OPA

Haumont Contracting Company of Phoenix, Arizona, has been awarded a contract covering construction of about 11 1/2 miles of road on the Navajo Indian Reservation running easterly from Tuba City, Arizona, toward Keams Canyon and Window Rock, the Department of the Interior announced today.

Haumont's bid of $267,721.04 was the lowest of eleven received. The others ranged from $276,725.73 to $419,467.05.

The road will be an important link in the highway system which the Bureau of Indian Affairs is constructing to promote Indian economic advancement under the 10-year Navajo-Hopi Rehabilitation Program. It will serve Indians and others in the Tuba City vicinity and facilitate cross-reservation travel between U.S. Highways 89 and 666.

When completed, the project will provide a graded and drained highway with a two-course base, the second course to be stabilized with liquid asphalt, and a bituminous seal coat with an aggregate wearing surface. It will involve 125,359 cubic yards of unclassified excavation, 19,178 cubic yards of borrow, 59,167 tons of base course, and 985 tons of liquid asphalt.

The Federal regulations governing the United States credit program for Indian tribes are being broadened to permit loans of funds which the tribes can use for the purpose of attracting industry to the vicinity of reservations, the Department of the Interior announced today.

In explaining the significance of the changes, Indian Commissioner Glenn L. Emmons pointed to the example of the Navajo Tribe in Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah which has appropriated $300,000 of its own funds both this year and last year for an industry-fostering program. The new types of loans, he added, will make it possible for other tribes with little or no cash reserves to offer similar inducements.

Such inducements might include assistance in furnishing facilities, in training programs, and in the recruitment of qualified workers.

Loans will be made only to tribes having a form of organization acceptable to the Secretary and “at interest rates and under terms and conditions found by the Secretary to be in the public interest."

Encouragement of industry to establish plants near Indian reservations is an important phase of Commissioner Emmons t program to advance the economic and social welfare of Indian people. The work is headed by Carl W. Beck, Assistant to Commissioner Emmons.

Following is a tabulation of the plants which either have been established or definitely planned to date as a result of the program:

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.

Construction of the dam on Big Muddy Creek is part of a comprehensive program for development and conservation of the resources of the Wind River Basin in which the Bureau of Indian Affairs has been engaged for the past eight years. When completed, it will be known as Big Muddy Dam and will help to retard erosion, halt sedimentation, and reduce peak flows of the creek.

The project will involve 260 feet of 42-inch asphalt-coated drawn down pipe, trash rack, concrete cutoff collars, and outlet structure. All labor and materials are to be furnished by the contractor

PORTLAND, Ore. - Commissioner of Indian Affairs Glenn L. Emmons today praised the progress being made by Pacific Northwest Indian tribes in 'establishing tribal scholarships for Indian youths seeking education beyond the high school level.

At the same time the Commissioner said he was hopeful that the four tribes which received portions of the $26,000,000 Celilo settlement would use some of their money received for ancient fishing rights to educate their youths to take their rightful place in modern American society as full-fledged citizens.

"Our Portland area director, Don C. Foster, has reported to me this week that eight Northwest tribes are offering scholarship help to their youths and that this year 79 students are receiving help from these scholarships or from tribal educational loan funds," Mr. Emmons said.

He said that the practice of Indian tribes providing scholarships is a relatively new one. Most scholarships provide only a part of the students expenses and the tribes expect the students to work to help themselves. In this way more students can be aided.

In addition to the 79 students receiving tribal scholarships or loans there are six Northwest Indian youths who received Bureau of Indian Affairs educational grants and 'one who is attending college with the help of a scholarship from the American Missionary Association.

“Mr. Foster tells me this report by no means represents all of the Indian youths attending Pacific Northwest colleges, universities or vocational schools. Many youths are attending these institutions of higher learning on their own or with the help of their parents. We have made no effort to tabulate how many there are in these categories.“ Emmons said.

The Commissioner said he was particularly happy about the report because it indicates progress is being made in the education phase of his three part program to better the lot of the Indians of the United States. The three part program, said Mr. Emmons, is designed to give all Indians 1) better education, 2) better health, and 3) better economic conditions. Commissioner Emmons arrived in Portland Monday to meet with a committee of the American Bankers Association to discuss problems involved in protecting the assets of Klamath Indians who are minors or otherwise not capable of managing their affairs after the termination of Federal trusteeship which is provided in Public Law 587. During the week he will also meet with members of the Warm Springs, Umatilla and Yakima tribal councils to discuss plans for use of the Celilo settlement funds.

