Past News Items

Interior Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Forrest Gerard announced today that Earl J. Barlow, a Blackfeet Indian, has been appointed Director of the Bureau of Indian Affairs Office of Indian Education.

Barlow has been Superintendent of Schools in Browning, Montana since 1973. He has also served as the Montana State Supervisor of Indian Education and has worked for thirty years as a teacher, principal and education program administrator.

WASHINGTON – Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary – Indian Affairs Lawrence S. Roberts today issued an updated Contract Support Costs (CSC) Policy for the Indian Affairs Manual (IAM). The updated Policy reflects extensive tribal consultation and the work of the Bureau of Indian Affairs’ (BIA) CSC Workgroup, which is comprised of tribal and federal experts.

Secretary of the Interior James Watt today awarded 23,000 timbered acres on Admiralty Island in southeast Alaska to the Sitka-based Shee-Atika Native Corporation in satisfaction of its selection rights under the 10-year-old Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act.

With the salmon spawning run on the Klamath River in California nearly over, the Department of the Interior announced today that it is opening portions of the river to Indian subsistence fishing.

Bureau of Indian Affairs officials from Washington, D.C., will be meeting September 14-17 with Alaska State officials and Alaska Native representatives to discuss a proposed transfer of as many as 20 BIA-operated village schools to state operation in the 1982-83 school year. The Bureau currently operates 39 elementary village schools serving approximately 2,100 students.

Coming to Alaska will be Interior's Deputy Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, Roy H. Sampsel and the BIA's Director of Indian Education Programs Earl Barlow.

The Department of the Interior an the State of California have agreed on a cooperative interim management plan for Klamath River salmon and steel fishery during the 1978 fall run, which has already begun, and the 1979 spring and summer run.

In a joint announcement today. Leo M. Krulitz, Interior Solicitor and A Secretary, ad Huey D. Johnson, California Secretary for Resource, said the agreement will allow the careful management of the fishery now while long-range studies continue.

WASHINGTON, DC – Deputy Secretary of the Interior Mike Connor today announced that nearly $1.5 million in purchase offers have been sent to more than 600 landowners with fractional interests at the Squaxin Island Indian Reservation in Washington through the Department’s Land Buy-Back Program for Tribal Nations (Buy-Back Program). Interested sellers will have until January 26, 2015, to return accepted offers.

Federal, State and Tribal leaders met in Washington on May 6 and 7 to seek solutions to problems concerning the fishery in the northern Great Lakes off Michigan's coastlines.

The group, composed of representatives of the Secretary of the Interior, Michigan Governor's Office and Michigan Department of Natural Resources and leaders of the Bay Mills, Grand Traverse and Sault Ste. Marie Tribes, issued the following statement:

The appointments of three officials to serve in administrative positions on the Navajo Reservation were announced today by Interior Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Forrest Gerard.

Ted S. Koenig was named Assistant Area Director for Resource in the Navajo Area Office.

Albert L. Keller was appointed Supervisory General Engineer for the Navajo Irrigation Project.

Thomas H. Begay was made Superintendent of the Chinle, Agency on the reservation.

WASHINGTON, DC – Assistant Secretary – Indian Affairs Kevin K. Washburn today announced that the Department of the Interior has extended to Nov. 3, 2014, the public comment period on proposed regulations to reform the process by which rights-of-way on Indian lands are approved and managed. He also announced the Department will hold an additional tribal consultation session on the proposed regulations during the week of Oct. 26, 2014, during the National Congress of American Indians 2014 Annual Convention in Atlanta, Ga.