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Hopefully, you have received the email sent out today from the Native American Financial Officers Association (NAFOA) urging you to send a letter of support for S. 4898. This new legislation will extend the period for all states, tribes, and territories to use the Coronavirus Relief Fund payments from December 30, 2020, to September 30, 2021. California Indian Legal Services strongly urges tribes to submit the letter of support for S. 4898 using the support letter template provided by NAFOA (download the letter here) or contact CILS for any assistance or questions you may have.
You can reach out to NAFOA’s Executive Director, Dante Desiderio, at Danta@nafoa.org or (202) 631-2003 or Mica Llerandi at mllerandi@calindian.org. Thank you.
Stay safe and healthy.
By Denise Bareilles, CILS Eureka office Directing Attorney
Governor Newsom signed Assembly Bill 3099 into law on September 25, 2020. What will it accomplish?
Under Public Law (PL) 280, passed in 1953, the state of California was granted concurrent criminal jurisdiction in all of California’s “Indian Country”[1]. What this means is that the state can enforce its criminal laws on the reservation and tribes can also enforce their own laws on their lands.[2] PL 280 can and often does create jurisdictional uncertainties, inconsistencies, and confusion on when and how state and/or tribal authorities should respond to crimes in Indian Country. AB 3099 seeks to address policing issues in Indian Country.
AB 3099 will provide technical assistance to state and local law enforcement agencies with Indian lands within or near their jurisdictions as well as to tribal governments with a tribal land base, regardless of whether the tribes have law enforcement agencies.
Furthermore, AB 3099 will address missing and murdered Native Americans in California by determining how to increase state criminal justice protective and investigative resources for reporting and identifying missing Native Americans in California, particularly women and girls.
AB 3099 will directly impact 34 county sheriff agencies that have Indian lands within or near their jurisdictions and 109 California tribes with reservations or rancherias. There are also numerous individual Indian trust allotments that will be impacted.
The California Department of Justice is charged with implementing AB 3099. Below are the specific AB 3099 mandates:
The first mandate addresses the inconsistent application of PL 280 throughout California Indian County
The second mandate addresses the crisis of missing and murdered Native Americans in California, particularly women and girls (not limited to Indian lands).
See here the full text of Assembly Bill 3099
[1] “Indian Country” is defined under federal law as including: tribal lands, Indian allotments and dependent Indian communities. 18- U.S.C. § 1151
[2] Please note that PL 280 also granted the state of California limited civil jurisdiction in California Indian Country.