Past News Items

Seminole Indians of Florida will have an opportunity in the near future to vote on the ratification of a proposed tribal constitution and tribal corporate charter under the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934, the Department of the Interior announced today.

The Department of the Interior today announced award of a road construction contract calling for asphalt paving of approximately 8.141 miles of the Chuichu-Covered Wells Road on the Papago Indian Reservation, about 27 miles south of Casa Grande, Arizona, in Pima and Pinal counties.

The contract was awarded to Palmer Contracting Company, Phoenix. Its bid of $248,164.80 was the lowest of 12 received. The others ranged from $249,280 to $310,770.02.

Award of a $271,570 contract for construction of day school facilities at Borrego Pass on the Navajo Reservation in New Mexico to Wilson Hockinson & Cantrall, Inc.; of Albuquerque was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

Two other New Mexico firms submitted higher bids of $279,900 and $283,630.

The new four-classroom school will serve 120 Indian children living in the Borrego Pass area. It will be erected at the site of the present trailer school operated by the Indian Bureau.

Regulations governing a new vocational training program for Indians between 18 and 35 years of age and residing on reservations ware announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The new program is being initiated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs with an appropriation of $1.5 million, contained in the Department’s fiscal 1958 appropriations measure signed by the President on July 1. Authorization for the program was provided by the 84th Congress in Public Law 959.

Legislation that would restore about 65,000 acres of land now in Federal ownership to five Indian tribal groups in California, Idaho, Montana and Washington is needed 1tin simple justice 11 to these people, the Department of the Interior said today in announcing endorsement of H. R. 3490 and S. 1757, bills that would accomplish this purpose.

Secretary of the Interior Fred A. Seaton today announced awarding of a $70,395 contract for base course road surfacing on the Zuni Reservation, New Mexico, to Allison &Haney, Inc., of Albuquerque.

The project begins at the junction of New Mexico Highways 32 and 53 south of Gallup and runs 9.833 miles westward along Route 53 to the Zuni Pueblo. Allison & Haney, Inc. was the low bidder. Higher bids ranged from $74,520.94 to $95,153.

Two Indian Bureau personnel changes involving positions in North Dakota were announced today by the Department of the Interior.

Harold W. Schunk, superintendent of the Turtle Mountain Agency at Belcourt, N. Dak. for the past three years, was transferred June 30 to the comparable position at Standing Rock Agency, Fort Yates, N. Dak. He succeeds Joseph W. Wellington whose transfer to the superintendency of the Wahpeton School, Wahpeton, N. Dak., was previously announced.

To enable the Navajo Tribe to expand its industrial development program, Under Secretary Hatfield Chilson has signed an order transferring 75 acres of the Coconino National Forest, near Flagstaff, Arizona, to the jurisdiction of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The withdrawal was arranged by the Department's Bureau of Land Management.

Secretary of the Interior Fred A. Seaton today announced the Bureau of Indian Affairs has awarded contracts totaling $51,582 to furnish transformers, substation equipment and steel framework for a substation at the Portneuf pumping station of the Michaud Irrigation Division near Pocatello, Idaho.

The contracts were for $31,187 to the R. E. Uptegraff Manufacturing Company, Scottdale, Pennsylvania, and for $20,395 to Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Portland, Oregon.

The Uptegraff and Westinghouse combination bid compares with the next lower acceptable bid of $60,300.

Award or a contract for construction of an earth-fill dam on the Wind River Indian Reservation in Fremont County, Wyoming was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The accepted bid of $35,932.64 submitted by L. H. Weber of Rawlins, Wyoming, was the lowest of seven received by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The others ranged from $36,000 to $70,600.