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OCTOBER 12, 2000

On Wednesday, President Bill Clinton signed into law the new budget for the Department of Interior which includes increases in funding for the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) and the Indian Health Service (IHS).

Among the beneficiaries include crumbling BIA schools and the currently under-funded Institute of the American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Law enforcement and health care also received a boost in money.

Some $2.1 billion has been approved for the BIA, representing a 15 percent increase over last year's budget. Included is almost $300 million to repair, improve, or construct reservation schools.

Six are listed as top priority, due to structural problems threatening students' safety. These include the Tuba City Boarding School in Tuba City, Arizona, and the Zia Day School in Zia Pueblo, New Mexico.

The BIA estimates that it has a backlog of $1 billion in repairs on its 187 schools.

Higher education also got a boost, in the form of $4.125 million for IAIA. This represents the full amount of funding required for the school, which had seen its budget slashed in half last year.

Law enforcement received an increase of about 8 percent, bringing funding to about $153 million. Fighting crime has been a focus of the Bureau and the Department of Justice, in light of studies which show that American Indians are victimized at twice the rate as the national average.

The budget for IHS appropriated in the new bill is $2.2 billion, representing an increase of about $230 million over last year. The increase is the largest ever in the history of the agency.

Included in the amount is some $31 million requested for urban health care programs. Of that amount, $1 million will go to an urban dental care clinic in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Relevant Links:
Budget, Bureau of Indian Affairs - www.doi.gov/bia/iabudget.html
Budget, Indian Health Service - www.ihs.gov/AdminMngrResources/Budget/cj2001/cjtoc.htm
Note: These budgets do not represent the actual amounts appropriated in the Interior bill. In some cases, they were higher or lower than the requested amounts.

Related Stories:
Increase in IHS funding expected (The Medicine Wheel 10/06)
Urban Indian health care appropriated (The Medicine Wheel 09/22)
IAIA may get full funding (Indian U. 09/22)