Alaska – Page 3 – Turtle Talk

New Student Scholarship on Trust Land Acquisitions for Alaska Tribal Nations

November 2, 2023Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Alexis Studler has posted “Reviving Indian Country: Expanding Alaska Native Villages’ Tribal Land Bases Through Fee-to-Trust Acquisitions,” forthcoming in the Michigan Journal of Race & Law, on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

For the last fifty years, the possibility of fee-to-trust acquisitions in Alaska has been precarious at best. This is largely due to the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 1971 (ANCSA), which eschewed the traditional reservation system in favor of corporate land ownership and management. Despite its silence on trust acquisitions, ANCSA was and still is cited as the primary prohibition to trust acquisitions in Alaska. Essentially, ANCSA both reduced Indian Country in Alaska and prohibited any opportunities to create it, leaving Alaska Native Villages without the significant territorial jurisdiction afforded to Lower 48 tribes. However, recent policy changes from the Department of Interior reaffirmed the eligibility of trust acquisitions post-ANCSA and a proposed rule from the Bureau of Indian Affairs signals a favorable presumption of approval for Alaska Native fee-to-trust applications. This Note reviews the history and controversy of trust acquisitions in Alaska, and more importantly, it demonstrates the methods in which Alaska Native Villages may still acquire fee land for trust acquisitions after ANCSA.

Mitchell Forbes on Powers of Alaska Tribes without Reservations

May 19, 2023Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Mitchell Forbes has published “Beyond Indian Country: The Sovereign Powers of Alaska Tribes Without Reservations” in the Alaska Law Review. PDF

Here is the abstract:

The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 1971 (ANCSA) devised a land entitlement system markedly different from the Indian reservation system that prevailed in the Lower 48 states. It directed the creation of twelve, for-profit Alaska Native regional corporations and over 200 private, for-profit Alaska Native village corporations, which would receive the bulk of Native land in the state. This corporate model left nearly all tribes in Alaska without a land base. As such, there is very little Indian Country land in the state over which tribes can exercise territorial-based sovereignty. Yet, the Supreme Court has long recognized the power of tribes to exercise membership-based jurisdiction. This Comment analyzes a range of state and federal court decisions addressing the authority of tribes and argues that Alaska tribes, through membership-based jurisdiction, can exercise various sovereign powers, like the exclusion of nonmembers. Importantly, this membership-based jurisdiction does not depend on lands over which tribes can exercise jurisdiction. Therefore, the exclusionary orders imposed by several Alaska Native tribes during the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 were valid exercises of the tribes’ sovereign powers.

Highly recommended.

Biden Administration Repeals the 2020 Roadless Rule in the Tongass

January 27, 2023Kate Fort

https://www.usda.gov/media/press-releases/2023/01/25/biden-harris-administration-finalizes-protections-tongass-national

Repealing the 2020 Alaska Roadless Rule, which exempted the Tongass from roadless protections, will return the inventoried roadless areas of the forest to management under the 2001 Roadless Rule, which prohibits road construction, reconstruction, and timber harvest in inventoried roadless areas, with limited exceptions. USDA determined that the underlying goals and purposes of the 2001 Roadless Rule continue to be a critical part of conserving the many resources of the Tongass, especially when it comes to the values that roadless areas represent for local, rural communities, Alaska Native peoples, and the economy of Southeast Alaska.

WaPo coverage here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2023/01/25/tongass-forest-protections-alaska-biden/

“The Tongass Roadless Rule is important to everyone,” said Joel Jackson, president of the Organized Village of Kake, which sits on the forest edge on an island south of the capital, Juneau.

“The old-growth timber is a carbon sink, one of the best in the world,” Jackson said in a statement. “It’s important to OUR WAY OF LIFE — the streams, salmon, deer, and all the forest animals and plants.”

Tribal leaders and Native organizers made a huge push to get these protections back in place. According to the press release, the Administration received more than 112,000 comments during this rulemaking (that is a *lot* of comments), a majority of which were in support of this change.