WEB ALERT A clearly irritated House Appropriations Committee says it won't give Interior another dollar for a statistical sampling plan that won't work. The text of the Committee's report follows: DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS BILL, 2002 OFFICE OF SPECIAL TRUSTEE FOR AMERICAN INDIANS FEDERAL TRUST PROGRAMS ----------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------- Appropriation enacted, 2001 $109,985,000 Budget estimate, 2002 $99,224,000 Recommended, 2002 99,224,000 Comparison: Appropriation, 2001 -10,761,000 Budget estimate, 2002 0 ----------------------------------------- The Committee recommends $99,224,000 for the office of the special trustee for American Indians the same as the budget request and a decrease of $10,761,000 below the 2001 level. The Committee has provided $2,496,000 for executive direction and $96,728,000 for program operations, support, and improvements. The Committee remains very concerned over the escalating costs associated with the Cobell v. Norton litigation. In the fiscal year 2001 Conference Report, the managers directed the Department to provide a comprehensive report to the Committee detailing the costs and benefits associated with the Department's proposed efforts to use a statistical sampling methodology for an historical Individual Indian Money Accounts (IIM) accounting. To date the Congress has appropriated over $31,000,000 for litigation related activities of which approximately $17,000,000 has been used to conduct an historical accounting of the five named plaintiffs and their antecedents. The Court of Appeals recently upheld the lower Court ruling requiring an historical accounting. The Committee believes that this places additional pressure on the Government to begin some type of reconciliation process. The Committee has yet to receive the Department's report for a sampling approach, and has not included any additional funds for an historical accounting in fiscal year 2002. Before the Department agrees to any method for undertaking an historical IIM accounting, the Committee directs the Department to submit a comprehensive report to the Committee detailing the costs and benefits and likely results associated with any proposal. The Congress has already provided approximately $614,000,000 for trust reform efforts. This includes the development and implementation of the Trust Fund Accounting System and the development and partial deployment of the Trust Asset and Accounting Management System and associated efforts in the area of data cleanup, records management, real estate services and a host of other reform projects that make up the High Level Implementation Plan. Beginning in fiscal year 1996, this Committee made a commitment to provide the support and resources necessary to ensure that the Department puts in place the hardware, software, people, and training to fix the broken trust systems. However, the Committee has no interest in appropriating additional resources for litigation support when these resources come at the expense of on-the-ground Indian programs designed to promote the well being of the Indian and Alaska Native populations. Therefore, the Committee reiterates its position that it will not appropriate hundreds of millions of dollars for an historical accounting that provides funds for a protracted reconciliation process whose outcome is unlikely to be successful. If the Department, working with the plaintiffs and the Court, cannot find a cost effective method for an historical accounting, the Congress may have to consider a legislative remedy to resolve this and other litigation related issues