Past News Items

Completion of the final membership roll of the Ottawa Indian Tribe of Oklahoma, following the disposition of all appeals, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The preliminary membership roll, published in the Federal Register March 21, 1958, included 549 individuals. The net result of additions and subtractions made as a consequence of appeals to the Secretary of the Interior is a final roll of 630.

Under a 1956 Congressional law, Federal trusteeship of the Ottawa property is to be ended by next August 3.

President Ronald Reagan has signed a bill authorizing the federal government to pay the Tohono O'Odham Indians (formerly Papago) in Arizona $30 million in order for the tribe to replace nearly 10,000 acres of reservation land that has been flooded repeatedly since 1979. The Gila Bend Indian Reservation Lands Replacement Act allows the U.S. Interior Department to begin paying the tribe in $10 million allotments over three years beginning in 1988. It is one of the Reagan Administration's largest land settlements with an Indian tribe.

Under Secretary of the Interior Elmer F. Bennett today cautioned against permitting lessees- of Indian lands the privilege of meeting the highest offer when the lands are sold under competitive bidding at the request of the owners.

He said such a provision, admittedly advantageous to the lessees, would in most cases have "an adverse effect on the Indian selling his land.”

The Under Secretary set forth the Department's position in a letter to Chairman James E. Murray of the Senate Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs.

Assistant Secretary Ross Swimmer said today he will initiate on June 2 a program to bring Bureau of Indian Affairs agency superintendents to Washington, D.C. for a three-week intensive orientation on the Bureau's headquarters operations

A priority will be given to selecting new and less experienced superintendents for enrollment in the program.

Award of three contracts totaling $171,820.40 for road construction work in Indian areas of Oklahoma was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

All three projects involve a stabilized asphalt base and single bituminous surfacing on grade and drainage completed sometime ago. All of the roads run through heavily populated Indian areas and are school-bus and mail-service routes.

Interior Assistant Secretary Kenneth L. Smith has announced the appointment of new area directors for the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) at Sacramento, California and Anadarko, Oklahoma.

Maurice W. Babby, area director at Anadarko, has been transferred to the Sacramento office and William P. Ragsdale, assistant area director for economic development in the Phoenix, Arizona area, has been assigned to Anadarko. The BIA has a total of 12 area offices, or regional offices, throughout the United States.

Award of a $53,878 contract for flood control work on the Papago Indian Reservation in southern Arizona was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The contract covers construction of 32 earth-filled flood control structures and the placement of about 3,000 linear feet of metallic pipe of varying diameters.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs has determined that a proposed wood supply agreement between the Penobscot Indian Tribe of Maine and the Lincoln Pulp and Paper Company, Inc., would have no significant impact on the environment.

An environmental assessment, prepared by the Bureau, indicates that some short-term environmental effects on land on wildlife resources would result from the timber harvesting, but would be typical of those encountered elsewhere in nearby locations in Maine where timber harvesting regularly occurs.

Award of a $868,653 contract for construction of school facilities to accommodate 188 Indian children not now in school at Dilcon, Arizona, on the Navajo Reservation was reported today by the Department of the Interior.

The contract calls for construction of a 7-classroom structure with a multipurpose room, a 128-pupil dormitory, a kitchen and dining room, employees' quarters, a bus garage, and a storage and utility building.

Interior Assistant Secretary Ken Smith today announced a major realignment of the Bureau of Indian Affairs' administrative structure. The changes, he said, will improve management efficiency, reduce personnel in central and area offices by 20 percent and reduce overhead costs by $16 million in fiscal year 1983.

Smith said the administrative cuts, coupled with an increase of $55 million in the Bureau of Indian Affairs' 1983 budget request, will result in increased funding of programs at the reservation level.