Cobell

GAO Transition Materials

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

From the GAO (via Indianz):

GAO has identified a number of long-standing financial and programmatic deficiencies in Interior’s Indian and Island Community programs.

  • While Interior has taken significant steps in the last 10 years to address weaknesses in certain Indian programs, it is still in the process of implementing key trust fund reforms, including preparation of a timetable for completing remaining activities, to effectively manage more than 300,000 trust fund accounts with assets of more than $3 billion. Further, in the department’s consolidated financial statements, the management of Indian trust funds continues to be reported as a material internal control weakness.

    Highlights of GAO-07-104 (PDF)

  • GAO has also reported on serious delays in the Bureau of Indian Affairs’ (BIA) program for determining whether the department will accept land in trust—as of the end of fiscal year 2005, more than 1,000 land in trust applications from tribes and individual Indians were pending. While BIA generally followed its regulations for processing land in trust applications, it had no deadlines for making decisions on them.

    Highlights of GAO-06-781 (PDF)

  • In addition, the department could be doing more to assist the island communities of American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the three sovereign island nations with long-standing financial and program management difficulties in accurately accounting for expenditures, collecting taxes and other revenues, controlling the level of expenditures, and delivering program services—all of which resulted in numerous federal agencies designating some of the governments as “high-risk” grantees. Further, the department faces challenges in addressing the failing economy in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and assisting Guam in preparing for the anticipated expansion of military personnel.

    Highlights of GAO-08-655 (PDF), Highlights of GAO-08-466 (PDF), Full Report of GAO-07-514R (PDF, 74 pages), Highlights of GAO-08-791 (PDF), Highlights of GAO-07-163 (PDF), Highlights of GAO-07-119 (PDF), Highlights of GAO-08-732 (PDF), Highlights of GAO-07-513 (PDF), Highlights of GAO-06-590 (PDF)

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NYTs on Cobell Litigation

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

From the NYTs:

February 1, 2008
Editorial

The Verdict: It’s Broken

The case of the mismanaged American Indian trust funds is Dickensian both in length — now 11 years before the courts — and inequity. On Wednesday, Judge James Robertson of the Federal District Court for the District of Columbia ruled that the Interior Department had “unreasonably delayed” its accounting for billions of dollars owed to American Indian landholders and that the agency “cannot remedy the breach.”

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Robertson Rules on “Accounting”

trentcrable

Today in the Cobell case, Judge Robertson issued his findings of fact and conclusions of law on the government’s “accounting.” The document is available here.

Here’s the story from Indianz.Com

Judge: Cobell historical accounting ‘impossible’
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Filed Under: Cobell

The federal judge handling the Cobell trust fund case has issued his
findings of fact and conclusions of law on the Bush administration’s
historical accounting.

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Assiniboine & Sioux et al. v. Kempthorne Materials

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Thirty-seven individual cases raising the same claims as in the Cobell litigation had been spun off from that massive case in the past few years. The United States moved to remand and stay these cases to the Department of Interior. Yesterday, Judge Robertson declined that motion.

Here are the relevant materials:

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Congressional Research Service Reports

Matthew L.M. Fletcher1 Comment

If anyone out there wants to find out what “secret” reports Members of Congress and their staffers read when confronted with an Indian law question, check out some of these CRS reports, now starting to appear online.

Indian Reserved Water Rights: An Overview (2005)

United States v. Lara (2003)

IGRA: Gaming on Newly Acquired Lands (2006)

Wagnon v. Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation (2005)

Cobell (2005)

Contract Support Costs: Cherokee Nation v. Leavitt (2005)

NAGPRA (2005)

Adam Walsh Act (2007)

Native Hawaiian Recognition (2005)

There are more reports at http://www.opencrs.com/