135 



right now. And so they have no understanding of the federal trust 

 responsibihty. 



The U.S. Forest Service has an uneven and inconsistent way of 

 deahng with us. 



In one National Forest, the local forest manager there has taken 

 it upon himself to enter into agreements with individual tribes for 

 the gathering rights. 



The Ottawa National Forest manager has taken a different view 

 on it and has said that for the neighboring tribe that's closest, he 

 recognizes no rights for gathering in there. 



The U.S. Forest Service has taken it upon itself to say in the 

 boundary waters canoe area that treaty rights don't apply. And it's 

 our reading of that legislation that the treaty rights were not abro- 

 gated by the boundary waters canoe area legislation. 



We have a pretty good relationship with the U.S. Fish and Wild- 

 life Service, and they seem to have a better understanding of what 

 the trust responsibility is. But when we do fishing in the spring, 

 where we go out and count fish to make sure there are viable fish 

 populations that the tribes can spear, we have to pay the U.S. Fish 

 and Wildlife Service for their activities. 



Admittedly, we don't pay them the full value of what they give 

 to us, but it seems to me rather inconsistent that our trustee has 

 to secure and exact pajonent from the people that it owes a trust 

 responsibility to. 



In the area of environmental protection, the EPA has come up 

 with an Indian policy, but it's been very ineffective in the way that 

 it deals with Indian tribes. 



Finally, and I don't like to sound as though I'm defending the 

 Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Bureau of Indian Affairs has too been 

 inconsistent and uneven in the way that it deals with Indian 

 tribes, particularly with organizations like ours that are inter-trib- 

 al organizations. 



In the past, it has taken the opportunity to say that it owes a 

 collective trust responsibility to the tribes, and we've been very suc- 

 cessful in going forward and being very effective and very success- 

 ful in self-management, self-regulatory capabilities under the aegis 

 of a collective trust doctrine. 



That collective trust doctrine has been overturned or put on its 

 head with the idea of self-governance. Where the Bureau sees that 

 its trust responsibility is to individual tribes. And so we've had 

 tribes that have taken money out of the Commission, taken their 

 Visth share and gone home with it. 



Luckily, those tribes have turned around and subcontracted back 

 to us, because we do have an economy of scale there. 



And so we need to really solidify what kind of trust responsibility 

 that the Bureau owes to organizations like ours that are inter-trib- 

 al organizations. 



Mr. Faleomavaega. Well, you still didn't give me a number one 

 to ten opinion of this issue that I've raised earlier. 



Mr. SCHLENDER. I wouldn't want to give them a grade, because 

 I'm sure I would see that some place in testimony in the future, 

 saying how good they were. 



But of the organizations that I mentioned, the other federal orga- 

 nizations, the Bureau of Indian Aifsiirs has the best understanding 



