OPA

A plan for the use and distribution of $600,000 awarded to the Seneca Nation of Indians by the Indian Claims Commission is being published in the Federal Register, the Bureau of Indian Affairs said today.

The award fa compensation for leased lands within the Allegany Reservation in New York State. The major portion, of the leased lands are within the boundaries of the City of Salamanca.

According to the plan, approved by Congress and made effective February l, 1979, 80 percent of the award will be distributed on a per capita basis to members of the Seneca Nation.

The remaining 20 percent will be invested and used for social purposes. The income from the invested portion plus ten percent of the principal will be used each year, until depleted, for funding and maintenance of the tribe's Day Care Program, Poormaster Fund and other programs.

Indian forest land owners would for the first time have a right of appeal from Indian Bureau decisions on their timber sale contracts under a proposed revision of Federal Regulations announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The proposal include many changes. They would permit any legally interested party to appeal on sale contracts to the Secretary of the Interior. The existing regulations do not specify such an appeal procedure.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs said the revisions also include these five other major changes:

1. For the first time it would be a stated goal of Indian forest management to preserve and develop grazing, wildlife and other values to the extent it would be in the best interests of the Indian landowners.
2. A sustained yield of timber would continue to be emphasized. However, Indian lands requiring such management would be defined for the first time as lands chiefly valuable for forest crop production or on which a forest cover is needed to protect watershed or other values. Lands better suited for farming or other purposes would not be included.
3. A number of detailed changes would be made in the sales procedures to bring them into greater conformity with those of the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management.
4. The revised regulations would make it easier for the Indian owner of a forested tract to cut and sell timber from his own land. Under the present rules .Indian owners are allowed to cut timber for their own use but not for sale.
5. The new rules would also liberalize the cutting of small quantities of timber from Indian lands under permit rather than formal contract. The value of the timber that may be cut under permit in anyone year would be increased from $100 to $200.

About 13,500,000 acres of forested land on Indian reservations, primarily in the Pacific Coast, Rocky Mountain and Lake states, would be affected by the proposed changes. This includes nearly 6,000,000 acres of Indian forest land that is commercially important.

The proposed revision was published in the Federal Register on November 27. Interested parties have until December 27 to submit their views, data and arguments to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Department of the Interior, Washington 25, D. C.

Interior Secretary Cecil D. Andrus today asked Commerce Secretary Juanita Kreps to seek further needed restrictions in the 1979 Pacific Salmon Plan.

Andrus expressed disappointment and concern about the recent action of the Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council which he said earlier this month voted restrictions for ocean fisheries which will be insufficient to provide for conservation and the allocation between ocean and inside fishermen.

Referring to Interior data analyzing the impact of the proposed ocean fishing regulations, Andrus told Secretary Kreps:

"In February, prior to the Council's action to adopt this year's salmon plan, I wrote the Council and recommended significant reductions in the offshore harvest to provide:

1)a greater escapement for conservation purposes, 2) protection of the diminishing wild stocks, 3) a more equitable allocation of fish between the inside and outside fisheries, and 4) a realistic fishery for treaty Indians.

"While the Council took an important step toward meeting these goals, their action falls short to such a degree that in some river systems and parts of Puget Sound, not only will there not be an inside fishery, but wild runs will be threatened and escapement for conservation will not be met.

"Further reductions in the ocean catch will be required this year. I respectfully request that you seek the necessary changes in the salmon plan to protect the fishery and the rights of the inside fishermen."

Interior Department analysis of the proposed ocean fishing regulations was also provided to Secretary Kreps. Fish and wildlife director Lynn Greenwalt concluded from that analysis that "spawning escapement goals will not be met in many areas along the California, Oregon and Washington coast, and that these problems will require inequitable curtailment or closure of inside fisheries in most areas.

Commerce Secretary Kreps must now decide whether to approve the recommendations of the Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council or to modify those recommendations to provide the further restrictions being sought by Secretary Andrus. The Pacific salmon fishing season is set to begin in May.

The Department of the Interior announced today the appointment of Charles J. Rives as superintendent of the San Carlos Indian Agency, San Carlos, Ariz., effective December 13. He succeeds Thomas H. Dodge who transferred last November to the superintendency of the Osage Agency at Pawhuska, Okla. His appointment was recommended by the San Carlos Tribal Council.

Mr. Rives has been serving as soil conservation staff officer at the Navajo Agency, Window Rock, Ariz., Since February 1957. He received his first appointment as soil conservation engineer at the former Southern Plains Agency, Clinton, Oklahoma in July 1949, and has had more than nine years' experience in the Indian Bureau in increasingly responsible positions. In July 1950, he transferred to the Washington Office of the Bureau, as soil conservation engineer in the Branch of Land Operations. In September 1951, he transferred to the San Carlos Agency as soil conservationist. He later became Land Operations Officer at San Carlos before moving over to the Navajo Agency.

