Past News Items

Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs (AS-IA) Kevin Gover signed on December 16, 1997, a Final Determination that denies Federal acknowledgment of the Mobile - Washington County Band of Choctaw Indians of South Alabama (MOWA) of Mount Vernon, AL.

Department of Interior’s Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, Kevin Gover will be the keynote speaker at the 1999 American Indian Tourism Conference, "Preserving our Past Sharing Our Future" on Friday, August 20, 1999 in Albuquerque, NM.

Schools funded by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs will receive a donation of $100,000 worth of computer hardware from Global Commercialization Foundation, a non-profit organization. The hardware will include routers, hubs, servers and other equipment needed to connect the schools to the Internet.

Ten athletes from the Riverside Indian School, Anadarko, OK were chosen to participate in the 1999 World Summer Games, a sport festival organized by Special Olympics International taking place June 25, thru July 4, 1999. Riverside Indian School is a Bureau of Indian Affairs boarding facility open nationally to American Indian children. These athletes, plus two coaches, qualified by competing in the Special Olympics Oklahoma 1997 Winter Sports Festival where they won the senior boys' level 3-basketball division.

Today in Billings, Montana the Bureau of Indian Affairs unveiled the Trust Assets Accounting Management System. Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt hit the switch that officially started the pilot project of TAAMS. The program designed by the Trust management employees of the BIA and implemented by Applied Terra Vision, Artesia Systems Group, worked perfectly.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs Aberdeen, SD Area Office responded to the devastation caused by two tornadoes on June 4, 1999, that destroyed houses and other buildings on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Immediately after the disaster, BIA allocated Welfare Assistance and Emergency Assistance Funds to the Pine Ridge Agency to address the immediate need for food, shelter, and clothing, and assisted in the coordination of other emergency relief efforts. Mel Lone Hill, a former tribal vice president, praised the BIA personnel who worked many hours to bring relief to reservation.

When the fire started on June 11 at the Over the Rainbow housing subdivision located on the Fort Apache Reservation in central-eastern Arizona, the initial response to it was performed by the Fort Apache Bureau of Indian Affairs Fire Department. But the fire grew quickly and in minutes was beyond the capacity of local resources. The Bureau of Indian Affairs coordinated the effort to get other resources from the state of Arizona and the U.S. Fish and Game Department to combat the fire that was quickly threatening surrounding property.

Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt, and Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Indian Affairs, Kevin Gover will unveil the Trust Assets Account Management System this Friday in Billings, Montana at the Billings BIA Area Office.

TAAMS is a major component in fixing the Indian Trust Funds System. The Billings Area will serve as the pilot of this project which is scheduled for completion early in 2001.

Denver, CO - The Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Indian Health Service and the Administration for Native Americans are joining forces to hold the first national conference for Native American youth, parents and organizations serving Native American youth. The Youth First: The Future of Indian America Conference will be held on June 2, 3, and 4, 1999 in Denver, Colorado.

The Deputy Assistant Secretary - Indian Affairs, Michael J. Anderson, on Monday will issue a new decision (technically described as a "reconsidered final determination," even though it is not a final determination) on the petition of the Golden Hill Paugussett for acknowledgment as an Indian tribe.

The reconsideration decision concludes that the earlier decision of Assistant Secretary Deer in 1996 rejecting the petition needs to be reconsidered.