Jack Stevens: The BIA vs. Entrepreneurship

For years, the BIA has discouraged Indigenous entrepreneurs.

Why?

Over 20 years ago, Horace Pipe, an enthusiastic and visionary Sioux geologist, joined with a seasoned refinery development firm from Canada to build a 15,000 barrel-a-day, clean fuels refinery at MHA Nation in Newtown, North Dakota. The plan was to process oil sands from Alberta, Canada. It would have been the first refinery built in the US in years and was state-of-the-art.

Apparently startled that Indians would undertake such a project, the BIA first slowed the development by having the Inspector General vet it for waste, fraud, and abuse. After the proposal got a clean bill, it was sent to an EPA regional office notorious for slow-walking its reviews. There it languished for over ten years. By that time, MHA’s leadership had changed, and the tribes abandoned the project.

Ten years ago, the Tunica-Biloxi Tribe of Louisiana sought an Indian loan guarantee from the Department of Interior's Division of Capital Investment to produce the movie "Wind River," which featured the real-world tragedy of missing and abused Indian women. The loan committee refused to finance it even though it had a top-flight cast, ruling tersely that “Indians don’t make movies.” Luckily, the division chief overruled the decision and unilaterally approved the loan. The film went on to achieve commercial and critical success.

More recently, a BIA regional director stood in the way of the Wind River tribes’ takeover of the 940-acre Circle Ridge Oil Field, insisting that they were not up to the task and that the field should be leased to non-Indians instead. Fortunately, the tribes prevailed and are now profiting handsomely from running the field.

What accounts for the BIA’s stubborn aversion to tribal entrepreneurship?

One theory is that tribes that can develop refineries, make movies, and run oil fields will no longer need hand-holding by the BIA, further eroding the agency’s raison d’etre. So, the BIA’s stance might be explained as self-preservation.