Past News Items

HHFA-OA-No. 61-240

(00 2-4433)

Housing Administrator Robert C. Weaver today announced approval of a loan of $166,600 to build a housing-for-the-elderly project in the middle of the 2,000,000-acre Pine Ridge Indian reservation in southwest South Dakota.

The project was initiated by leaders of the Oglala-Sioux Tribe of Indians most of whose 12,000 members live on the reservation.

Bena MN – The Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke was among the dignitaries to speak at the dedication of the newly constructed Bug-O-Nay-Ge-Shig High School on the Leech Lake reservation, a replacement building resulting from the combination of efforts made over 25 years. The new building replaces the metal clad pole barn, a structure originally built as an auto mechanic shop and bus garage. It lacked proper insulation that made regular classroom sessions difficult during Minnesota’s harsh winters.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs' 1981 budget request has been reduced by ~40.2 million as a part of the President's anti-inflation program. The President's revised budget proposals, sent to Congress March 31, cut some $15 billion from the total U.S. budget he proposed to Congress on January 28. The proposed cuts for the Bureau call for the closing of two off-reservation boarding schools, Stewart Indian School in Nevada and Fort Sill Indian School at Lawton, Oklahoma.

Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall stated today that the revised budget estimate for fiscal year 1962 which President Kennedy submitted to the Congress is a great step forward in the Administration's programs in conserving and developing our Nation's natural and human resources.

"The request for additional appropriation of $40,668,000 over the amount submitted by the previous administration", he said, “will launch a vigorous resources program.”

WASHINGTON – As part of President Obama’s Generation Indigenous (“Gen-I”) initiative to remove barriers to success for Native American youth, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary – Indian Affairs Lawrence S.

Secretary of the Interior Cecil D. Andrus announced today the appointment of Sidney L. Mills as the Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, effective January 19, 1980, when Assistant Secretary Forrest J. Gerard leaves the Department.

Gerard announced his resignation December 11 to return to private business.

Award of a $34,193 contract for improvement to the water supply system at Shiprock, New Mexico, on the Navajo Indian Reservation was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The contract provides for approximately 2,000 feet of water main, and for the construction of a water treatment plant with a capacity of 750,000 gallons per day. This work is the second phase of a project to provide adequate water supply at Shiprock for a recently completed Indian hospital, a 1,000-pupil Indian boarding school and a sub-agency headquarters of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Assistant Secretary – Indian Affairs Kevin K. Washburn today announced that the Department of the Interior has finalized updates to Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) regulations on Secretarial elections for tribal governments that will, among other things, protect the rights of tribal members living away from their communities to vote in these elections. A Secretarial election is a federal election conducted by the Secretary of the Interior for federally recognized tribes under a federal statute or tribal governing document (25 C.F.R. Part 81).

Senator Henry M. Jackson (D. Wash.), chairman the Senate Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs announced today following an executive session of the full committee that he has appointed an ad hoc subcommittee to make a thorough study of a long-standing dispute between the Navajo and Hopi tribes over reservation boundary lines. The subcommittee is composed of Senator Frank Church (Idaho) as chairman and Senator Frank. E. Moss of Utah and Paul J. Fannin, Arizona.

The Second Annual Invitational Exhibition of American Indian Paintings will open November 30, at the Department of Interior Art Gallery.

The exhibition is composed of 91 paintings and 12 works of sculpture, assembled and organized through direct invitation to the outstanding Indian artists in the Nation. The exhibition illustrates the great diversity of fine artistic expression among contemporary Indian, Eskimo and Aleut artists living in the United States. The majority of these works were created in 1965 and will be offered for sale to gallery visitors.