FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NEWS RELEASE
March 30, 2007

1st Vice President Presents ITMA Testimony

Thursday, March 29, 2007 on behalf of the national Inter-Tribal Monitoring Association on Indian Trust Funds (ITMA), CCTHITA 1st Vice-President Bill Martin presented testimony before the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs (SCIA). Martin serves as a member of the ITMA Board of Directors.

ITMA is a national tribal consortium consisting of 64 federally recognized tribes. Organized by tribes in 1990, ITMA actively monitors the activities of the Federal Government to ensure fair compensation to tribes for the mismanagement of trust funds. 

Trusts were first created in 1887. Horrible conditions surrounding the trusts have existed for the past two decades, leading up to the Cobell lawsuit.

ITMA’s important testimony expressed their views regarding the historical mismanagement of trusts and the proposed $7 billion settlement offer of the United States on the historic Cobell lawsuit. “ITMA and our member tribes do welcome a dialogue with this Committee. We believe strongly, however, that a true dialogue can only occur if we are at the table to develop proposals, and not merely to react to them,” said Martin.

In addition to Martin, witnesses at the Oversight Hearing on Indian Trust Fund Litigation included the Honorable Dirk Kempthorne, Secretary of the Interior, U.S. Department of the Interior; Mr. William W. Mercer, Acting Associate Attorney General, Department of Justice; Mr. John Bickerman, Bickerman Dispute Resolution; Ms. Eloise P. Cobell, Blackfeet Reservation Development Fund (accompanied by Keith Harper, Partner, Kilpatrick Stockton, LLP, Washington, DC); and Mr. John Echohawk, Executive Director, Native American Rights Fund.

Attached is the ITMA Testimony and Summary of the Testimony for the March 29, 2007 SCIA Hearing. Audio recordings, statements and testimonies presented at the Oversight Hearing on Indian Trust Fund Litigation are available at the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs website http://indian.senate.gov/public/.