Born at Clayton, New Mexico in 1924, Mr. Rives received a degree from the New Mexico A & M College, State College, N. Mex., in agricultural engineering in 1949. He also attended Pre-Flight and Advanced Naval School at San Marcos, Texas, in 1944, and later served in the Air-Transport Command (Military).

Zane O. Browning, a Chickasaw Indian, has been named Superintendent of the Bureau of Indian Affairs Agency at Ardmore, Oklahoma, Interior Assistant Secretary Forrest Gerard announced today.

Browning has been Program Analysis Officer in the BlA's Muskogee Area Office.

The 43-year-old Haskell Indian School alumnus has worked for the Bureau since 1955. He studied Business and Public Administration at Oklahoma State and Oklahoma University. He also completed the Interior's Departmental Management Training Program.

Browning's first BIA job was at Sequoyah School in Oklahoma. He has since worked in various administrative positions in Arizona, New Mexico and Oklahoma.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs has appointed Bernard W. Topash as the field representative for the Siletz Indian Tribe, Interior Assistant Secretary Forrest Gerard announced today.

The position is a newly created office to serve the Oregon Indians who were accorded federally-recognized tribal status by legislation passed November 18, 1977.

Topash, a Snohomish and Potawatomi Indian, has been Administrative Manager of the BIA's Fort Hall Agency in Idaho.

A 41-year-old veteran of the Marine Corps, Topash began his career with He has held increasingly responsible jobs in the Bureau in 1962. Montana, Washington, Minnesota and Idaho.

He is an alumnus of the University of Portland, where he studied Business Administration.

Regulations governing the preparation of a roll of lineal descendants of Michigan and Indiana Potawatomi Indians eligible to share in a judgment award of more than $6 million are being published in the Federal Register, the Bureau of Indian Affairs announced today.

The award, granted by the Indian Claims Commission, is compensation for lands in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan ceded to the United States by the Potawatomi Tribe and Nation of Indians during the treaty making period of 1795 to 1833.

The funds will be shared by members of four organized tribal groups Prairie Band, Citizens Band, Hannahville Indian Community and Forest County Potawatomi Community --and lineal descendants, who are United States citizens, of Michigan and Indiana Potawatomis, including Huron, Pokagon and other bands.

The regulations set forth the procedures for enrollment as a member of this group of lineal descendants. The application deadline is November 15t 1979.

For additional information contact the Superintendent, Michigan Agency, Bureau of Indian Affairs, P.O. Box 884, Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, 49783 (906-632-6809).

Over the years, Hoopa Valley Reservation Indians and all inside fishers have criticized the lack of action restricting the ocean take. The Department addressed this point in February when Secretary Cecil D. Andrus cautioned the Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council (FIRFM) against a proposal to extend the 1977-78 salmon plan, which has implications for the Klamath River and coastwise fisheries.

The 1979 salmon runs are expected to be dangerously low, due to the impact of the 1976 drought, which has adversely affected fish runs from California to Alaska. In his February 7 letter to the PRFM Council Chairman, Andrus stated that the inside fisheries cannot be expected “to bear the conservation burden for all. Fairness alone requires that the ocean fisheries bear their fair share of the conservation burden.” However, the cutback in ocean fishing voted two weeks ago by the PRFM does not solve the conservation problem, and restrictions on river fisheries are still necessary to achieve conservation goals.

The 1979 regulations will take effect on April 1, when the spring run is expected to begin. The comment period closed on March 16. The regulatory procedures may undergo further alteration throughout the year, based on the spring run experience, all available biological data and continuing consultation.

Further information on the regulations can be obtained from: Joe Weller, Superintendent, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Hoopa Agency -P.O. Box 367, Hoopa, California 95546, Telephone (916) 625-4285.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs has appointed Bernard W. Topash as the field representative for the Siletz Indian Tribe, Interior Assistant Secretary Forrest Gerard announced today.

The position is a newly created office to serve the Oregon Indians who were accorded federally-recognized tribal status by legislation passed November 18, 1977.

Topash, a Snohomish and Potawatomi Indian, has been Administrative Manager of the BIA's Fort Hall Agency in Idaho.

A 41-year-old veteran of the Marine Corps, Topash began his career with He has held increasingly responsible jobs in the Bureau in 1962. Montana, Washington, Minnesota and Idaho.

He is an alumnus of the University of' Portland, where he studied Business Administration.

Amendments to Federal regulations which are designed to bring the oil and gas leasing of Indian lands more into conformity with present industrial practices and still provide Indian owners with adequate protection have been approved, the Department of the Interior announced today.

