St. Croix Band of Chippewa lost a motion for a preliminary injunction in their attempt to avoid the new off-reservation gaming rules [see here for Bryan Newland’s analysis of the new rules].
Here are the materials:
Part 151
House Resources Committee Hearing re: New Fee-to-Trust Guidance Announced
From Indianz:
The House Natural Resources Committee will hold a hearing on Wednesday, February 27, to discuss the Bush administration’s new land-into-trust policy.
In January, assistant secretary Carl Artman issued guidelines that make it harder for tribes to take land into trust for off-reservation casinos. More scrutiny will be applied to gaming sites that are hundreds of miles away from existing reservations. [See Bryan Newland’s excellent commentary on these new rules here.]
NYTs Editorial on Off-Reservation Gaming
From the NYTs:
Good Decision on Tribal Casinos
Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne made exactly the right call when he recently denied permission to 11 Indian tribes around the country to acquire more land in order to build casinos.
Department of Interior Changes Fee-to-Trust Process
Last week, the Department of Interior rejected fee-to-trust applications for eleven tribes . Matthew has linked to the rejection letters elsewhere on this site. In rejecting these applications, the DoI has changed the method by which it will review all fee-to-trust applications under 25 C.F.R. Part 151. On January 3rd, Assistant Secretary of Interior Carl Artman , issued a letter to the BIA’s Regional Directors that established that all future applications will be subjected to a “commutable distance” test. In other words, if a tribe seeks to have land placed into trust, even for non-gaming economic development purposes, it must be within a distance where tribal citizens on the existing reservation can reasonably commute to jobs at the site. This had previously not been the case.
Off-Reservation Gaming Letters
Indianz has links to the letters in which the Secretary of Interior rejected proposals to take land into trust for gaming purposes.
This is a significant development. Expect litigation, hopefully smart litigation.
Turtle Talk 