United States. DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR AND RELATED HEARINGS BEFORE A SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES NINETY-NINTH CONGRESS D. NEAL SIGMON, Kathleen R. JOHNSON, JOCELYN HUNN, and ROBERT S. KRIPOWICZ, Staff Assistants PART 9 Page Navajo and Hopi Indian Relocation Commission Overview... 1 169 For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, Congressional Sales Office KFay .A6424 1986 pt.q COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS JAMIE L. WHITTEN, Mississippi, Chairman EDWARD P. BOLAND, Massachusetts JOSEPH P. ADDABBO, New York LOUIS STOKES, Ohio TOM BEVILL, Alabama BILL CHAPPELL, JR., Florida BILL ALEXANDER, Arkansas JOHN P. MURTHA, Pennsylvania BOB TRAXLER, Michigan JOSEPH D. EARLY, Massachusetts LINDY (MRS. HALE) BOGGS, Louisiana MATTHEW F. McHUGH, New York MARTIN OLAV SABO, Minnesota VIC FAZIO, California W. G. (BILL) HEFNER, North Carolina LES AUCOIN, Oregon DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii WES WATKINS, Oklahoma WILLIAM H. GRAY III, Pennsylvania BERNARD J. DWYER, New Jersey BILL BONER, Tennessee STENY H. HOYER, Maryland BOB CARR, Michigan SILVIO O. CONTE, Massachusetts LAWRENCE COUGHLIN, Pennsylvania C. W. BILL YOUNG, Florida ELDON RUDD, Arizona CARL D. PURSELL, Michigan TOM LOEFFLER, Texas JOHN EDWARD PORTER, Illinois ROBERT J. MRAZEK, New York RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois RONALD D. COLEMAN, Texas FREDERICK G. MOHRMAN, Clerk and Staff Director (II) DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS FOR 1987 TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 1986. NAVAJO AND HOPI INDIAN RELOCATION COMMISSION OVERVIEW WITNESSES RALPH WATKINS, CHAIRMAN, NAVAJO-HOPI INDIAN RELOCATION COMMISSION HAWLEY ATKINSON, COMMISSIONER, NAVAJO-HOPI INDIAN RELOCATION COMMISSION SANDRA MASSETTO, COMMISSIONER, NAVAJO-HOPI INDIAN RELOCATION COMMISSION CHRIS BAVASI, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NAVAJO-HOPI INDIAN RELOCATION COMMISSION MICHAEL MCALISTER, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR, NAVAJO-HOPI INDIAN RELOCATION COMMISSION PAUL TESSLER, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR, NAVAJO-HOPI INDIAN RELOCATION COMMISSION IVAN SIDNEY, CHAIRMAN, HOPI TRIBAL COUNCIL PETERSON ZAH, CHAIRMAN, NAVAJO TRIBAL COUNCIL ROSS SWIMMER, ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR INDIAN AFFAIRS, DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR GARY HARTZ, INDIAN HEALTH SERVICE JEROME C. MUYS, SANTA FE SOUTHERN PACIFIC CORPORATION ROMAN BITSUIE, COUNCILMAN, NAVAJO TRIBAL COUNCIL CLAUDEEN BATES ARTHUR, ATTORNEY GENERAL, NAVAJO NATION, DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE Mr. YATES. This hearing is coming to order. This will be the hearing on the budget for the Navajo-Hopi Indian Relocation Commission for fiscal year 1987. The President's budget has not yet been submitted and it will be made a part of the record when it is submitted. [COMMITTEE NOTE.-The FY 1987 budget for the Navajo and Hopi Indian Relocation Commission is contained in Part 3 of the 1987 hearing volumes for the Subcommittee on Interior and Related Agencies.] We thought it was important to have this hearing early in order to try to establish where the Commission is going and what has to be done to try to bring a constructive resolution. I think this hearing is going to be a very important one because of where we are. We are 12 years into a program that was supposed to last 7 years. PROGRAM HISTORY AND COSTS When the bill was passed in 1974, it was represented to the Congress that the cost would be approximately $41 million, it would take about seven years to dispose of the matter, and that there were about 1100 families that would have to be relocated under the program that was created by the 1974 law. In contrast to what the Congress believed when it passed the 1974 law, we are 12 years into the relocation. According to the figures that we have, approximately $70 million has already been spent. Based upon the schedule that was placed in last year's record by the Commission, the Commission contemplates that it will take another seven years to settle the relocation. It has a schedule that provides for the relocation of about 200 to 225 families per year for the next seven years at a cost of approximately $275 million, so that the total cost that is contemplated will approximate $325 to $350 million, assuming that there is not the kind of escalation in costs that has taken place since the law was passed by the Congress. The newspaper reports that I have seen and the Appropriations Committee investigations have reported that in many respects the Commission has botched the job of relocation. It has failed in relocating families. It has failed to provide proper counseling for the relocatees. It has stated that, in great measure, the failures that have taken place have been a result of a lack of adequate resources furnished by the Congress. I have reviewed the hearings since the start and I must say that as far as the budgets that were presented to the committee, the funds that were made available to the Commission were in great measure as much as the Commission requested, and in some instances, for particular purposes even more than the Commission requested. PUBLIC COMMENTS REGARDING RELOCATION We have been deluged within the last three or four months with mail from all over the country and from the Scandinavian countries telling us that we ought to repeal the 1974 law, and the 1980 law which amended the 1974 law, we ought to stop this forced relocation of the Navajo and the Hopi Indians, and we ought to let the Indian people resolve their own problems. I don't know how that came about. Apparently there is a campaign throughout the country about the wrongs that the Congress is doing in trying to resolve a dispute and perhaps we should have left it to the courts. The District Court found that after going into the history of the relationship between the Navajo and the Hopi in that area that the Navajo had encroached upon Hopi lands and that a line should be drawn establishing land that could be properly designated as Navajo land and land that could be properly designated as Hopi-owned land. The problems that have taken place in great measure have related to the relocation of the Navajo people from what the court designated as the Hopi land. In retrospect and in hindsight, there are a number of Members of Congress who wonder whether what the Congress did in 1974 was the proper path to take; whether it might not have been better |