OPA

A significant first step toward the resolution of Indian water-rights claims in New Mexico will be taken Monday, April 6, in Albuquerque, N.M., when Chief U.S. District Court Judge John E. Conway signs an order that finally adjudicates the water rights of the Jicarilla Apache Tribe in the Rio Chama Basin in northern New Mexico. The order, which is a Partial Final Judgment and Decree, will determine the tribe's water rights on the east side of its reservation. The signing will take place in the U.S. District Court, 500 Gold SW, 13 floor east courtroom, at 1:30 p.m.

"This settlement provides benefits to numerous water users throughout northern New Mexico," said Tim Vollmann, the chairman of the Federal Negotiating Team. "The tribe worked closely with all the parties in the Rio Chama Basin, addressing their concerns and seeking their support." All objections to entry of the decree were addressed, which enabled Judge Conway to sign the decree without holding a trial on the matter.

Although numerous lawsuits have been filed in New Mexico over the last 30 years to determine the water rights of Indian tribes, this is the first final decree adjudicating such rights in the Rio Grande Basin and its tributaries. Claims of a dozen other Indian tribes are still pending.

The court proceedings that led to the signing of today's decree were a product of the 1992 Jicarilla Apache Tribe Water Rights Settlement Act, which conditioned the settlement on the entry of final decrees in two general stream adjudications, the Rio Chama in federal court, and the San Juan River in state district court in San Juan County, N.M. The state proceedings are still pending.

Under the settlement the Jicarilla Apache Tribe entered into a federal contract with Interior Secretary Manuel Lujan in December 1992 to provide the tribe with a share of federal project water from the Navajo Reservoir in northwestern New Mexico and from the San Juan Chama Project. The latter project delivers water to the tribe and other contractors at Heron Reservoir, located on the eastern boundary of the tribe's reservation.

The proposed decree was the subject of a motion filed jointly by the tribe, the federal government, and the state engineer in 1995. Numerous public meetings were held in the Town of Espanola, the Village of Abiquiu, and other locations within the Rio Chama Basin in 1996-97 to ensure that water users were fully informed of the terms of the tribe's water-rights settlement.

The Interior Department has five other Negotiating Teams working to resolve Indian water-rights claims in the State of New Mexico. These include the claims of Taos Pueblo, the claims of three pueblos on the Rio Jemez north of Albuquerque, and the' claims of four pueblos on the Rio Pojoaque, which are located north of Santa Fe, where litigation has been pending since 1966.

A Tribal-State gaming compact between the Pala Band of Mission Indians and the State of California was approved Saturday, April 25, by Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Kevin Gover and will take effect when the notice is published in the Federal Register. "I want to stress that this compact applies only to the future gaming operation of the Pala Band of Mission Indians," said Assistant Secretary Gover. "The terms and conditions of this compact are binding only on the State and the Pala Band. Representatives of the State have confirmed that other California Tribes are free to assess whether the provisions of this compact are appropriate for inclusion in their compact with the State.

The State has an obligation under the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA) to negotiate in "good faith" with each tribe requesting a compact. Because circumstances vary from tribe to tribe, our approval of this compact cannot and does not mean that the State meets its obligation of good-faith negotiating merely by offering identical compacts to other tribes. Based on our conversations with representatives of the State, we do not expect that the State will insist on provisions that are not reasonable given the circumstances of other tribes."

During the review process, several amendments were made to the Pala compact and subsequently approved by the Pala Band and the State of California. The amendments address issues that arose during the review process. The Bureau of Indian Affairs' review of the compact concludes that the agreement does not violate IGRA, Federal law, or the Bureau's trust responsibility. The compact allows the Pala Band an allocation of 199 lottery devices that it can either operate itself or license to other tribes to operate.

Twenty-eight Bureau of Indian Affairs schools in four states will officially become on-ramps to the information superhighway this Saturday, May 16, 1998. Access Native America Net Day will officially move Indian schools in Arizona, New Mexico, South Dakota, and Mississippi on-line and provide the students of these schools with access to the Internet through the Department of the Interior's network.

