Past News Items

WASHINGTON – The National Park Service today announced more than $1.5 million in grants under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) to assist museums, Indian tribes, and Alaska native villages to document and return human remains and cultural objects to their native people.

The Office of the Secretary previously announced that it will conduct a listening session on the status of implementation of the Land Buy-Back Program for Tribal Nations. The purpose of the session is to meet with Indian tribes to discuss progress to date and receive feedback. Indian landowners may also attend to provide input. This notice corrects the previously published notice to provide RSVP and testimony information and an agenda.

WASHINGTON – The National Park Service today announced nearly $40,000 in repatriation grants under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) to assist museums, Indian tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations in returning ancestral human remains and cultural objects to their people.

Secretary of the Interior Douglas McKay announced today that the Department of the Interior has proposed to Congress an amendment of Public Law 280 of the 83d Congress which governs the extension of State criminal and civil jurisdictions to Indian reservations and other similar Indian areas.

Two changes in the Federal regulations governing the mineral leasing of land owned by Indian tribes and by individual Indians were announced today by the Department of the Interior.

Underlying purpose of the changes is to provide better protection for the interests of the Indian landowners in the light of current economic conditions in the mining industry.

The Department of the Interior today announced ,approval of a contract for $67,303.30 between the Bureau of Indian Affairs and Aslett Construction Company, Twin Falls, Idaho, for construction of five miles of road on the Fort Hall Indian Reservation near Pocatello.

The contract calls for grading and bituminous surfacing of 4.985 miles of road on the reservation. The road will be used for farm to market access school bus and mail routes. When completed the road will be turned over to Power County, Idaho, for maintenance under an agreement between that county and BIA.

Ten young men from Alaska--five Indians and five Eskimos--will soon move into technical jobs in the space exploration program as a result of training received under auspices of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Department of the Interior reported today.

The Department of the Interior has asked Congress for legislation declaring the Colorado River Indian Reservation, which lies mainly in Arizona and partly in California, to be the property of the Mohave and Chemehuevi Indians now occupying the reservation.

Enactment of a bill proposed by the Department would settle a long-standing controversy which has seriously retarded effective development of the 1,300,000- acre reservation, the Department said.

Commissioner of Indian Affairs Morris Thompson announced today the appointment of Ralph E. Paisano, a Laguna Pueblo Indian, as Superintendent of the BIA's Ramah Navajo Agency, Ramah, New Mexico.

Paisano, who has been an Employment Assistance Specialist in the Albuquerque Area Office, assumed responsibility at Ramah on April 11.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Assistant Secretary–Indian Affairs Larry Echo Hawk today announced that Indian Affairs Office of Indian Energy and Economic Development (IEED) and the Bureau of Indian Affairs Office of Trust Services, working in partnership with Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) are planning to hold a series of tribal energy transmission system planning workshops for tribal leaders and tribal resource managers.