Neb., with various counts of false, imprisonment and manslaughter following the death of Mr. Yellow Thunder.

Dear Tribal Leader:

A plan for the use of $7 million awarded to the Jicarilla Apache Indian Tribe by the Indian Claims Commission is being published in the Federal Register, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson announced today.

The award represents payment for claims of the Jicarilla Apache Tribe against the United States for the general accounting of tribal funds and properties which the Federal Government controlled and managed since the last century.

Clarence W. Ringey, superintendent of the Umatilla Indian Agency, Pendleton, Oreg., will move to the comparable position at Western Washington Agency, Everett, Wash., on July 17 and will be replaced on July 31 by William E. Ensor, Jr., administrative officer of the Cherokee Agency, Cherokee, N.C., the Bureau of Indian Affairs announced today.

At Western Washington Mr. Ringey succeeds Melvin L. Robertson who transfers July 14 to be superintendent of the Menominee Agency, Keshena, Wis.

Washington, D.C. - Today, the Departments of Justice, Interior and Agriculture applauded the bipartisan House passage of the Claims Settlement Act. The Act, which recently passed the Senate, will provide long-awaited funding for the agreements reached in the Pigford II lawsuit, brought by African American farmers; the Cobell lawsuit, brought by Native Americans over the management of Indian trust accounts and resources; and four separate water rights suits made by Native American tribes. President Obama has said that he will sign the legislation into law.

Wyman J. McDonald, a member of the Flathead Indian Tribe, has been appointed Superintendent of the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Mescalero Agency in New Mexico. His appointment will be effective March 30.

He has been since 1971 executive director of Tri-State Tribes, Inc., in Billings Montana. This organization has been involved in training and other work with Indian Community Action Programs in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho.

Tribes of the Salt and Gila River Indian Reservations in Arizona will use satellite and high altitude aircraft photography to aid in the management of, reservation lands and resources, the Department of the Interior announced today.

The project linked to the Interior Department's EROS (Earth Resources Observation Systems) program, technically administered by the U. S. Geological Survey, is aimed at using conventional photography and other remote sensing data that will be relayed by a NASA earth resources survey satellite, which is scheduled for launching before summer.