Past News Items

The Department of the Interior has scheduled a hearing on the Klamath River fishing situation November 15 at Eureka, California, Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Forrest Gerard announced today.

The purpose of the hearing is to receive and record the views of persons not eligible to exercise Indian fishing rights, and who are interested in the Indian fishery on the Klamath river system. It will be an information gathering meeting only.

The Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Chippewa Indians of Northern Wisconsin has taken action to correct accounting deficiencies and other irregularities in the administration of Federal funds received under contract with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Interior Assistant Secretary Forrest J. Gerard said today.

A BIA audit, completed this spring, revealed several problems including the failure to maintain adequate records, violation of contract terms, unauthorized payments to a tribal official and a total lack of accounting controls.

The Departments of "the Interior and Commerce announced today the addition of representatives of the Department's Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Department of Commerce's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to the federal task force working to attain a settlement of the salmon fishing controversy in Washington state.

Richard C. Whitesell, an enrolled member of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe,, has been named Superintendent of the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Flathead Agency at Ronan, Montana, Assistant Secretary Forrest J. Gerard announced today. Whitesell's appointment will be effective November 6.

Whitesell has been Assistant Area Director for Community Services in the BIA's Phoenix, Arizona office for the past year. He was the Education Program Administrator at the Flandreau Indian School in South Dakota from 1971 to 1976 and at the Riverside: School in Oklahoma 1969-71.

A proposed revision of the program description for vocational training and the establishment of a program for employment assistance for adult Indians are being published in the Federal Register, the Bureau of Indian Affairs announced today.

Interior Department officials have recommended that the United States oppose the June 1977 ruling of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) which has the effect of banning the subsistence hunting of bowhead whales by Alaskan Eskimos.

Interior under Secretary James A. Joseph proposed this position to Secretary of State Cyrus R. Vance in an October 10 letter in which he said, "Our trust responsibility to this Native American population cannot be ignored or subjugated to other concerns."

Forrest J. Gerard was ceremonially installed as the Department of the Interior's first Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs October 13.

Before an audience of Indian leaders, Congressional representatives and Interior Department officials, Interior Secretary Cecil D. Andrus formally administered the oath of office to Gerard.

Secretary of the Interior Cecil D. Andrus pledged the full cooperation of his Department in carrying out the five-year plan for the allocation of Columbia River fish runs which was announced today.

"I want to extend my earnest personal congratulations to all those who have worked so effectively to achieve this equitable solution to the volatile situations arising from the implementation of the mandates of the courts on Indian fishing rights," Secretary Andrus said.

Jack N. Rumsey has been appointed Superintendent of the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Agency at Wewoka, Oklahoma, Acting Commissioner Raymond V. Butler announced today.

Rumsey, a Creek Indian, succeeds Buford Morrison who retired. The Wewoka Agency, located east of Oklahoma City, is one of six agencies under the Muskogee Area Office of BIA.

Proposed rules governing the adoption of tribal water codes on Indian reservations were published March 17 in the Federal Register, Acting Commissioner of Indian Affairs Raymond v. Butler announced today.

The regulations, designed to preserve and protect Indian water rights, establish the standards which tribal codes must meet to be approved by the Secretary of the Interior when such approval is required.