Celebrations are planned at all the schools with major event sites located at one school in each state. The Cottonwood School in Chinle, Arizona, will serve as the event site for the Navajo Nation; Jemez Pueblo Day School will serve New Mexico; Little Wound School in Kyle, South Dakota, will serve the Oglala Lakota Nation on the Pine Ridge Reservation; and the Red Water School in Carthage, Mississippi, will serve the Mississippi Choctaw Nation. Events will include cultural performances by students, presentations from members of the Net Day Planning Team, and an on-line event from the four schools. A show-and-tell of the web sites created by the students at all of the newly connected schools will be featured.

Many of the schools served by the Bureau of Indian Affairs are located in rural, impoverished areas where access to telephone lines and computers is limited by distance, poverty, and a lack of service that most Americans take for granted. "This is why it is so important we provide the technology of the 21st century to these children," said Kevin Gover, Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs. "Our children do not have the same opportunities to take field trips to museums, zoos, or libraries. The Internet, and projects like Access Native America Net Day, bring the museums, the zoos, and libraries to Indian children."

Access to the Internet for students in Indian schools will broaden their horizons with instant links to all of the information on the Internet while also serving a strong social purpose. From the Internet, they will be able to communicate with other Indian children who may be experiencing similar problems. Peter Camp, an education specialist in the Office of Indian Education Programs and a Net Day coordinator, explains the importance of the Internet on isolated reservations: "If our kids are to participate in society they have to have the technology. Its absolutely critical. Indian children often are gripped by the feeling of isolation, that they are the only Indians left. With the creation of web pages and links between the schools, the kids are learning more about other Indian children, and gaining a new sense of hope. There is a definite lack of coverage of modem Indian issues, and this can help our kids know they are not alone," said Camp. Access Native America Net Day is a public-private collaboration between the Bureau of Indian Affairs and corporate and foundation sponsors including Intel, Microsoft, Toshiba, UPS, Los Alamos National Laboratories, and foundations like the Annenberg Rural Challenge, and the One 2 One Indigenous Learning Center.

Through the cooperation of these entities and the participation of programs such as Students Recycling Used Technology, the computers and training for their use were provided for the students involved in Net Day activities. Through the cooperation and generosity of these corporate and foundation sponsors more than a million dollars in hardware and software has been donated. Through the StRUT program, students at the Santa Fe Indian School, with the guidance and training supplied by the Los Alamos National Laboratories and Intel, built computers used by the Access Native America Net Day program. To help the newly networked schools maximize their connections Microsoft Corp. donated software and training resources to the Access Native America Net Day schools. Each school received FrontPage' 98, Microsoft's Web site creation and management tool: Internet solutions for K-12 CD, a comprehensive set of industry-leading tools and resources designed to enhance school and classroom Internet connections, training guides, including In and Out of the Classroom with FrontPage' 98, self-guided lessons to make it easy to use FrontPage as a classroom tool; and Microsoft's full Academic Training Pack, which contains training materials for educators that cover a range of technology solutions for schools. In addition through its work with StRUT Microsoft is providing Windows 95 and Microsoft Office 97 for the schools.

"Microsoft's support of Native American Net Day is part of our continuing effort to build a global Connected Learning Community, where all students have access to technology and the tools that support learning today and for a lifetime," said Kathryn Yates, director of Microsoft K-12 programs. "We are pleased to be a part of the community that is helping connect the students in these rural Native American schools to the vast resources of the Internet."

"Access Native America Net Day is already a success, but it is only a first step," said Assistant Secretary Gover. "The goal of the Bureau of Indian Affairs is to connect all 185 BIA operated schools to the Internet by the year 2000. Work on Net Day 99 begins next Monday. Our children are the national treasures of the Tribes, and the Internet is too important to their future for them to be left behind."

Bison and the American Indian people have a symbiotic relationship that needs to be honored and respected. After a visit to the Ft. Belknap Indian reservation in Montana, Assistant Secretary Kevin Gover is encouraging American Indians everywhere to let their voices be heard in determining the outcome of the current controversy over the management of the bison herd in Yellowstone National Park.