Four small bands of Paiute Indians in Utah, comprising 232 members, will take over full responsibility for management of their own affairs under a proclamation approved by Acting Secretary of the Interior Fred G. Aandahl in fulfillment of a 1954 congressional enactment.

The bands affected are Shivwits with 130 enrolled members and 27,520 acres of tribal property, Kanosh with 42 members and about 6,000 acres of tribal land, Koosharem with 34 members and 440 acres, and Indian Peaks with 26 members and approximately 9,000 acres. In addition to the tribal holdings, individual members of the Kanosh band own a total of 1,840 acres and members of the Koosharem group 240 acres which have been up to now in Federal trusteeship.

In accordance with the 1954 enactment, Public Law 762 of the 83rd Congress, subsurface or mineral rights to all of the lands still owned by the Indians have been transferred to a private trustee to be held for at least 10 years. The Walker Bank and Trust Company of Salt Lake City has been selected for this purpose.

In the case of the surface rights, the decision on disposition was left up to the Indian owners. The great bulk of the lands involved have not been used by the Indians in recent years and most are scheduled for sale. Those not already sold have been transferred to the Walker Bank and Trust under a liquidation trust agreement.

One major exception is on the Shivwits Reservation where two tracts of irrigated land and a homestead tract, comprising 840 acres altogether, will be held by the Walker Bank for the use and benefit of the tribal members. In addition, an 80-acre tract on the Kanosh Reservation has been divided among four tribal members and a 40-acre parcel at Koosharem has been conveyed to two individuals. In each of these latter cases, other members of the band will have a lifetime right of access and use to the particular tract.

Over 100 members of the four bands have taken advantage of the Indian Bureau's voluntary relocation program and have moved to cities such as Los Angeles, Denver, or San Francisco. A substantial number of the adults have taken vocational training or adult education courses which were made possible by Public Law 762 and provided by the University of Utah under a contract with the Indian Bureau.

The Utah bands are the second group of Indians to move away from Federal trusteeship in the past six months. A similar step was taken by the Indians of western Oregon under a proclamation signed by Secretary Fred A. Seaton last August 13.

To stimulate wider competitive bidding and more active development of Indian-owned mineral resources, the Department of the Interior has substantially liberalized the acreage limitations in the Federal regulations governing the mineral leasing of Indian lands, it was announced today.

Under the new regulations approved by Acting Secretary Hatfield Chilson on February 28, the maximum area that may be covered by a single lease for development of all minerals (including oil and gas), except coal, is established at 2,560 acres. However, individual lessees are not limited, as they were under the former regulations, in the amount of Indian land they may hold under more than one lease in a particular State.

On the leasing of Indian lands for coal development, the limitation under the new regulations will ordinarily be 2,560 acres for one lease. The Commissioner of Indian Affairs, however, is authorized to approve the combining of several coal mining leases held by one or more lessees or the issuance of a single lease covering more than 2,560 acres when such action is considered to be in the best interests of the Indian landowners and is necessary to permit the establishment of steam electric power plants or other industrial facilities on or near the reservations.

The former acreage limitations were originally established in the period before World War II when deposits of strategic metals and nonmetals in Indian lands were not being widely developed because of inadequate transportation facilities or remoteness from mills and markets. More recently there has been a growing interest in the commercial development of such deposits.

Under the former regulations the maximum amount of Indian land in a single State that could be held by one lessee was limited to 640 acres on “deposits of the nature of lodes or veins, containing ores of gold, silver, copper, lead, zinc, or other useful metals;" 960 acres for "beds of placer gold, gypsum, asphaltum, phosphate, iron ores or other useful minerals except coal, oil and gas” unless otherwise authorized by the Commissioner; and 10,240 acres for coal mining.

While no acreage limitations have been in effect on oil and gas leasing for the past several years, very few tracts of Indian land advertised for such leasing have exceeded the 2,560-acre limit established by the new regulations.

The new regulations do not apply on the Osage or Quapaw Indian lands of Oklahoma where special regulations on mineral leasing still remain in effect.

