by Robert Gehrke
Associated Press Writer
The Associated Press
Interior Secretary Gale Norton stripped the Bureau of Indian Affairs of its
oversight of billions of dollars of royalties from Indian land on Thursday.
A new division was created to fix more than a century of trust
mismanagement.
The change should help different elements of the effort to reform the trust
work together, Norton said. "The main question that people have been
struggling with is, 'Who is in charge of trust reform?"' she said.
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth last month asked that question of
department lawyers when he threatened to hold Norton and others in contempt
for failing to comply with his order to correct the trust fund management.
Elouise Cobell, the Browning, Mont., banker and member of the Blackfeet
Nation who sued the Interior Department in 1996 for mismanaging the funds,
said Norton's action was a "last-minute, backs-to-the-wall effort to stave
off" court action.
"The trust is a shambles and in need of top-to-bottom reconstruction," she
said.
Norton said the Interior Department began reviewing the trust fund
management in April and is basing the changes on a report completed this
week by Electronic Data Services Inc.
Ron Allen, vice president of the National Congress of American Indians,
expressed concern that Indian tribes were not consulted before Norton
announced the changes and that the new Bureau of Trust Assets Management
will not be as responsive to tribes as the BIA was.
The new bureau will report directly to Norton.
Norton said tribes will have a say in shaping the new system, and that her
action with let the bureau focus on Indian education, law enforcement,
social services and economic development.
Attorneys for the plaintiffs have asked Lamberth to strip the department of
the trust fund management altogether and assign an outside party to manage
the money.
In 1994, Congress ordered the department to clean up more than a century of
mismanagement of mining, grazing, oil drilling and timber harvesting
royalties from Indian land.
Nearly two years ago, Lamberth ordered the department to determine how much
it owes the Indians - the plaintiffs say it is at least $10 billion - and to
improve its system of accounting.
Neither has happened, despite $614 million spent by department, according to
reports by a court-appointed watchdog. Moreover, Interior officials have
misled the court about the status of reform efforts, the reports say.
The Indians' attorneys want nearly 50 government officials, including
Norton, held in contempt and possibly jailed on grounds they have obstructed
the reform and misled the court.
In 1999, Lamberth held Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt and Treasury
Secretary Robert Rubin in contempt and fined them $600,000 for failing to
turn over documents related to the case.
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