At the request of the Inter-Tribal Bison Cooperative, a BIA-sponsored program working to restore buffalo to Tribal lands, and the Assiniboine and Gros Ventre Tribes of the Ft. Belknap reservation, Gover toured the Tribes' bison-restoration and prairie-conservation project and came away impressed. "It is amazing how the restoration of the buffalo to native lands has impacted this Tribe and the other Tribes that have undertaken similar efforts," said Gover. The restoration of the buffalo to American Indian lands has been a great success for the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Inter-Tribal Bison Cooperative. Many American Indians believe that when the buffalo is returned to its rightful healthy place among the Tribes, that the Tribes will also rise again to health: spiritually, economically and physically. "Most people do not fully understand that the spiritual connection between the Tribes and this majestic animal is more than symbolic," stated Gover, "We are seeing a rebirth of spirit and pride among the Tribes and it is not coincidental that this is coming with the return of the bison to Tribal lands."

The ITBC has been engaged with the Department of the Interior, the Department of Agriculture, and the State of Montana in the current crisis over the bison herd at Yellowstone National Park. Two winters ago, the State of Montana killed nearly one-third of the Yellowstone bison herd when they left the park in search of winter forage. This slaughter was extremely offensive to American Indians, and ITBC has been working to ensure a slaughter like this can never happen again. So far, the Tribes have not been allowed a place at the table while this issue is being decided. The Departments of the Interior and Agriculture, and the State of Montana recently released an Environmental Impact Statement concerning the management of the Yellowstone herd, and the period for public comment allows American Indians the opportunity for their voices to be heard. Gover encouraged all Tribal members to raise their voices during the public comment period. "The Tribes deserve a place at the table when this issue is decided," stated Gover, "I will do everything I can to protect our brothers the buffalo, but it will take all of our voices to make a difference." Gover stated that the bison need to be treated like wild animals and allowed to roam, but if the parties involved will not agree to natural ranging of the bison, that the Tribes should be involved in the solution. "For centuries, the bison provided for our people, now it is our tum. The American Indian is the natural guardian of the bison."

In an address to the Building Economic Self-Determination in Indian Communities conference today, Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Kevin Gover attacked the lack of jobs and opportunities on Indian reservations, and pointed out some of the major barriers to economic development on the reservation. "Unemployment on Indian reservations is 49%*. Nearly half of our people are not working, because there are not enough jobs, and not nearly enough opportunity in Indian country. What would happen if half of America were unemployed? During the Great Depression, the answer was to put America back to work through the Works Progress Administration. But instead of a WPA program to provide Indian jobs, we see only shortsighted rhetoric attacking the Tribes and their right to govern themselves.

There are many impediments to progress on the reservation, not the least of which are the attempts by the States to tax and regulate all activities on Indian lands. "States and localities regularly say hat they are putting money into Indian country and not getting anything in return, but nothing could be further from the truth. States contribute less than $226 million in direct assistance to the Tribes. American Indians living on the reservations spend $3 .1 billion off the reservations, Tribal governments spend $1.2 billion on goods and services and reservation based businesses spend $4.4 billion off the reservation." This amounts to $8.7 billion dollars being pumped into State economies directly from American Indians. 'This amount is generated with almost half of American Indians unemployed. We can double these figures if we are successful in creating jobs and economic opportunity for American Indians." State and local taxation, and attempts by Congress to diminish Tribal sovereignty also are dangerous impediments to creating more opportunities for American Indians. "The Tribes are at once being told by the Federal government to pull themselves up by the bootstraps, while at the same time being deprived of the ability to use tax and regulatory policy as economic development tools," stated Gover, 'This is not right, and should not be encouraged. There is a theory that every dollar going to an American Indian falls into a black hole, never to be heard from again, this unfortunately is a ridiculous but widespread concept." Gover pledged the resources of the Bureau of Indian Affairs to create $500 million of new jobs and opportunities for American Indians over the next five years. "We are going to aggressively move forward to create new jobs, streamlining loan processes, and offering technical assistance to Tribes and individual American Indians interested in creating new businesses on the reservation."

