Past News Items

Secretary of the Interior Douglas McKay announced the details of a proposed $10,000 program under the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1954 to improve and maintain roads on Indian reservations in 24 states.

Award of a $344,435.33 contract for irrigation construction work on the Hogback Unit of the Navajo Indian Reservation near Shiprock, New Mexico, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The Confederated Indian Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation in Oregon were warmly commended today by the Bureau of Indian Affairs of the Department of the Interior for the "progressive step" they have taken in entering into a $100,000 contract with Oregon State College for a study of the human and natural resources on the reservation.

Award of a $33,014.25 bridge and flood-control construction project on the Hoopa Indian Reservation, Humboldt County, California, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The project, on the main route to Hoopa Agency, involves the construction of a continuous slab bridge on existing substructures, and protecting levees which will include roadway approaches to the bridge and the developed areas inundated by the floods of the winter of 1955-56. The road is on a school bus route and serves a substantial number of the reservation population.

Enactment of legislation that would add about 845 acres of public land to two Indian reservations in southern California and 80 acres to a reservation in Nevada has been recommended to Congress by the Department of the Interior, Assistant Secretary Roger Ernst announced today.

Commissioner of Indian Affairs Glenn L. Emmons announced today that he has accepted “with regrets’ the resignation of William R. Olsen, effective May 12, as Area Director of the Interior Department’s Indian Bureau at Juneau, Alaska.

Legislation that would make it a Federal criminal offense to trespass for hunting, fishing or trapping purposes on Indian reservations and other Indian lands held in trust by the United States is needed to protect the property rights of Indian tribal groups, Assistant Secretary of the Interior Roger Ernst said today.

The Interior Department, Mr. Ernst pointed out, has reported favorably to Congress on H.R. 7240, a bill which would provide such protection by amending appropriate sections of the United States Code.

The Department of the Interior announced today the award of a $813,533 contract for the expansion of school facilities that will provide for 150 additional Indian children at Kinlichee School on the Navajo Reservation in Arizona.

The contract covers the construction of a 256-pupil dormitory, a five-classroom school building, twenty employees' quarters, a kitchen and dining hall, and a generator building. The existing school is also to be remodeled under this contract.

The Department of the Interior today recommended the enactment of legislation that would transfer about 10,500 acres of federally owned land to the Rosebud Sioux Indian Tribe of South Dakota.

The lands to be transferred are located on the Rosebud Reservation and were acquired by the Federal Government between 1933 and 1950 for use in farming and ranching operations of the Rosebud Indian Boarding School. They are no longer needed for this purpose.

Award of a $1,176,800 contract for construction at the Wingate School at Fort Wingate, New Mexico, to provide facilities that will increase the school's capacity by about 325 Indian students, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.