Past News Items

Interior Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Eddie F. Brown will keynote the third in a series of regional economic development conferences with Indian tribal leaders May 14-15 in Oklahoma City. The meeting is being held in conjunction with the Oklahoma Department of Commerce's third annual Indian economic development conference on May 14.

The Department of the Interior today announced .its support of H. R. 4786, a bill that would turn over to the Cheyenne River Sioux Indian Tribe approximately 16 acres of land, together with a Government-owned cottage and warehouse office building, in Dewey County, South Dakota.

The land was bought by the United States from a private company in 1915 and was for many years used as the site for an Indian Bureau farm station. Its use for this purpose was discontinued in 1948.

A nearly $40,000 Bureau of Indian Affairs grant to the Lummi Indian Business Council in Bellingham, Washington, has translated into a $2.5 million a year fishermen's corporation that provides jobs for tribal members and revenues for tribal coffers.

The tribally-chartered corporation, formed in July, markets the catches of 12 Indian fishing operations to buyers in Japan, France, Belgium and the United States. The results are impressive:

Under Secretary of the Interior Elmer F. Bennett today announced approval of Federal regulations governing the enrollment of members of the Rincon, San Luiseno Band of Mission Indians of California. Adoption of such regulations was requested by the band.

Under the regulations, which will be published shortly in the Federal Register, anyone who believes that he or a minor or incompetent should be enrolled is given a period of 90 days after publication to file an application with the Area Field Representative of the Bureau of Indian Affairs at Riverside, California.

Secretary of the Interior Don Hodel today pledged OOI support and active participation in President Reagan's war on drugs.

"The land managing agencies of the Interior Department long have waged a battle of eradicating marijuana growing on Federal lands. Now, as a result of the impetus given the war on drugs by the President, we have added incentive to continue our efforts. We are going to fight this battle until it is won, because we are going to return our national parks and public lands to the American people."

Award of a contract for construction of two dormitories to house 512 Indian school children at Albuquerque, New Mexico was announced today by the Department of the Interior. The total cost or the structures will be $579,530.

The new one-story structures will be located on the grounds of the Albuquerque Indian School and will be ready for occupancy by the next school term. Each will contain over 31,000 square feet of floor space and will accommodate 256 pupils.

The Department of the Interior will conduct a series of hearings in late November and early December on the status of Alaska Natives and the implementation of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) of 1971.

Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Kenneth L. Smith will preside over hearings at Fairbanks, November 27; Bethel, November 28; and Juneau, November 30.

Deputy under Secretary William P. Horn will conduct hearings in Alaska at Nome, December 3, and Anchorage, December 4.

The 130,000 man-days of recreational fishing which a fishery management program provided to visitors alone on the Fort Apache Indian Reservation in Whiteriver, Ariz., in 1958 is creating considerable interest in similar programs on other Indian reservations, especially in the West, the Department of the Interior reports.

Interior Assistant Secretary Ken Smith announced today new assignments for four Bureau of Indian Affairs area directors all of them members of the Federal Government's senior executive service.

The new appointments are as follows:

Sidney Mills, the Albuquerque area director, has been named director of the Bureau's Office of Trust Responsibilities in Washington, D. C.

Vincent Little, director of the Bureau's Portland, Oregon area office, replaces Mills in Albuquerque.

Award of a $1,313,550 contract for the construction of complete new school facilities to accommodate 244 additional Indian pupils on the Navajo Reservation at Shonto, Arizona, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The new facilities will b, built at a site approximately 3/4 of a mile from an existing Indian Bureau school.