By The Capistrano Dispatch
After nearly 30 years, the Juaneno Band of Mission Indians will learn in a few weeks whether their petition for federal recognition will be granted.
R. Lee Fleming, director of the Office of Federal Acknowledgement, said the announcement will be made on or before October 4. The decision comes after the Juanenos scrambled to change course in the wake of a preliminary ruling in 2007 that found the tribe did not meet four of the seven criteria for federal recognition.
Federal recognition would allow the tribe to form its own government, enforce laws (both civil and criminal), tax, license and regulate activities, zone, and exclude persons from tribal territories—which can be acquired from the federal government. The recognition is also a key step in allowing a tribe to operate a casino or other business enterprise.
More than 560 tribes have gained federal recognition, but the process is painstaking and lengthy. San Juan Capistrano Native Americans initially filed for the recognition in 1982, and now more than one group seeks the federal authority. But in a June 2007 proposed finding, federal officials said the Juanenos fells short in four of the seven criteria required for recognition. The ruling said then that only 4 percent of the tribe’s 908 members could show they descended from the original Mission tribe.
Fleming’s news came as he rejected a request by Juaneno tribal Chairman Anthony Rivera for more time to file arguments supporting tribal recognition. Rivera apparently told the Office of Federal Acknowledgement—part of the US Department of Interior—that the group had a new attorney and new information.
“The regulations provide that unsolicited comments submitted after the close of the response periods will not be considered in a preparation of a final determination,” Fleming says in a August 17 letter. “This provision in the regulations precludes petitions or interested parties from submitting material for consideration in the final determination…Your request, therefore, is denied.”
His letter did not indicate how the decision might come down.
The Juanenos issued a statement as copies of the letter began to circulate among city and community leaders.
“The denial of the Tribe’s request is one of many examples over the last 160 years of the U.S. violation of the Tribe’s due process and rights as an Indian Tribe,” says the two-page statement posted on the tribe’s website, www.juaneno.com.
The statement says the Juanenos are confident they can satisfy the requirements for federal recognition. The seven requirements are:
A. That external observers have identified the petitioner as an American Indian entity on substantially continuous basis since 1900;
B. That a predominant portion of the petitioning group has comprised a distinct community since historical times;
C. That the petitioning group has maintained political influence over its members as an autonomous entity since historical times;
D. That the petitioner provide a copy of its governing document;
E. That the petitioner’s members descend from a historical Indian tribe;
F. That a petitioner’s membership be composed principally of people not members of another federally recognized tribe;
G. That the petitioner not be subject to legislation forbidding the federal relationship.
The June 2007 proposed finding says the Juanenos failed to qualify on A, B, C and E.
Since then, the Juaneno statement says, the tribe submitted a new tribal role—excluding some names on the earlier list—and other documentation.
“The Tribal Council remains focused on the department’s final determination on our petition for federal acknowledgement and we are confident that the department will correctly determine that the Acjachemen Nation should gain federal recognition,” Rivera says in the statement.
