Recently President Obama issued a memorandum directing his Departmental and Agency Heads to re-think the whole government contracting process.
Specifically he called for a move away from non-competitive and cost reimbursement contracts except in exigent circumstances. He called for a move toward competitive and fixed-price (performance-based I assume) contracts. President Obama said that the contracting process should not interfere with inherently governmental activities either.
I would like to propose that the treaty obligations are part of the governmental activities. The oversight of the government's accountability to oversee the land held in trust for Indians must not be held by a contracting vendor. They are afterall "vendors," these contractors. They are not the U.S. Government. When an appraisal firm in a city near a reservation assumes an appraisal contract from the Northwest Office of Special Trustee, Office of Appraisal Services and then allows two levels of sub-contracted vendors onto the project, where has accountability gone? I would think that since it resulted in grave errors in more than one appraisal, and that project had to be re-appraised, that the accountability was gone along with a good dose of pride. When discrepancies are discovered by the Tribe for whom the appraisal was being done, how do they address the issue with the Office of Special Trustee? There is no "real" grievance processs that is working. When the vendors make serious (grade schoolers could probably do better) mistakes where is the record for their performance? Why aren't tribes being listed as clients on the appraisals for reservation-wide appraisals? Why aren't tribal land owners being listed as clients on the appraisals for their land? If they aren't listed as clients, they cannot access the documentation that is used to appraise their land, their crops, their timber, their minerals. Only the client can access that information. Who is the client? The client is the Office of Special Trustee, and asking them questions will result in tirades where they question your own qualifications for appraising according the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practices. What remains to be answered is how Appraisers reach their conclusions in "States of Non-Disclosure." But since the tribes aren't "clients" on the appraisal contract, somebody else will have to ask OST how the appraisers reach their conclusions. OST officers have not-too-kindly pointed out that the Tribe is not a client so they should just take the OST officer at his word.
When the vendors for surveying projects include contracted surveyors who are state, county, and city-hired surveyors who may also have a great deal of interest in boundary disputes and land taxes for the local tax payers, I would assume that there is a conflict of interest. When the Certified Federal Surveyors are state, county, city, and local government-elected officials, I would assume that they have a conflict of interest when they perform cadastral surveys for land being put into trust, for land that is in boundary dispute with either the local government or one of its constituents.
I would assume that if the CFEDS surveyors are members of an anti-sovereignty, or anti-indian organization, that there is a possiblity for a conflict of interest. If they display behavior that is less-than-objective what punishment exists to right the injustice? What happens? We jerk their contract and they go home to their home agency with their full-time job intact? If they bend the rules for themselves and they get caught, who will really press the issue for them to lose their licenses? The point is, appraisals, surveys, and wills are all of such a grave nature to the balance of accountability to the U.S. government that they should all be completed under the colors of the U.S. Government, not by a "vendor," over whom Indians hold no influence and no hope of justice in the event of any unjust actions.
For all these vendor-driven tasks, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and Office of Special Trustee will tell you that the Tribes can make their own decisions about whether to accept the contracts or to reject them. That may be true in a perfect world but when the list comes to the Bureau of Indian Affairs employee, is it plausible to believe that they will tell superiors that the situation requires more work, more background checks? Will the BIA employees really reject a surveyor who is already on a list titled "CERTIFIED Federal Surveyors?"
I doubt it. Most Indians are oblivious to the entire process and therefore are not the ones to question about the problem. There are a few tribal land owners who are very conscious of the situation and can tell you that this is not the way things should be. Land owners, even though the vocal ones may be in the minority, are the fairest assessors of the impact from sending government responsibilities out to sloppy vendors, who will come back next year to sell us their services once again.
I am hopeful that President Obama and Secretary Salazar will steer the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Office of Special Trustee into spending the budget dollars in such a way as to have more GOVERNMENT surveyors, more government APPRAISERS, more government EMPLOYEES perform the trust duties. Since the great and holy probate judges require that trust land be probated with a will separate from non-trust interests, since they require such a level of sophistication that not every attorney will be familiar with the requirements--the Federal government should create more positions for probate specialists, more attorneys to work the probate process from creation of an "appropriate" will to probate hearing to probate appeal.
The budget process should be re-vamped; the services for which the U.S. Government is responsible should be maintained by the Government employee, not a vendor who despite his knowledge is not required to know all that is contained within the phrase "trust responsibility" as it applies to the honored tasks for which they have clearly not "just volunteered."
This isn't new.....
President Obama Contracting Memo
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Memorandum-for-the-Heads-of-Executive-Departments-and-Agencies-Subject-Government-Contracting/
The Only Good Indian..... (11-5-08)
http://nativelandguardian.blogspot.com/2008/11/good-indians.html
Dirk Kempthorne had it right (9-11-08)
http://nativelandguardian.blogspot.com/2008/09/two-cheers-for-dirk-kempthorne.html
Lacking a Contracting Accountability (3-21-08)
http://nativelandguardian.blogspot.com/2008/03/grand-contracted-mess.html
Appraisals: Keeping the poor poor (3-18-08)
http://nativelandguardian.blogspot.com/2008/03/poorest-of-poor.html
Here's how you manage leasing (2-20-08)
http://nativelandguardian.blogspot.com/2009/02/heres-how-you-manage-leasing.html
Where Surveying Money should be spent (1-09-08)
http://nativelandguardian.blogspot.com/2008/01/run-numbers.html
Contracting for Customers (1-8-08)
http://nativelandguardian.blogspot.com/2008/01/yet-more-motivations.html
Fraudulent leadership plagues the Office of Special Trustee (12-18-07)
http://nativelandguardian.blogspot.com/2007/12/return-to-scene-of-crime.html
A Penney for your thoughts on Reservation Appraisals (12-4-07)
http://nativelandguardian.blogspot.com/2007/12/penney-for-your-appraisal.html
Indian Reservation Surveys (11-30-07)
http://nativelandguardian.blogspot.com/2007/11/surveys-on-reservation.html
Sunday, March 15, 2009
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