Past News Items

The Department of the Interior has recommended enactment of three bills affecting Indians now before Congress. One bill would- increase the appropriation authorization for Indian adult vocational education programs and the other two would permit tribes to issue long-term land leases for industrial and commercial development of reservation properties.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Secretary Ken Salazar today announced the Interior Department’s plan of actions, as directed by President Obama in his memorandum dated November 5, 2009, to implement Executive Order 13175, Consultation and Coordination With Indian Tribal Governments, which directs Executive Branch departments and agencies to develop policies on tribal consultation and cooperation.

A score of Indian leaders, representing the national Indian community, met in Albuquerque May 3-4 with Interior Assistant Secretary Forrest Gerard and staff to be briefed about Gerard's management improvement program for the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

The Department of the Interior has recommended that Congress amend certain provisions of "the Act of March 1, 1933, which added lands in southern Utah to the Navajo Indian Reservation.

The act provides that 37.5 percent of net royalties from tribal oil and gas leases on these lands be paid to the State of Utah. The State, in turn, is required to spend the money for “tuition of Indian children in white schools" and for road construction.

As of May 18, 1966 the special fund totaled more than $5 million.

WASHINGTON -- As part of President Obama’s commitment to fulfilling this nation’s trust responsibilities to Native Americans, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar today named five prominent American Indians to a national commission that will undertake a forward-looking, comprehensive evaluation of Interior’s trust management of nearly $4 billion in Native American trust funds.

The Interior Department today published the 1979 regulations for fishery conservation on parts of the Klamath and Trinity Rivers in Northern California. The plan includes a ban on Indian commercial fishing on the Hoopa Valley Indian Reservation, effective April 1, 1979. Non-Indian sale of fish taken from the Klamath River is already prohibited by State law.

Ernest Childers, an Oklahoma Indian who holds the Congressional Medal of Honor for Valor in World War II, has joined the Department of the Interior's Job Corps staff as a regional coordinator, Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall announced today.

WASHINGTON – Bureau of Indian Education Director Keith O. Moore today announced that he has named Dr. Charles M. “Monty” Roessel as the associate deputy director overseeing 66 BIE-funded schools on the Navajo Nation reservation. Roessel, an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation, had served since 2007 as superintendent of the Rough Rock Community School, a BIE-funded, tribally operated K-12 boarding school near Chinle, Ariz., on the Nation’s reservation. His appointment is effective today.

The Department of the Interior today (December 9) invited leasing and development proposals on a 3440·-acre tract of undeveloped Indian land in Nevada with a shore frontage of 6.4 miles on Pyramid Lake, an inland body of deep-blue fresh water in a desert-mountain setting.

The tract being offered is on the Pyramid Lake Indian Reservation about 33 miles north of Reno and offers excellent possibilities for business, recreational or residential development.

Under Secretary of the Interior James A. Joseph announced today the appointment of a task force to develop recommendations for the Secretary on the reorganization of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

"Secretary Andrus wants to insure that the trust responsibilities of the Federal Government are carried out effectively, that services to Native American people are provided efficiently and that tribal governments are strengthened," Joseph said.