Award of a contract to Yuma Rock and Sand, Yuma, Arizona, for construction of a concrete waste way structure as a key element in the Colorado River Indian Irrigation Project at Parker, Ariz., was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

Yuma Rock and Sand’s bid of $83,615 for the job was the lowest of five received by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The other four ranged from $111,366 to $125,747.20.

The new structure will be located on the main canal of the project about 18 miles southwest of Parker and will replace a temporary timber structure installed about 14 years ago.

Plans call for extending the main canal about 27 miles to the south beyond the location of the new structure and for expanding the area under irrigation from the present 37,000 acres to an eventual 100,000 acres of fertile river bottom land. The new waste way, with a capacity of 1,500 cubic feet per second or three times that of the present structure, is designed to regulate the water in the main canal and to prevent flash floods and seepage and waterlogging of the area.

A contract to supply 10,000 feet of corrugated metal culver pipe for use in water spreading and drought alleviation work on the Papago Indian Reservation of southern Arizona has been awarded to the

Consolidated Western Steel Division of the United States Steel Corporation in Phoenix, the Department of the Interior announced today. Consolidated Western Steel's bid of $28,485.60 for supplying the 18- and 24- inch pipe was the lowest of four received by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The others ranged from $30,781.80 to $34,917.60.

The pipe will be used in the construction of charcos (deep pit structures with a minimum of exposed surface), flood control detention reservoirs, and water spreading structures as part of the broad reservation development program initiated in 1949.

The range water development phase of this program, scheduled for completion in 1959, has rehabilitated all existing range wells on the reservation and provided an additional 15 deep wells in selected localities.

The water spreading phase, which involves the collection of water in arroyos and its diversion over adjacent flat areas, has already proved its usefulness during drought periods. In many cases the areas so treated have been the only places over broad stretches of the reservation where any green vegetation could be found.

Designation of new Indian Bureau superintendents at the Fort Belknap Agency, Harlem, Mont., and the Uintah and Ouray Agency, Fort Duchesne, Utah, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

Darrell Fleming, who has been superintendent at Fort Belknap for nearly five years, will take over the Utah post April 13 replacing John O. Crow who transferred to the Bureau’s Washington office as a program officer March 24. At Fort Belknap Mr. Fleming will be succeeded April 5, by Howard Dushane who has been program officer in the area office at Portland, Oreg., since 1955.

All three men are of Indian descent and all received part of their education at the Haskell Indian Institute, Lawrence, Kansas.

Mr. Fleming entered the Indian Service in 1933 as a clerical assistant at the Crow Agency in Montana. Over the years since that time he has served in positions of steadily increasing responsibility at Indian agencies in South Dakota, North Dakota, Florida, Minnesota, Arizona, and Washington. Immediately before taking over as Fort Belknap superintendent in 1952, he was for nine months an accountant at the area office in Billings, Mont. He was born at Bernice, Okla., in 1911.

A veteran of 23 years’ service with the Bureau, Mr. Dushane spent the first 16 years of his career on· assignments in Arizona. After entering the service at Valentine, Ariz., in 1934, he remained in this location in positions of increasing responsibility until 1944 when he transferred to the Fort Apache Agency in the same state as personnel clerk. Five years later he was appointed chief clerk at Hopi Agency, Keams Canyon, Ariz. After one year in this spot he transferred to Hoopa, Calif., as district agent and in 1952 was designated as program officer in the area office at Sacramento where he remained until his assignment to Portland in 1955.

Sproul Construction Company, Albuquerque, N. Mex., has been awarded a $780,500 contract for a major expansion and renovation of the Indian Bureau's boarding school plant at Lukachukai, Ariz., on the Navajo Reservation, the Department of the Interior announced today.

Sproul's bid was the lowest of 11 received. The others ranged from $810,188 to $972,000.

The major purpose of the project is to expand the school, which now has about 160 Navajo children enrolled under overcrowded conditions, so that it will adequately accommodate 256 pupils ranging from 6 to 14. This will involve the construction of two dormitories, a four-classroom building, a kitchen and dining hall building, a plant and storage building and necessary staff quarters and utilities improvements.

The new structures will be of semi-fire-resistant masonry block construction and will replace two quonset hut dormitories which will be used for warehousing, the old dining and kitchen building, and temporary trailer quarters now being used by the staff.

The job, which is part of the Indian Bureau's broad program for expanding and improving school facilities to keep pace with the growing school-age Indian population, is expected to take about 15 or 16 months for completion.