After several hearings about the need for more police on Tribal lands and the severe need for school construction and repair funds in Indian Country, the Senate Subcommittee on Interior Appropriations cut the President Clinton's request to fund the needs of the American Indian people for law enforcement and school construction by more than $140 million.

Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Kevin Gover was disappointed to learn that after the concern expressed by many members of the Congress, the subcommittee made these drastic cuts in the President's budget request for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. "We presented a very clear picture of the need for more law enforcement personnel, and the necessity of new and safe schools for Indian children. While many members agreed that these were a priority, the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee did not choose to budget the money in these areas." Gover also said, "American Indian communities have less than one-fourth of the police protection of comparable-sized communities. The safety of these Tribal communities is at stake, but we cannot provide more police officers without more money."

"Budget time is a difficult time, and hard decisions need to be made," said Gover. "The Administration hoped the Committee shared our interest in finding solutions to the problems of inadequate law enforcement and crumbling schools on the reservations. We were hopeful that the Tribes would receive the funding necessary to create solutions to these very serious problems." "The reservation schools are old, and there are many of these schools that are literally dangerous to our students. The President's budget was calculated to provide enough money to begin to solve the problem. The Subcommittee seemed to share in the need to fund this construction process, but it did not show up in the bill."

An emergency created by a historic lack of salmon in the Bristol Bay area of Alaska has created the need for emergency funding from the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, Kevin Gover announced today the Bureau of Indian Affairs would immediately release $206,000 to be used for emergency assistance to the hundreds of Native Alaskans dependent on the salmon harvest in the Bristol Bay area. ·

"Emergencies come in many forms, they are not just hurricanes ·and tornadoes," Gover stated, "The salmon harvest in Bristol Bay has been the smallest in 20 years; and this will lead to suffering among the Native Alaskans, as surely as if a hurricane had hit the area." Many Native Alaskans depend on the salmon catch as their only source of income, and as the primary means of feeding their families through the Alaska winter. This year's poor harvest means that without some assistance, many Alaska Natives may go hungry this winter. "This is only a small amount of assistance, but it can be used immediately by the Native Alaskans for emergency food, shelter and clothing. We tend to see disasters and emergencies in the terms of storms that blow in and destroy, but the lack of salmon in the nets of Native Alaskans will create emergency conditions in the months to come if we do not act now. The lack of fish in this year’s catch is a true disaster even though it is not as dramatic as the destruction of a storm."

This year's dismal catch, worth less than one third of an average annual catch, has created hardship for Alaska Natives dependent on the salmon. Last year's catch was also below projections, and the accumulated debt of two substandard years is causing many Native Alaskans to look at a winter without enough food, fuel oil, or clothing to face the - winter ahead. "The amount of money here is simply not enough", stated Gover, "But by quick delivery and distribution, possibly we can help see the Native Alaskans through until more relief funds can be found."

Education for American Indian children, safety for Indian reservation residents, the restoration of the environment and a continuation of the remarkable comeback of an American icon lead the way in President Clinton's Fiscal Year 2000 budget request for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The FY 2000 budget request for the BIA is 1.9 billion dollars; an increase of $155.6 million above the 1999 enacted level. "This budget represents the wishes of the Tribal leaders across America for the needs of their people, and is a positive step toward preserving and protecting the needs of the 7th generation of the American Indian people since the reservation system began," stated Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, Kevin Gover. "These steps are necessary and we are very pleased with this year's budget. This is an important step, but we are still a very long way from bringing the quality of reservation life up to the level most of America now enjoys."

The federal government holds direct responsibility for the education of students in two school systems: the Department of Defense school system for the children of military personnel stationed overseas, and the BIA school system for children on American Indian reservations. Over the years, the schools in Indian country have been neglected. This budget requests major new funding to repair and replace schools in Indian country.

