Past News Items

A $51,306.45 contract for road construction on the Big Pine Reservation at Big Pine, Inyo County, California, has been awarded.to J. T. Smith Company, San Fernando, California, the Department of the Interior announced today.

It was the lowest of the fourteen bids received.

The construction of the 2.66 miles of road will give access to existing residential areas and other areas within the reservation.

The White House Conference on Indian Education will take place January 22-24 at the Ramada Renaissance at Techworld, 999 9th St., N.W., Washington, D.C.

Assistant Secretary of the Interior Roger Ernst today announced proposed changes in the Federal regulations on the granting of rights-of-way across Indian lands.

The major effect of the proposed amendments would be to increase the permissible term on rights-of-way for oil or natural gas pipelines from 20 to 50 years.

The 20-year limitation, Mr. Ernst explained, was originally adopted many years ago and has become obsolete. Modern trunk pipelines, he added, are engineered to last much longer.

Secretary of the Interior Manuel Lujan and Secretary of Energy James D. Watkins have signed an agreement committing their departments to a cooperative program to improve the teaching of science, mathematics computer science and other technical subjects in American Indian elementary and secondary schools in New Mexico and Arizona.

High bonus bids totaling over $10,000,000 for oil and gas leases on Ute Indian lands in southwestern Colorado were opened by the Bureau of Indian Affairs on September 2 at Gallup, New Mexico, Assistant Secretary of the Interior Roger Ernst announced today.

On 41 tracts of Ute Mountain tribal land, comprising 92,062.96 acres, the average bonus bid per acre was $112.53 and the total of the high bids was $10,359,671.30. On one of the tracts the bid was $539.25 per acre.

Interior's Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Eddie F. Brown today announced the appointment of Edward F. Parisian as Deputy to the Assistant Secretary and Director of Indian Education Programs in the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

Parisian, an enrolled member of the Chippewa-Cree tribe of Montana, has served as Superintendent of Schools of the Rocky Boy Indian reservation in Box Elder, Montana, since July 1983. His new appointment is effective Feb. 1.

Assistant Secretary of the Interior Roger Ernst today announced the restoration of nearly 9,000 acres on two Indian reservations in South Dakota to tribal jurisdiction.

Thirteen tracts totaling over 3,000 acres of the restored land are on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. An additional 5,880 acres are on the Rosebud Sioux Reservation.

Interior Assistant Secretary Ross Swimmer has signed a contract that will allow the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes to manage and operate an electric power system on the Flathead Indian reservation in northwestern Montana The three year contract is effective immediately, though a short personnel phase-in period is necessary. Under the Indian Self-Determination Act, Indian tribes and groups are given the authority to contract the management of federal government services that affect Indian people.

Award of a $243,427.06 contract for grading, drainage, and crushed gravel surfacing of 15.4 miles of roads on the Cheyenne River Indian Reservation in Dewey County, South Dakota, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

Ross Swimmer, Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs in the Department of Interior, today announced revised guidelines for Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) review of tribal bingo management contracts and asked Indian tribes that are presently operating with unapproved contracts to submit them for review.

Previous guidelines provided that review and approval by the BIA would be at the option of the tribes