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April 25, 2003
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Secretary
Norton Under Fire:
Department of Interior’s Lack of
Credibility Stretches to
the Top
By Jean Pagano
Department
of Interior (DOI) Secretary Gail Norton came under attack from two
sides this
week relating to the seven-year-old Cobell v Secretary of Interior
lawsuit. This landmark case seeks an accounting of Individual Indian
Money
accounts held in trust by DOI. The Department of the Interior has
allegedly
mismanaged the 300,000 IIM accounts for over a century.
The first
salvo in the barrage against Secretary Norton came from Democratic
Representative Frank Pallone, Jr. from the 5th District in
New
Jersey. Pallone has asked Norton to “cease and desist from any further
implementation of your trust reorganization” until U.S. District Judge
Royce C.
Lamberth has a chance to rule in early May. A trial has been ordered by
Judge
Lamberth starting on 1 May to evaluate trust reform plans presented to
date and
to decide upon a course of action for trust reform. Trust reform is
required
under the American Indian Trust Fund Management Reform Act.
Representative
Pallone stated “It has recently been brought to my attention by tribal
leaders
that you are proceeding to reorganize the Bureau of Indian Affairs
(BIA) in the
name of trust reform even though Indian Country is overwhelmingly
opposed to
your efforts.”
Pallone
further states that he is concerned that Norton will waste further
monies in
implementing her plans for reform since the court and Judge Lamberth
has not
reviewed and approved her plans. Pallone joins a number of
Representatives and
Senators that have voiced concerns about the ongoing Cobell
litigation.
While some members of Congress are outright hostile to trust reform,
others
would like to see the Department of Interior and the Cobell
defendants
work out some compromise in the landmark case. A previous agreement,
arrived at
in the latter days of the Clinton Administration, was not acted upon
when the
Bush Administration arrived in Washington in 2001.
On a
separate but similar front, court-appointed Special Master Alan L.
Balaran
presented the U.S. Court of Appeals his Interim Report Concerning DOI’s
Eighth
Quarterly Status Report on Trust Reform. In this 57-page document,
Balaran
claims supplemental authority in support of Judge Lamberth’s holding of
Secretary Norton and former Assistant Secretary Neal McCaleb in civil
contempt.
Lamberth had held that both Norton and McCaleb had perpetrated a fraud
on the
court by their actions.
Balaran
holds that a number of claims listed in the Eighth Quarterly Status
Report are
false and materially misleading and that Norton continues to deceive
both the
District and the Appellate Courts. The Status Report in question was
released
during Norton and McCaleb’s previous contempt trial.
Specifically,
Balaran claims that Norton, as signatory of the Eighth Report,
intentionally
withheld information concerning problem with the automated Trust Assets
and
Accounting Management System (TAAMS) that was being developed at the
time of
the contempt trial. The Special Master believes that the problems with
the
system were hidden to cast DOI in a more favorable light during the
contempt
trial.
The TAAMS
Project Team and NAID (an information technology, security, management,
and
training firm employed by DOI since 1999) had reported to DOI a number
of
problems, concerns, and issues during a High-Level Planning process,
much to
the chagrin of DOI. Concurrent with the TAAMS Project Team and NAID’s
evaluation, Electronic Data Processing Systems (EDS) was also looking
at the
Trust Reform process. The conclusions arrived at by EDS differed from
the
TAAMS’ review and was ultimately the basis used to report findings in
the
Eighth Quarterly Status Report.
According
to Balaran’s Interim Report, “The evidence reveals that EDS employed a
flawed
methodology resulting in reports that overlooked or diluted the
informed
findings of NAID and the TAAMS Project Team.” Judge Lamberth and the
U.S.
Appellate Court will most likely address the issue of DOI’s ongoing
deception
in the coming weeks. The Bush Administration has appealed Lamberth’s
previous
contempt ruling against Norton and McCaleb. McCaleb has since resigned
his post
as Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs, claiming that the Cobell
litigation made his job all but impossible. |
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