A study by the Inspector General's office determined that Indian schools were in significantly worse shape than even inner city schools. The backlog of repairs necessary to BIA schools is growing and now exceeds $740 million. Although the Bureau of Indian Affairs was recently awarded a "Hammer award for reducing by 50 percent the time it takes to plan, design, and construct new schools on Indian reservations by the National Performance Review, a massive amount of funding will be required to fix the problems that years of neglect created. Throughout Indian country, children are learning in schools that present serious health and safety threats. Many schools have leaking roofs, peeling paint, overcrowded classrooms, inadequate heating and cooling systems or are conducted in trailers too old and unsafe to sustain continued use in a school environment. The Bureau of Indian Affairs funds 185 schools in Indian country, and the most of these schools are more than thirty years old. The design life for a modern school building is twenty-five years. "Indian children are getting a 21st century education in what might as well be 19th century buildings" said Gover, "Our children deserve safe and decent learning environments. This budget is a step toward correcting the terrible situation where our children may be learning on a state of the art computer in a building where the roof is falling in." The school construction and repair request includes $75.9 million to replace Seba Dalkai School on the Navajo reservation in Arizona and Fond Du Lac Ojibway school in Minnesota and complete urgently needed repair work at existing facilities.

The budget also proposes a School Modernization initiative that would provide $400 million in bond issuance authority for tribal governments over two years. Tribal governments could use this authority to issue zero interest bonds to investors who would receive tax credits for the life of the bond in lieu of interest. "In traveling throughout Indian country, the most common request I hear from Tribal leaders is the need for new schools on their reservations. Up until now, it has not been possible to even consider building new schools, because the money has simply not been there in our yearly appropriations. The School Construction initiative will allow Tribes to move quickly to get schools financed and built, providing a safe, quality learning environment for their children," said Gover.

Inside the schools, the proposed budget for the BIA increases the budget for school operations $27.5 million over 1999 to a total investment of $503.6 million. The United States has a special historic responsibility for the education of Indian children, as was reaffirmed by the President's Executive Order 13096 on American Indian and Alaska Native Education. In this order, the Clinton Administration committed to improving the academic performance and reducing the dropout rate of Indian students. The order set forth six goals, including improved reading and mathematics, increased high school completion, improved science education, and expanded the use of educational technology. The increase in the School Operations budget will cover additional costs for teachers, transportation, and operations due to the growing student population in Indian country.

Fifty-three-thousand students are educated in the BIA school system, in some of the most remote and isolated reservations in the country. Assistant Secretary Gover credited this}ncrease as a wise investment in the future. "This is a great investment in our 7th generation. These students will become the tribal leaders, artists, lawyers, doctors and scribes of the American Indian people. This generation will be the group who will defeat the many problems plaguing Indian country, and their safety and education is the highest priority of this Administration." Part of this increase will also be dedicated to linking every BIA school to the Internet through a partnership with industry giants and the Access Native America program. Internet teaching is especially important in Indian country, because there are very few opportunities for field trips to museums, libraries and other cultural attractions. "The best part of this job is working with our children and seeing the pride on their faces as they show us their schools and their accomplishments," said Gover. "To look into the eyes of these children is to see into the future of the American Indian people. We simply cannot do enough in the areas of education, child protection, and fighting alcohol and drug abuse among our children."

The second major concern addressed by the FY 2000 budget is public safety on the reservations. While violent crime has decreased across most of America, Indian country has experienced a startling rise in violent crime on the reservation. A joint report between the Department of Justice and the Department of Interior showed Indian country law enforcement receives about one fourth the resources of most rural law enforcement agencies. This lack of resources has translated into a lack of police patrols, inferior radio systems, lack of jail space, and even the absence of 911 service on many reservations. While most Americans expect a response time in minutes when calling for help from the police, on many reservations, the response time is measured in hours and in some cases even days. Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Kevin Gover says this is simply unacceptable. "No community can prosper unless its people feel safe in their homes. For far too long, Indian people have not been afforded the same protection for their homes and their families as other Americans." In last year's budget, Congress provided $20.0 million for BIA to begin addressing the law enforcement needs of Indian country. This year, the Administration is requesting another $20 million increase for the continuation of this multi-year presidential initiative. "This year's request constitutes the second investment in our commitment to bringing Indian law enforcement up to par with the rest of America," Gover said, "Last year the BIA spent 90% of the additional funds to provide the Tribes in the greatest need with more cops on the reservation. But we still need more cars, a communications system that will actually work, and even more cops to guarantee the safety of our public safety officers, and the residents of the reservations." The program increase will be invested in the hiring of more criminal investigators and uniformed police officers, upgrading radio systems, and strengthening basic detention services.

