Michael Gross: Tribes must protect self-determination contracts

Contract support costs are the engine oil of Indian self-determination. Without enough oil, the machine sputters and eventually stops. Contract support costs enable contractors to pay overhead costs. No organization can function without covering its overhead.

In later years, appropriations for this vital funding element have grown closer to nationwide need, particularly on the BIA side, but there has never been enough and distribution of the appropriated contract support cost funding has often been spotty.

Congress has commanded the BIA and the IHS to come up with a plan for the future, after first consulting with the Tribes.

So what's to be done?

Above all, Congress must reassert the fundamental principle of program parity: Tribes should be free to contract but not be forced to contract and a Tribe’s decision whether to contract should not be influenced by the level of services to its members one way or the other.