The amendments, as first proposed, were published in the Federal Register May 10, 1958. As the result of comments submitted to the Department by Bureau of Indian Affairs officials, tribal attorneys, oil company representatives and other persons, the amendments were slightly revised before final approval by the Secretary for republication in the Register this week.

The purpose of the amendments is to authorize overriding royalties or payments out of production on oil and gas leases of Indian lands. Such royalties or payments are those paid to a lessee or leaseholder when a lease is assigned and are in addition to the royalties or payments paid to the lessor or landowner. While such "farming out” or releasing of Indian leased land to a third party does not increase the royalty rate received by the lessor or owner, it may promote greater production under the lease and generally tends to increase the negotiable value of such leases. The practice of paying overriding royalties has become common as a method of financing oil and gas developments.

The new amendments safeguard the interests of Indian landowners by placing all parties on notice that agreements creating overriding royalties or payments out of production shall be subject to the condition that all lease requirements must be met. "The existence of agreements creating overriding royalties or payments out of production, whether or not actually paid,“ the new language directs, “shall not be construed as justification for the approval of abandonment of any well.” This should insure diligent development and operation of wells and the plugging abandonment of wells only after possibilities for commercial production have been exhausted, which is the conservation objective desired.

The major change between the proposed amendments and those finally approved by the Secretary lies in the elimination of a proposed requirement that all agreements creating overriding royalties be subject to approval by the Secretary. Comments received on the proposed amendments recommended against this provision as burdensome and unnecessary. The Department agreed that adequate protection would be provided by requiring that "such agreements shall be subject to the condition that nothing in any such agreement shall be construed as modifying any of the obligations of the lessee, including, but not limited to, obligations for diligent development and operation, protection against drainage, compliance with gas and oil operating regulations and the requirement for departmental approval before abandonment of any well." At the same time regulations requiring the Secretary’s approval of assignment of leases have been strengthened by the new amendments.

Interior Secretary Cecil D. Andrus said today that he had reluctantly requested Attorney General Griffin Bell to take legal action to protect the water rights of Indian tribes on five reservations in northern Montana. The suits were filed by the U.S. Department of Justice April 5 in the Federal District Court for Montana.

Andrus said that he asked the Justice Department to file stream adjudication suits in the Federal courts because the Montana legislature was proposing to pass legislation which would give state courts jurisdiction over Indian water rights issues.

"I recommended the action very reluctantly," Andrus said, "since it has been and continues to be my hope that the matter could be settled by negotiation. I want to stress that negotiation is not precluded by the suits and is still possible. While President Carter's water policy supports negotiated agreements for settlement of water disputes, it also supports the position that any litigation of Indian claims should take place in Federal courts."

Andrus said that it was part of his fiduciary responsibility as trustee for the Indians to keep Indian water rights issues in Federal courts ''when and if they had to be settled in court." He said that the United States Constitution initiated the tradition that Indian affairs be handled by the Federal Government rather than state or local governments.

Andrus said the Department's Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Forrest Gerard and Interior Solicitor Leo Krulitz discussed the proposed legislation with Montana Lt. Governor Ted Schwinden, Attorney General Mike Greeley and other Montana officials in January following a meeting with tribal leaders of the state

Gerard, who is himself a Blackfeet Indian from Montana, said that members of his staff have worked closely with the tribal leaders and with state representatives, beginning last fall, to explore possibilities for handling conflicting water claims through negotiation. Re said he had been hopeful that such a process would be developed and Indian water rights issues would not be included in the state legislation.

He also noted that tribal leaders generally accept the Federal court-s as neutral forums for issues that involve a large proportion of a local community but are concerned that "state judges who are elected by a local community are sometimes subjected to political pressures."

Gerard said that his office had suggested amendment of the state bill to provide, in lieu of including tribes within the Montana State jurisdiction process, a resolution of Indian/non-Indian water questions through a state/ tribal compact. He said, "I am disappointed that this was not done. I still think it is very important for all of us to try to build on points of agreement toward negotiated settlements, rather than adopt attitudes of confrontation and dissension."

Defendants in the suits are the State of Montana and ·various persons and entities claiming rights in the water systems.

The four suits filed by the Department of Justice ask for a declaration of the Indian water rights on the Marias, Milk, Poplar and Flathead River systems. The five reservations involved are Flathead, Blackfeet, Rocky Boys, Fort Peck and Fort Belknap.

The other two Montana reservations, Crow and Northern Cheyenne, already are in litigation, in Federal court about water rights on the Tongue and Bighorn River systems.

The Montana bill, SB76, would establish a system to adjudicate all water rights issues in the state.