An additional $2.6 million increase has been slated for use to strengthen tribal court systems. Along with the increase in BIA funding for Indian country law enforcement and public safety comes a requested increase in the Department of Justice (DOJ) for law enforcement on reservations. The DOJ money would be distributed through a grant program to Tribes.

The BIA's most basic responsibility is the management of lands held in trust for Indian Tribes and Indian people. The BIA is responsible for accounting for the land, allowing for its use at its greatest possible value, and distributing income to its owners. The BIA manages over 55 million acres of land (including 18 million acres of forest), 170,000 individual tracts of land, 100,000 active leases, 350,000 land owners and 2 million owner interests. By comparison, if you put all the trust land in one parcel, it would cover all of the District of Columbia, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Connecticut. "The central responsibility of the Bureau of Indian Affairs is the management and protection of Indian trust assets. Sadly, the United States has failed historically to provide the funds needed. This has been the case for many decades. The Clinton administration and Secretary Babbitt are the first to attack this longstanding problem in a systematic and comprehensive manner. With Congress' help, we can establish a trust management system that will meet our trust responsibilities well into the next century," said Assistant Secretary Gover. The resources allocated in this budget are designed to close the books on Indian trust management problems as we enter the next century by completing the replacement of core trust management systems, including the complete computerization and cleanup of all trust records in the Trust Asset and Accounting Management System (TAAMS). The 2000 budget request includes $100 million dollars for the Office of Special Trustee, which will provide $65.3 million for continued implementation of the Trust Management Improvement Project. "The TAAMS project is the largest single modernization program ever attempted by the BIA, and we will be successful. The TAAMS program is our chance to demonstrate to the Tribes and Congress the management expertise of the BIA. When the necessary resources are provided for this -"extremely important responsibility to the Tribes and the American Indian people," said Gover, "It truly is a matter of trust."

The protection of the environment is a long-standing principle of the Tribes, who for centuries have believed deeply in the protection of the earth and appropriate use of resources. This principle is universally held among American Indian people who have long understood that harmony with the earth belongs to those who recognize themselves as part of the ecosystem, and not as the masters of it. In this year's budget, a $3 million increase for environmental programs has been included in the BIA budget. Assistant Secretary Gover commented on the American Indian tradition of conservation and environmentalism, "For generations, the keepers of the hidden knowledge, available to all, but seen and sought out by only a few, have been American Indians. The heritage and mythology of America come from the first Americans, the Tribes, who have understood for centuries that the preservation and protection of the earth is for the benefit of all."

Also within the budget is a $1 million appropriation for a "Bring Back the Bison" program within the BIA. American bison and the American Indian are symbiotically linked. The bison, due to a misguided Federal policy designed to subdue the Tribes at the end of the last century, were within a breath of being exterminated at the beginning of the century. Tribes of the Northern and Southern Plains, along with Tribes in the Northwest and Southwest, have begun a program to reestablish the bison on Indian lands. The program has been extremely successful, reestablishing not only the bison, but also the buffalo culture and Tribal spiritual practices, and creating of hundreds of jobs for Tribal members raising and caring for the buffalo. Gover, a descendent of the Pawnee and Comanche Tribes, articulated the meaning of this program to the American Indian people. "At the turn of the last century, there was little doubt that American Indians and the buffalo would be a thing of the past. But we have both survived. It is important to grow and maintain our bison, and along with the bison, the health and prosperity of the Tribes. This is important not just as a link to the past, but also as a gateway into the next millennium."

The Department of the Interior will publish final regulations to deal with Indian gaming compact negotiations between States and Tribes when Tribes have exhausted other federal judicial remedies. A final rule has been sent to the Federal Register for publication. The new regulation will only apply in cases where Tribes and States have been unable to voluntarily negotiate Class III gaming compacts and where States otherwise allow Class III gaming activities and when States assert immunity from lawsuits to resolve the dispute.

The final regulation is the result of an extensive public process that began with the publication of an Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, published in the Federal Register in May, 1996, and a Proposed Rule in January, 1998.

