Backlog at Interior Draws Ire of Tribes

(Carrie Levine is reporter with Legal Times, an ALM publication.)

WASHINGTON, DC-Native American tribes around the country are complaining about lengthy delays at the Interior Department, raising questions over whether Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne is blocking action on some gaming applications because of his personal reservations about off-reservation gambling. Tribal representatives–including Washington lawyers and lobbyists–say that overall the delays have cost tribes and state governments millions of dollars in lost revenue, without much explanation for their cause. Tribal representatives and lobbyists are now pressing Congress to intervene.

So far, the rumblings have drawn little notice inside the Beltway, but they are getting louder. The Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, chaired by Sen. Byron Dorgan, decided last week to hold an Oct. 4 hearing on the backlog at Interior. And New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer has written a sharply worded letter of complaint to Rep. Nick Rahall, chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, about Kempthorne’s handling of an application from a New York tribe, asking that committee to hold its own hearing.