[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 9]
[Senate]
[Pages 11453-11455]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      EDUCATION OF INDIAN CHILDREN

  Mr. DASCHLE. I will use my leader time this morning.
  This is the cover of a recent Parade magazine. The man in this 
photograph is the great-great-great-grandson of Sitting Bull, one of 
the most extraordinary leaders America has ever produced.
  His name is Ron. His horse is Thunder. He is part of the new 
generation of American Indian leaders. He is a lawyer by training, but 
education is his life's work. He is president of the Sitting Bull 
College in Fort Yates, ND, on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, and 
chairman of the President's Board of Advisors on Tribal Colleges and 
Universities.
  The subtitle of this article expresses a fundamental truth that 
Sitting Bull taught and that people I talk with throughout Indian 
Country still believe today: Education is the key to a better future 
for the American Indian people. Education, more than anything else, 
gives a person the power to determine his or her own destiny. It is the 
most effective tool there is to relieve the grinding poverty that 
exists today in too many tribal communities throughout America.

[[Page 11454]]

  When Native Americans surrendered their lands more than a century and 
a quarter ago, the United States Government promised to provide the 
descendants of Sitting Bull and all Native Americans, free education, 
health care and other basic necessities of life, forever. That is one 
reason I am disturbed by the results of two new audits by the Interior 
Department's inspector general.
  The first audit reveals that, over a 3-year period, the BIA's Office 
of Indian Education Programs used at least $5 million from a 
contingency fund for non-emergency purposes, including staff retreats, 
bean bag chairs, televisions and puppets. This misuse of contingency 
funds shortchanged Indian schools of money they need for emergencies.
  The second audit, which concerns the BIA school construction program, 
also documents numerous examples of poor management and lack of 
accountability. It found that Indian children are being forced to try 
to learn, and their teachers are trying to teach, in schools that put 
them at undue risk of injury because ``no one in BIA ensures that 
school buildings are not occupied'' until hazards are corrected. That 
is shameful.
  This second report also found that 30 percent of the school 
construction and repair projects it reviewed failed to meet the BIA's 
own goal of completing design and construction within 3 years.
  The IG made nine recommendations that it said could strengthen the 
BIA school construction program and increase the program's benefits for 
Native Americans. Those nine recommendations were included in a draft 
copy of the report the IG gave to BIA officials for comment.
  Incredibly, despite being given an extended deadline, Bureau 
officials failed to respond to the draft. As a result, when the report 
was released publicly, it noted that ``all nine recommendations are 
considered unresolved.''
  I do not know why the BIA failed to even acknowledge those nine 
recommendations for improving the Indian school construction program; I 
do not know if it was arrogance, indifference, incompetence or simply a 
result of being overwhelmed. But I know that it is unacceptable.
  The BIA operates or funds 187 schools in 23 States, including South 
Dakota. Most of these schools were built in the 1940s or 1950s. Many 
are decades older than that. Few are equipped to support computer labs 
or other sorts of modern equipment that are now considered essential in 
most school districts.
  I have visited BIA schools where children had to place trash cans 
beneath the holes in the roofs to catch the rain. I have been to BIA 
schools in which cold winds whipped through broken windows. I visited a 
school, which has since been replaced, in which neither the furnace nor 
the bathroom plumbing worked. That is not keeping our promise to 
educate Indian children. That is a disgrace.
  The Cheyenne Eagle Butte School and dormitories on the Cheyenne River 
Sioux Reservation in South Dakota were built by the BIA around 1960. 
The floor tiles in both the school and the dormitory contain asbestos, 
a known cause of lung cancer and emphysema.
  To date, the BIA's remediation efforts consist of recommending that 
the school ``keep the boiler room door shut'' and keep the floors waxed 
so the tiles will not chip and flake.
  Three years ago, the Cheyenne Eagle Butte School was first on the 
BIA's priority list for school replacement. Then the BIA changed its 
criteria, and the school dropped down on the list. Today, the tribe has 
no idea when the school will be replaced.
  Several weeks ago, I spoke on this floor about the Crow Creek Tribal 
Schools in Stephan, SD.
  Two years ago, Crow Creek's middle school was condemned and replaced 
with modular trailers. The elementary school and high school still need 
to be replaced. Throughout the high school, crumbling walls are 
supported by steel braces; one can see exposed electrical wires.
  The Crow Creek Council has been lobbying for money to fix the schools 
on the reservation for 25 years. Recently, the Crow Creek school 
superintendent received this letter from the South Dakota state fire 
marshal. I have had it reprinted and enlarged here. I will quote:

       [T]he buildings are dangerous and represent a threat to 
     life.

