Endever, Jimmy, Yupiktuk Bista, Inc___ Fredriks, Glen, president, Kuskokwim Native Association_. Gravel, Hon. Mike, a U.S. Senator from the State of Alaska. Hoffman, Edward, Sr., president, Association of Village Council Presi- Jones, John Paul, tribal operations officer for Bethel Agency, Bureau of 148 Napolian, Harold, contracting officer, Yupiktuk Bista, Inc., Association Richards, Tom, director, Native service, Tanana Chiefs Conference_. 120, 156 192, 193 Three Stars, Peter P., superintendent, Bethel Agency, Bureau of Indian 132, 140 190 Worle, Rosita, Tlingit_-_- Appendix I-Legislative history of the Indian Finance Act_. Appendix II-Additional material submitted for the record by Raymond E. Paddock, president, Tlinglit and Haida Central Council_ Appendix III-Assessing the implications of the present definition of tribe(s) contained in the Indian Self-Determination and Education 207 PROBLEMS OF DEFINITION OF TRIBE IN ALASKA RELATING TO PUBLIC LAW 93-638 THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 1976 U.S. SENATE, SUBCOMMITTEE ON INDIAN AFFAIRS, OF THE COMMITTEE ON INTERIOR AND INSULAR AFFAIRS, Juneau, Alaska. The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 1:25 p.m., in courtroom A, State Court and Office Building, Hon. James Abourezk presiding. Present: Senators Abourezk, Gravel, Stevens and Commissioner John Borbridge, American Indian Policy Review Commission. Also present: Tony Strong, professional staff member. OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES ABOUREZK, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA Senator ABOUREZK. The Indian Affairs Subcommittee hearings will come to order. My name is Senator James Abourezk of South Dakota, chairman of the Indian Affairs Subcommittee. I would like to yield at this time for a statement from Alaska Senator Mike Gravel. STATEMENT OF HON. MIKE GRAVEL, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF ALASKA Senator GRAVEL. Thank you very much, Jim. Senator Stevens and Mr. Borbridge will be joining us in a moment, but we did want to get the hearings underway since we are late in getting started and we have a large number of witnesses to be heard. I think it is important to appreciate the time constraint that we are under and that forcibly statements will have to be limited if we are to hear everybody involved. I am sure that the committee will have the record open to receive statements from individuals who do not get a chance to make them orally. I am personally very grateful to Senator Abourezk, who is taking up his time on this Labor Day weekend to fly to Alaska rather than to his own State, South Dakota, where he would have been attending various affairs and being very visible to his own constituency, but coming to Alaska and becoming informed on a very esoteric problem-not so esoteric to you, the Native community, because it involves rights of yours and involves your capability within the socioeconomic community of Alaska and the Nation, but esoteric from another point of view, because it deals with definitional problems, and so these hear ings will be very valuable because from this will spring decisions made by the Congress in the future which will inure substantially to your benefit, so I personally want to use this opportunity to thank Senator Abourezk for taking up his time and coming forward and thanking John Borbridge and Ted Stevens in this regard. Senator, it's all yours. STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES ABOUREZK, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA-Resumed Senator ABOUREZK. Thank you very much, Senator Gravel. We will be joined by Senator Stevens and John Borbridge of the American Indian Policy Review Commission. I might say at the outset that— am I able to be heard by everybody in the room? Can you hear me? It is in a sense a joint set of hearings between the American Indian Policy Review Commission and the Subcommittee on Indian Affairs of the Senate Interior Committee, and John Borbridge will be sitting in his capacity as a Commissioner of the American Indian Policy Review Commission. The policy of Congress is to allow for the full participation of Indian tribes in programs and services conducted by the Federal Government for Indians and to encourage the development of human resources of the Indian people. The prolonged Federal domination of Indian service programs has served to retard rather than to enhance the progress of Indian people and their communities by depriving Indians of the full opportunity to develop leadership skills crucial to the realization of self-government. It has denied to the Indian people an effective voice in the planning and implementation of programs for the benefit of Indians which are responsive to the true needs of Indian communities. The Congress has recognized the obligation of the United States to respond to the strong expressions of Indian people for self-determination. The Congress has committed itself to the maintenance of the Federal Government's unique and continuing relationship with and responsibility to the Indian people, including the Indian people here in Alaska, through the establishment of a meaningful Indian self-determination policy which permits an orderly transition from Federal domination of programs which serve Indians to effective and meaningful participation by the Indian people for the planning, conduct, and administration of those programs and services. The Congress has become aware of an acute problem that has come about because of the many and varied statutory definitions of what a tribe is, as they may or may not apply here in Alaska. The result of those differing definitions of an Indian tribe is great confusion on the part of the administrators of those Federal programs which are designed to benefit Indians and Alaskan Natives. It appears that of the approximate 225 villages and 24 regional organizations that there are about 465 legal entities that may be defined as "tribe." The purpose of these oversight hearings is to review those problems caused by the ambiguous definitions of tribe, and to review other problems relating to contracting for Federal programs and services. Aside from the specific purposes that I have just mentioned, the hearings which we will