"The vast majority of compacts negotiated between States and Tribes during the past 10 years have been negotiated voluntarily and in a spirit of good faith,"Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Kevin Gover explained. "We do not believe that the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act envisioned giving States a veto power over Class III Indian gaming when other Class III gaming activities take place within their borders. The new regulation addresses only this narrow issue and seeks to level the playing field once again in these rare circumstances."

The Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988 (IGRA) mandated a process of judicially supervised mediation when States and Tribes were unable to negotiate a compact. However, since the Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Florida decision in the U.S. Supreme Court in April, 1996, Indian Tribes have been unable to request judicial mediation if States asserted sovereign immunity. The final regulation lays out a process for mediation under those narrow circumstances, seeking State involvement in developing any gaming procedures that might ensue. The final rule does not alter the qualifications necessary for land acquisition for off-reservation Indian gaming.

In addition, State law would continue to govern the 'scope of gaming' permitted in any procedures proposed by the Department to resolve Indian gaming compact disputes. This policy is consistent with the Department's position that IGRA does not authorize classes or forms of Indian gaming in any State where they are affirmatively prohibited.

More than 200 compacts between Tribes and States for Class III gaming have been successfully negotiated in good faith and implemented in 24 States since the passage of the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act in 1988.

The Department of the Interior is proposing to amend the federal regulations used in determining whether to take land into trust on behalf of Indians. The proposed amendments will be published in the Federal Register on Monday, April 12. Their publication will open up a 90-day period of public comment.

Historically, tribal ownership of lands set aside as Indian reservations was seriously eroded by the federal governments allotment policies in the late 19th Century. Recognizing that loss of tribal lands had resulted in serious degradation of the social welfare and economic opportunity for Indian people, Congress in 1934 authorized the Secretary of the Interior to take land in trust for the benefit of Indians. Since that time, however, only approximately eight percent of the lands lost through allotment have been re-acquired. The overwhelming majority of applications to take land in trust are for lands located within the boundaries of Indian reservations and involve small parcels of land, on average about 30 acres.

Federal regulations governing the process by which the Secretary of the Interior decides whether to take land into trust for Indians were first published in 1980 (25 C.F.R. Part 151). The Department now proposes to amend the Part 151 regulations to provide tribes and their non-Indian neighbors with a clearer understanding of how the Department reviews requests to take land into trust.

"In restructuring the regulations, we believe that the decision-making process will better reflect the present day needs and concerns of Indian tribes and surrounding non-Indian communities," Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt said.

The proposed revisions underscore clear differences in policy regarding the need to re-acquire land in trust on reservations versus trust land off reservation.

• On reservation: The policy of the Department is to assist tribes in the re-acquisition of land within reservation boundaries. To accomplish this, the process by which land may be returned to trust status has been streamlined and there is a strong presumption established in favor of the applicant.
• Off reservation: The Department is committed to addressing the impact on non-Indian communities affected by proposed acquisitions of off-reservations lands. Jurisdictional, economic, zoning and other related concerns must be adequately resolved within an application to take off reservation land into trust under the new proposed regulations before the Department considered acting favorably on the request.

In addition, the proposed regulations clarify how the Department will address a number of more specialized issues related to taking land into trust. For example, the proposed amendments to Part 151 delineate the procedure by which the Department will process "mandatory acceptances of title." Mandatory acceptances of title are trust acquisitions where Congress, by explicit direction in statute, requires the Secretary to take lands into trust for Indians through the administrative process.

Finally, the proposed regulations address the unique difficulties encountered by tribes that do not have a reservation. New provisions are included that set out a process using Tribal Land Acquisition Areas approved by the Secretary to give tribes without reservations access to same policy benefits within the new regulations for on reservation trust acquisitions.

After the regulations are published, Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Kevin Gover plans a series of regional meetings with tribes and other outreach opportunities during the public comment period. Information on his activities can be obtained through Nedra Darling in the Bureau of Indian Affairs at 202/219-4150.

Informational materials on the proposed regulations are available on the 'Department of the Interior's and the Bureau of Indian Affairs' web sites.