DOJ has released a draft tribal consultation policy available here. Public comments on the consultation policy are due by December 31st. Comments should be sent to USAEO.DOJTribalConsultation@usdoj.gov
Author: Kate Fort
Response and Reply in Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe v. NLRB
Here is the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe’s combined Response and Reply: Combined Response & Reply
And here is the NLRB’s reply: Reply Brief – 12-05-11
Earlier posts here.
Arctic Slope Relist and Hold on SCOTUSblog
From SCOTUSblog today:
Back on the civil side, we have Arctic Slope Native Assoc. v. Sebelius, 11-83. No, it’s not another health care challenge: Arctic Slope concerns a Native American contractor stiffed by a government agency because it did not have enough money left in its annual appropriation to pay. Per the Solicitor General’s recommendation, the case is likely being held for Salazar v. Ramah Navajo Chapter, 11-551, a pending government petition that raises a similar question.
New Federal Tribal Consulation Policy
Available here.
From the press release:
The consultation policy creates a framework for synchronizing Interior’s consultation practices with its bureaus and offices by providing an approach that applies in all circumstances where statutory or administrative opportunities exist to consult with the tribes – including any regulation, rulemaking, policy, guidance, legislative proposal, grant funding formula change or operational activity that may have a substantial and direct effect on a tribe. Interior bureaus and offices, which are required to designate one or more Tribal Liaison Officers, must examine and change their consultation policies within 180 days to ensure they are consistent with the new departmental policy.
Under the policy, Interior officials will identify appropriate tribal consulting parties early in the planning process, provide the tribes a meaningful opportunity to participate in the consultation process, and participate in a manner that demonstrates a commitment and ensures continuity.
To increase accountability, bureaus and office heads will implement training, performance standards and comprehensive annual reporting to the Secretary, through his designated Tribal Governance Officer, on the scope, cost and effectiveness of their consultation efforts.
Based on information received from the bureaus and offices, the Secretary will provide an annual report to the tribes on the Tribal Consultation Policy. In consultation with the tribes, the Secretary will also establish a joint Federal-Tribal Team to make recommendations on implementing and ensuring continued improvement of the policy.
Members Named to National Commission on Trust Administration and Reform
From the press release:
As part of President Obama’s commitment to fulfilling this nation’s trust responsibilities to Native Americans, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar today named five prominent American Indians to a national commission that will undertake a forward-looking, comprehensive evaluation of Interior’s trust management of nearly $4 billion in Native American trust funds.
The members of the Commission are Fawn Sharp, President of the Quinault Nation, Dr. Peterson Zah, former President of Navajo Nation, Stacy Leeds, Dean of the University of Arkansas School of Law, Tex Hall, Chairman of the Inter Tribal Economic Alliance, and Bob Anderson, Oneida Nations Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard. Additional biographical details and information about the commission are available on the press release. Congratulations!
ETA–here is a corrected press release. Tex Hall is also the current Chairman of the Three Affiliated Tribes.
Library Recieves Large Grant to Complete Documentary on Michigan Indians in the Union Army
From Central Michigan Life (student paper for Central Michigan University):
Clarke Historical Library received a grant of $15,000 to complete its documentary on American Indians fighting in the Civil War.
The library was among 14 organizations awarded the major grant by the Michigan Humanities Council.
“This grant will support the completion and dissemination of ‘The Road to Andersonville: Michigan Native Americans Sharpshooters in the Civil War,’ a film documenting the history of the Native American soldiers of the first Michigan Sharpshooters during the Civil War,” according to a news release.
Proposed Leasing Regulation Changes
Tribal Justice News from DOJ, Nov. 14-18
TRIBAL JUSTICE NEWS
Nov. 14 – 18, 2011
Contact: Wyn Hornbuckle, Office of Public Affairs (202) 514-2007
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INDIAN COUNTRY PUBLIC SAFETY INITIATIVES
U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District Of Montana Announces The Creation Of The “Native Shield Initiative”
U.S. Attorney Michael W. Cotter announced today the creation of a new initiative, the Native Shield Initiative, in partnership with county and tribal authorities in Montana. The initiative is designed to help protect Indian women from physical and sexual violence. The new Initiative encourages the U.S. Attorney’s Office to focus on existing federal statutes that give the federal government jurisdiction to prosecute misdemeanor domestic assaults committed by a non-Indian perpetrator against an Indian victim. The Initiative also promotes prosecutions of habitual domestic violent offenders under 18 U.S.C. § 117. In support of the Native Shield Initiative, the U.S. Attorney’s Office has committed to providing the following to its tribal and county law enforcement partners: training on how to submit misdemeanor domestic violence cases directly to the U.S. Attorney’s Office; training in the investigation and prosecution of crimes against women; and training on the resources available for those entities, including potentially entering into collaborative agreements with tribal and county law enforcement.
For more information: www.justice.gov/usao/mt/
News Coverage of the 8th Annual Haudenosaunee Conference
From the Democrat and Chronicle:
SYRACUSE — Three federal court decisions regarding Native American land claims in upstate have created legal doctrine that lawscholars meeting in Syracuse described as unsupportable.
About 50 Indian law professors and students discussed the issue Friday at Syracuse University during the eighth annual Haudenosaunee Conference, which continues today. The conference, hosted by the SU Law School’s Center for Indigenous Law, Governance & Citizenship, looks at contemporary legal issues that affect New York’s native peoples.
Referring to a new legal theory espoused in a 2005 decision regarding a tax dispute between the Oneida Nation of New York and the city of Sherrill in Oneida County, Syracuse attorney Joseph Heath said, “It’s racist. It only applies to Indians.”
* * *
Kathryn Fort, staff attorney at the Indigenous Law and Policy Center at Michigan State University, described what she called “new laches” doctrine established by the recent cases. The doctrine departs from the 800-year-old laches theory that says legal complaints can be denied if the plaintiff waits too long and the defendant would be harmed by that delay.
However, even when laches applies, she said, there can still be an equitable remedy — paying for the land taken by illegal treaties, for instance.
In the New York tax and land claim cases, though, no remedy was offered.
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More Spying by the Canadian Government–Child Welfare Edition
The article is in the Toronto Star:
Why is the federal government spying on Cindy Blackstock?
When does a life-long advocate for aboriginal children become an enemy of the state?
The answer, it would seem, is when you file a human rights complaint accusing your government of willfully underfunding child welfare services to First Nations children on reserves.
Accusing your government, in other words, of racial discrimination.
That’s what Blackstock, as executive director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada, did in 2007.
Since that time, federal officials attended 75 to 100 meetings at which she spoke, then reported back to their bosses.
They went on her Facebook page during work hours, then assigned a bureaucrat to sign on as himself after hours to check it again looking for testimony from the tribunal.
On at least two occasions, they pulled her Status Indian file and its personal information, including data on her family.
H/T to our Senior Canadian Correspondent.
Turtle Talk 
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