conduct will review other problems that the American Indian Policy Review Commission can address itself to in its recommendations to the Congress. The first witness we will have this afternoon will be the president of the Tlingit and Haida Central Council, Mr. Raymond Paddock. Ray, do you want to come forward, and if you have other people you have with you that you want to accompany you, if you would like to bring those up. And before you get underway, Ray, I want to introduce the senior Senator, Senator Stevens, from Alaska, and ask if he has any statement he would like to make. Senator STEVENS. No. I am very delighted that you have accepted the request that Senator Gravel and Congressman Young and I made to conduct these hearings throughout Alaska, and that you have taken your time to come with us, and I am looking forward to developing a good record on these subjects, Senator Abourezk, but I have no statement. Senator ABOUREZK. Thank you very much. These hearings are being held at the request of Senator Stevens and Senator Gravel, at the urging of the Indian community throughout Alaska for clarification of these points. Also with us is John Borbridge. John, do you have anything you would like to say? Mr. BORBRIDGE. I do want to acknowledge and join with Senator Stevens and Senator Gravel in both welcoming you to Alaska and as we had the occasion to discuss formally and informally, Senator Abourezk, I feel that this meeting is going to represent just one step and one phase in your active participation in the affairs affecting not only Alaska Natives but Alaska in general, to the extent that having you here today in view of all of us is a foundation for meaningful and very much more involved activity in Alaska in the future, and it is a pleasure to have you here and to welcome you to our home. Thank you. Senator ABOUREZK. Thank you very much. Now, I hope all the witnesses will try to abide by the time restraints that we have, and the first witness, as I said, is Ray Paddock, an old friend of mine. I'm very glad to see him and would like to welcome him to the subcommittee hearings as you have welcomed me to Alaska. Mr. PADDOCK. Thank you, Senator. STATEMENT OF RAYMOND E. PADDOCK, JR., PRESIDENT, CENTRAL COUNCIL, TLINGIT AND HAIDA INDIANS OF ALASKA Mr. PADDOCK. First I would like to introduce beside me Mr. Eli Reyes, who is the deputy director of our Southeast Agency Contract. I am also expecting Mr. Joe Wilson, who is the director, to join us, and they are the entity that has been dealing primarily with Public Law 93-638, the Indian Self Determination Act. You have been all given a packet that we prepared which is our formal testimony. I am going to submit that without reading it and just briefly go around it to a number of problem areas that we have. I appreciate the opportunity to appear before this committee, and I would like to acknowledge the presence of my predecessor, Mr. Bor bridge, who understands very clearly the problems that we are faced with and also the presence of, for the benefit of those here, of your staff assistant, Mr. Tony Strong, who was on my staff and worked for the central council last summer. I appreciate your wisdom in hiring a Tlingit to handle your Indian affairs. Senator ABOUREZK. I just want to say that I always in my office have two people, Indian people, handling Indian affairs for me. One deals specifically with South Dakota Indian problems, and the other one deals with national Indian problems, because as chairman of the subcommittee I have found that people from all over the country, Indian people, come in to see me about legislation and projects and so on, and when I got Tony Strong of Klukwan on my staff, all of a sudden legislation that kept winding up in my file for me to take action on was Alaskan legislation, and there was no more Navajo, no more Pueblo, no more anything except Alaska, and mostly Klukwan. Mr. PADDOCK. Senator, one of the reasons that there is Public Law 93-638 which I summarized in my opening statement is the fact that in 1970 President Nixon came out with his statement on Indian selfdetermination without termination. At that time, John Borbridge was president of the central council, and with the help of our congressional staff or congressional delegation, assisted the central council in getting the first contract to contract programs of the Bureau of Indian Affairs agency in the Nation, I believe, and I think Zuni was also along with us. The experience that we have gained over the years since 1970 and 1971 when we were attempting to get this contract let, our testimony and the experience we received, led to the implementation and finally the passage by Congress of Public Law 93-638. The act itself departs somewhat from the original contract we received, which was under the Buy Indian Act, and we now have to adjust ourselves to rules and regulations of Public Law 93-638, and this has caused us a number of problems which I would like to relate. The first one is a problem of identity, which you mentioned in your opening remarks. It was never clear, it was never made clear by the Bureau of Indian Affairs that they regarded us as a tribal governing body, and only this last week we received a letter from the area director, the area office, that confirmed the fact that we were indeed a tribal governing body. In addition, it also named, and we have a letter to that effect which we will support this with, the following entities as tribal governing bodies: The Sealaska Corp., the village corporations established under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act and the IRA councils. Since we do have in hand now the document that will assist us in gaining Federal contracts as a tribal governing body, we still have to work out the problem administratively of where this is leading us, and hopefully the Congress can deal with it. We are primarily interested in the delivery of human resourcestype programs, and the definition of what our status is leads not only to problems within the Bureau of Indian Affairs, but to all other contracts that we have with Federal agencies. When we contract with CETA, for instance, the Department of Labor, they in turn want to know who we are and are we in fact an Indian tribe. When we |