  The State fire marshal ``strongly recommends discontinued use of 
both'' the elementary and high schools.
  Two weekends ago was graduation weekend at Crow Creek Tribal Schools. 
The school had originally planned to hold the graduation ceremony 
outside because the gym has been condemned--but it rained on graduation 
day. So 1,500 people--the graduates, their families and friends--
crowded into a condemned gymnasium that threatened to fall down around 
them.
  I ask you, what other group of children would we allow to be treated 
this way?
  The BIA has committed to replace the Crow Creek gym--but it is 
unclear when. Tribal officials had thought students would be playing 
basketball in the new gym this fall, but the construction funds have 
once again been delayed.
  In the last several months, Crow Creek schools have experienced a 
crisis of suicides among students. Mental health experts call such 
episodes ``cluster suicides.'' Six young people on the Crow Creek 
Reservation have killed themselves in the last 6 months--and many more 
have tried. In April, there were 21 suicide attempts; the month before, 
28. Last month, a 14-year-old girl tried to hang herself behind the 
elementary school. She was discovered and cut down just in time. The 
most recent suicide was a 19-year-old young man who had dropped out of 
school. Had he stayed, he would have graduated last month.
  Clearly, the suicide crisis at Crow Creek schools is not caused only 
by crumbling schools. This is a complex crisis with very deep roots. It 
involves public health issues and myriad other issues.
  But what message does it send to young people when they are forced to 
try to learn in a condemned building?
  There are school buildings like the Crow Creek Tribal Schools 
throughout the BIA system. All told, the BIA school construction 
backlog is estimated at $1 billion. At the current funding levels, it 
would take decades to get through that backlog.
  In 2000, when he was running for President, then-Governor Bush met 
with tribal leaders in New Mexico and promised to invest $1 billion to 
fix crumbling BIA schools. Yet, the President's proposed budget for 
next year cuts funding for Indian school replacement for the second 
year in a row. That is wrong.
  America's commitment to build new schools for children in Iraq and 
Afghanistan is admirable, but it does not erase our treaty obligations 
to provide good schools for Indian children in this country.
  The JOBS bill the Senate just passed last month includes a promising 
program that was first suggested by tribal educators in my State. The 
program would allow tribal governments to issue school construction 
bonds; the Federal Government would pay the interest and the principal 
on the bonds. The BIA school construction bond program would increase 
by about half the number of BIA schools that are currently being 
replaced or repaired each year.
  Yesterday evening, I met with two officials from the Porcupine school 
board on the Pine Ridge Sioux Reservation. Those two gentlemen are with 
us this morning.
  The grade school in Porcupine is 40 years old and overcrowded. The 
foundation is unstable. The boiler is unreliable. There is no 
cafeteria; the children eat their meals in the hallways.
  The Porcupine elementary school is number two on the BIA's school 
construction replacement list. School board officials say they have 
been told that construction on a new school could start in July--not 
this year, not next year, not the year after that, but in 2008--more 
than 4 years from now.
  The new Indian school bonding program would enable us to replace and 
renovate more schools faster.
  For the sake of the children at the Porcupine elementary school, and 
all

[[Page 11455]]

the children in crumbling and inadequate BIA schools throughout 
America, Congress needs to get the JOBS bill--with the BIA school 
construction plan--to the President and get this important program up 
and running as soon as possible.
  Once the law is signed, we are going to insist that the BIA report 
regularly to Congress on how the BIA school construction program is 
being implemented and managed. We expect progress and results. We will 
not tolerate the lack of accountability that is documented in the two 
recent audits of the BIA's Office of Indian Education Programs.
  This chart says it so poetically and prophetically. More than a 
century ago it was said the first time. Sitting Bull implored 
representatives of the Federal Government:

       Let us put our minds together and see what life we can make 
     for our children.

  In that same spirit, we must now put our minds together and hold our 
Government accountable to keep the promises it made in trusts and 
treaties and laws to Native Americans.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.

                          ____________________