Indian Arts and Crafts Board Museums Threatened | Rebecca Dobkins
(from Anthropology news, May 2006)
For over a half-century, the US Department of the Interior (USDI) has operated three Native American museums in the Central US--the Museum of the Plains Indian in Browning, MT; the Sioux Museum in Rapid City, SD; and the Southern Plains Indian Museum in Anadarko, OK. The department reports that the aggregate collection across these three museums includes over 11,000 artifacts and archival items ...
In the US president's FY2006 Budget Plan, the administration proposed transferring these museums out of federal ownership by the end of FY2007 (or as of October 1, 2007). During the past year the Department of the Interior has discussed this proposal with related tribes, local communities and the National Museum of the American Indian (a non-federal museum). No entity has supported the proposal, emphasizing the federal government's fiduciary responsibilities for the are and preservation of these invaluable materials (indluding, in Browning, traditional bundles).
Museum staffing was frozen in 2005 and the museums are functioning with minimal staff. The Plains Anthropological Society and the National Congress of American Indians are supporting maintenance of these museums as federal entities with adequate staff, maintenance program, and community involvement with artisans, educators and the general public ...
Elsewhere:
Jana McKeag, chair of the Indian Arts and Crafts Board, on the Board's policy of local control of the museums (from Indian Country Today, Dec. 2005)
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