{"id":102973,"date":"2017-10-30T18:25:36","date_gmt":"2017-10-31T00:25:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/tribal-leaders-call-land-use-bill-step-in-right-direction\/"},"modified":"2017-10-30T18:25:36","modified_gmt":"2017-10-31T00:25:36","slug":"tribal-leaders-call-land-use-bill-step-in-right-direction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/tribal-leaders-call-land-use-bill-step-in-right-direction\/","title":{"rendered":"Tribal leaders call land-use bill step in right direction"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Nez\"
Nez<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The American Indian Empowerment Act would let tribes shift federally controlled trust land to \u201crestricted fee land,\u201d a move that could save millions of dollars that tribes now spend on \u201cburdensome regulation,\u201d while restoring a level of tribal sovereignty.<\/p>\n

While they called the bill a step in the right direction, however, witnesses said they are concerned about ambiguities in the thin, three-page bill that \u201ccould allow state or local governments to implement property taxes on tribal land,\u201d among other issues.<\/p>\n

Navajo Nation Vice President Jonathan Nez said that clarifying those issues is necessary for tribes who, \u201cgiven our history with the federal government . are rightly concerned about any further loss of our lands.\u201d<\/p>\n

But with slight changes, witnesses said at a hearing of House Natural Resources subcommittee, the bill would greatly benefit Indian Country.<\/p>\n

Currently, Nez said, even small tasks are laborious and expensive for tribes. He pointed to road repairs that the state can do \u201cin days\u201d in most of Arizona.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut when it comes to dealing with road infrastructure on our nation . we have to wait for BIA (the Bureau of Indian Affairs) on the regulations, we would have to go through environmental reviews, right-of-way applications,\u201d Nez told the committee . \u201cAnd it takes years sir, and a lot of resources.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said bureaucracy was in part to blame for problems with electricity and water, which he said \u201care not helped by the current requirement that we gain additional approvals from the Department of Interior for rights-of-way permits across our own lands.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those delays come with a cost: Nez said that of \u201cthe dollars that go to Indian Country to improve the roads, millions of dollars are utilized to go just to those clearances, and right-of-ways alone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lummi Nation Council Member Henry Cagey said the current system \u201cinterferes with the sovereign authority of the tribal government to determine what is appropriate use of our own land.\u201d By shifting trust land to restricted fee lands, which are \u201cnot considered owned by the United States,\u201d tribal leaders have exclusive management rights for the land.<\/p>\n

Cagey said the bill \u201cstreamlines land-use regulation and makes it easier to develop such things as housing or businesses.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eric Henson, an executive vice president for economic consulting company Compass Lexecon, said the bill is a \u201cvery positive move forward\u201d but that there are \u201ca few clarifying things\u201d that need to be addressed to avoid unforeseen consequences.<\/p>\n

One concern raised by Henson is the lack of specific language about taxation in the bill, which could open the door to other governments taxing the restricted fee lands. Henson, who works with the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development, said it\u2019s \u201cdiminishing\u201d to the sovereignty of tribal governments to dictate how they can tax their lands.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe should treat Indian nations as nations,\u201d Henson said . \u201cYou wouldn\u2019t call France, and say, \u2018Hey, don\u2019t tax your citizens because we are going to do it instead . Why don\u2019t you guys start exporting more baguettes?\u2019 That would be crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nez said the bill should also include language to let tribes \u201celect to revert land back to trust land from restricted federal land if they deem it in their best interest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Henson said tribes could decide to put land back into trust for any number of reasons, including unexpected taxes leveraged by state and local governments and other \u201cunforeseen consequences.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is the fourth time Rep. Don Young. R-Alaska, has introduced the bill. No previous version has ever gotten out of committee.<\/p>\n

But Cagey and other panelists said it\u2019s time for the bill, that tribes are able to regulate themselves.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we\u2019re asking the committee to do is what\u2019s best for us,\u201d Cagey said. \u201cNot what\u2019s best for the businesses, or the state or the county or the United States, but what\u2019s best for the Indian people.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nezdu1-i-syn The American Indian Empowerment Act would let tribes shift federally controlled trust land to \u201crestricted fee land,\u201d a move that could save millions of dollars that tribes now spend on \u201cburdensome regulation,\u201d while restoring a level of tribal sovereignty. While they called the bill a step in the right direction, however, witnesses said they […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":102974,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[21,13,561,1655],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-102973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-cortez","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-native-american","tag-navajo-nation"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102973","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102973"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102973\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102973"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=102973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}