QUINAULT — The Quinault Indian Nation will receive $19 million from the federal government that will allow it to buy back communal land taken from the tribe.
The U.S. Department of the Interior announced the agreements Wednesday with five American Indian nations, including the Quinault, for the repurchase of tribal lands taken and given to individuals in the tribe through the Dawes Act of 1887.
The buyback stems from the $3.4 billion class-action settlement of a suit brought by Elouise Cobell (Cobell v. Salazar), a Blackfeet woman who sued the U.S. government for mismanaging royalties from oil, gas, grazing and timber rights on tribal lands.
The Dawes Act, designed to help lift Indians out of poverty, allowed the government to take tribal lands and allot them to individual tribal members.
Since then, most of those lands across the U.S. have been leased out by the federal government in trust for recipients.
Fractional ownership
As individually owned lands have passed down through families, their ownership has been split with each generation. Those splits have grown exponentially and many of these tracts now have hundreds of owners.
Because it is difficult to get landowner consensus on the use of these lands, the parcels often are not used.
“Land fractionation is a serious problem, and the Quinault Reservation is one of the most highly-fractionated reservations in the country. We are committed to handling this challenge effectively and efficiently, in a way that will benefit our entire nation,” said Quinault President Fawn Sharp.
“We hold our lands and resources sacred and consider it a high priority to consolidate our reservation in a way that maximizes our ability to manage it properly.”
The buyback program is designed to give the allotment owners fair market value for their land, in addition to a base payment, regardless of the land’s value.
The decision to accept a buyback offer belongs to the many individual owners.
In addition to those payments, the federal government will make contributions the Cobell Education Scholarship Fund for each sale.
The fund will be governed by a board of trustees and administered by the American Indian College Fund in Denver, Colo., with 20 percent going to the American Indian Graduate Center in Albuquerque, N.M.
“The Quinault Nation will now proceed with landowner outreach, land research, valuation and purchase activities,” Sharp said.
“Although the funds allocated to the Quinault Nation to purchase lands is far short of what is needed, the $19 million will help in the purchase of properties targeted for village expansion and relocation, economic development and sensitive area protection.”
On the Quinault reservation, the allotments average 80 acres each.
Currently, the Quinault Indian Nation owns about one-third of its reservation, which totals over 208,000 acres.
Fee owners own about 1/8th of the reservation and the remaining is owned by allottees in trust.
Quinault plans
It is expected that the Quinault tribe will be able to purchase about 7,000 to 8,000 weighted acres.
For example, one-quarter undivided interest in 80 acres equals 20 weighted acres. The nation may gain only another 4 percent of the reservation as calculated with weighted acres.
Geographically, the Quinault reservation occupies a rough triangle between Queets, Lake Quinault and Moclips along the Pacific Ocean on the Olympic Peninsula.
Putting the consolidated land back into the nation’s hands, Sharp added, will allow the Quinault to protect habitats, more effectively manage natural resources and enable the relocation of the lower Taholah village on tribal lands.
The nation is currently in the planning stages of relocating the Taholah village, which sits along the ocean at the mouth of the Quinault River, to 200 acres about a half mile away.
Because it is close to the ocean and the river, the older “lower village” is under threats from potential tsunamis, storm surges and river floods.
Makah repurchases
The Makah tribe in Neah Bay is the only other tribe on the North Olympic Peninsula to have received money from the $1 billion settlement.
In 2012, the state Department of the Interior announced that the Makah tribe in Neah Bay would receive $25 million.
The Makah tribe has made buyback offers totaling almost $1.78 million, according to the Department of the Interior; acceptances total $975,150 as of Sept. 11 for a total of 64 acres.
Makah representatives said last year that repurchased land will be put in trust for the tribe and be under control of the Makah Tribal Council.
The tribe can use the land for economic development, home site assignments or cultural preservation.
This week, four other tribal nations also signed agreements in the Cabell settlement: the Cabazon Band of Mission Indians in California; the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa in Minnesota; the Ponca Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma; and the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes of the Fort Hall Reservation in Idaho.
“The Cobell Settlement provided no more than 10 years to implement this program, which helps fulfill President Obama’s commitment to strengthen Native American communities,” said Deputy Secretary Michael Connor.
“We will meet this ambitious deadline by giving tribal governments the resources and flexibility to carry out the program in coordination with tribal priorities,” said Connor.
In total, Department of the Interior has signed buyback program agreements with 25 sovereign tribal nations.
Since it began making offers in December 2013, the program has paid more than $660 million to individual landowners and restored the equivalent of approximately 1.3 million acres of land to tribal governments.
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Reporter Mark Swanson can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5054, or mswanson@peninsuladailynews.com.
