Past News Items

David C. Harrison, a member of the Osage Tribe, has been appointed Judicial Services Officer in the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Office of Indian Services, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson announced today.

The position is a new one created to enable the Bureau to work more effectively for the strengthening of tribal judicial systems. Harrison, in the new post, will work with national organizations of Indian judges, tribal chairmen and Indian lawyers.

WASHINGTON, DC – In a signing ceremony held at the U.S. Department of the Interior, Carl J. Artman, Assistant Secretary Indian Affairs, signed an interagency agreement with the U.S. Department of Transportation to provide funding to develop the American Indian/Alaska Native Business Opportunity and Workforce Development (ABOWD) Center for highway construction.

The Department of the Interior has asked Congress to increase the authorized amount of annual appropriations for vocational training of adult Indians from $7.5 million to $12 million.

In its request, the Department said the number of Indians who are qualified and wish to participate in the training program greatly exceeds the number for whom funds are available. If the present limitation is retained, some of those who have applied in the past six months cannot expect to enroll in vocational training courses before June 30, 1964.

Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson-today announced that applications for enrollment at Intermountain Boarding High School, Brigham City, Utah, will be accepted from members of all tribal groups served by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. In the past, this Bureau school had been operated solely for Navajos.

WASHINGTON – Associate Deputy Secretary James E. Cason today announced that the Department of the Interior has declined to acknowledge that a group known as the St. Francis/Sokoki Band of Abenaki located in and around Swanton, Vt., is an Indian tribe within the meaning of Federal law.

The Department of the Interior today announced its endorsement of proposed Federal legislation that would permit the leasing of Indian lands on the Fort Mojave Reservation in Arizona, California, and Nevada for periods up to a maximum of 99 years.

Under present law the maximum term permitted for such leases is 25 years, with an option to renew for an additional 25 years.

Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson announced today the appointment of Martin E. Seneca, Jr., 32, to be Director of Trust Responsibilities, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Washington, D.C., effective May 12, 1974. His post is the second of five directorships - top jobs within the bureau of Indian Affairs - to be filled.

WASHINGTON – Department of the Interior Associate Deputy Secretary Jim Cason today announced a partnership effort involving the Bureau of Indian Affairs, South Dakota Senator John Thune, South Dakota Governor Mike Rounds, and Crow Creek Sioux Tribal Chairman Duane Big Eagle involving an initiative to address the devastating effects of a fire in the Crow Creek school dormitory in Fort Thompson, South Dakota on Sunday, April 24, 2005.

More than $1 million in new construction is slated for the Indian school at Chilocco, Oklahoma, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Philleo Nash announced today.

Regulations to govern the preparation of a roll of members of the Apache Tribe of Oklahoma to be used for the distribution of funds awarded by the Indian Claims Commission were published in the Federal Register, August 6, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson announced today.

The Apache, Kiowa and Comanche Tribes were awarded more than $35 million as additional payment for land ceded to the United States by treaties concluded in 1865 and 1867.