The state has finally recognized nearly 230 tribes within Alaska. Many hope this will improve relations between the people and governments.
Alaska governor Mike Dunleavy signed House Bill 123On Thursday, the Alaska Tribal Recognition Act was approved. This law recognizes 229 tribes. Federal recognition was already granted to the tribes.
“House Bill 123 is nothing more or less than a statutory codification of a simple truth: that tribes exist in Alaska,” said bill sponsor Rep. Tiffany Zulkowsky, Yup’ik. “Tribes have quietly been doing excellent work as government in its most local form, and stewarding this land we now know as Alaska since time immemorial.”
The new law allows tribes to be recognized and accepted. It is not clear how much more it does, but Alaska Natives have high expectations.
Some see it to be a basis for strong partnerships among tribes and Alaska, similar to those between tribes & the federal government. Others hope it will signal the end to state lawsuits challenging tribal sovereignty.
Zulkowsky said she’s commonly asked: What’s the point of statutory recognition if it doesn’t legally or structurally change state policy related to tribes?
Zulkowsky stated that Alaska is home to approximately half of the federally recognised tribes in the country. The state has had a long and hostile relationship with its tribal governments. She said that the state relies on its tribal partners and tribes to provide essential services to Alaskans. These services include public safety, transportation, healthcare, economic development, education, and transport.
“But how can the state talk about expanding relationships with tribes when it has never taken the most fundamental basic step by recognizing them in our legal code?,” Zulkowsky said. “This is not just about an opportunity to work more closely in the future. It’s an important first step towards healing and reconciling our past.”
Federal-Indian law is a set of rules federal trustresponsibilities to support tribal self government and economic prosperity. In contrast, Alaska’s recognition act explicitly states it does not create a trust relationship between the state and tribes.
The Alaska Tribal Recognition Act recognizes that tribes in Alaska predates the United States and any territorial claims.
“Indigenous people have inhabited land in the state for multiple millennia, since time immemorial or before mankind marked the passage of time,” the act states.“It is the intent of the legislature to …acknowledge through formal recognition the federally recognized tribes in the state. Passage of this Act is nothing more or less than a recognition of tribes’ unique role in the state’s past, present, and future.”
More than 100 people attended the Alaska Native Heritage Center Anchorage to celebrate its signing. The act was recognized by state and corporate officials as well as Native dignitaries Emil Notti (Native settlement act leaders) and Willie Hensley (AKF of Natives president).
Athabascan Sophie Minich serves as President and CEO of CIRI. CIRI is a for-profit regional Alaska Native corporation that covers the Cook Inlet area in South Central Alaska. She explained that her mother, who died young, was put in BIA, which affected her self-identity.
“My mother was not proud to be Alaska Native and that breaks my heart,” Minnick said.
Minnick stated that state recognition of tribes would have likely changed that.
“Because days like today, if my mother were alive, I think my mom would rejoice,” she said. “She’d be proud again, and she would just be full of pride to stand up here and say, ‘I’m Alaska Native. I’m Athabaskan. I’m from a tribe. I’m an ANCSA (Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act) shareholder. And I’m a person.’”
Minnick expressed her gratitude to all those who helped get the bill signed. “And Alaska: welcome to a new day, a new day for unity,” she said.
Former Rep. Bryce Edgmon is an Aleut ancestor and the first Alaska Native to be elected House Speaker in 2019-2021. He said just a few years ago tribes were the “boogeyman.” He said the introduction of even non-binding resolutions that mentioned tribes triggered the spread of anti-tribal misinformation.
Richard Chalyee Éesh Peterson is Tlingit, Haida, and Unangan. He’s president and CEO of the Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska. He too remembers when ‘tribe’ was a dirty word.
He stated that he was 19 years old when he started serving as the mayor and tribal president of his village. He’s now 36.
“It was the tribe in our village that was powerful, that had money, that was getting things done. I had to wear my ‘mayor hat’ to get any recognition from the state, to get money from the state to get money into those projects,” he said.
Peterson said if he told legislators the tribe was the one making the infrastructure projects happen, “it just went silent. So I quickly learned if I’m going to be successful for my community, I’m going to have to stop saying the word ‘tribe,’ and that really bothered me.”
These are the issues that Senator President Peter may be interested in. MicciceWhen he thanked Rep. Tiffany Zulkowski, the bill sponsor, for bringing the bill forward, he was thinking of Kenai, a Republican from South Central Alaska.
He said he did it “so that we can once and for all start the mending process of actually hundreds of years of not only unfair treatment but just the attitude that Alaska Natives were far less important, less deserving, less respected, deserve less respect for your culture and your subsistence way of life and just who you are as a people, the years of the boarding schools and countless things that occurred that were just simply unacceptable. This begins that process.”
Rhonda Pitka is Koyukon Athabascan, Inupiaq and First Chief at Beaver Village Council. She is also vice chair of Council of Athabascan Tribal Governments.
She stated that both the state and tribes have a lot to do before they can succeed.
“I think a series of meetings need to take place to start establishing what does this look like? It looks vastly different than the one (relationship) with the federal government that we have.”
Pitka described the features that tribes share with federal government when she spoke about the ways in which the state and tribes could work together to their mutual benefit.
First up, said Pitka, government-to-government consultation: “We need to start forming relations, settling with our legislators, their staff and then heads of agencies like we already do with the federal government.”
Next is the compacting and contracting of tribes to provide their citizens with services. “And I really think having the policies and protocols in place early is going to be really critical,” Pitka said. “I think a lot of tribal governments already have that capability because of other relationships. So we’ll be doing this mostly just educating the state at this point, and making sure that they’re on the same page with us.”
Peterson and other tribal leaders believe that this cooperation can result in increased federal funding for areas such as education, health, and public safety, as well as infrastructure like broadband.
Gov. Mike Dunleavy, a Republican signed a bill authorizing states to enter into compacts with tribes in order to operate schools. This supports self-determination. Sponsor Rep. Gary Stevens from Kodiak stated that it will encourage the teaching of Native languages.
The Tribal Recognition Act looks a lot like a ballot initiative that was to be on the November ballot. Lt. The Governor declared that the ballot measure was nullified because it is substantially similar to the law passed in the legislature.
