New Year’s Eve celebrations were bittersweet for Osage elder Louis Gray. He’s beginning 2025 with a lot of uncertainty, but he has hope.
He learned in December that after having lived four years in Madison Village Apartments in Bartlesville, a low-income complex built with federal money from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), his rent was being quadrupled. The reason why – his quarterly payments from his headright interest.
“I’m trying to figure out where I’m going to live,” he said. “Do I put my stuff in storage? Do I go flop myself on one of my relatives’ sofas until I figure out where I’m going to live? Do I risk going back to work and risk my SSDI? Can I physically work anymore?”
Gray is 72 years old, disabled and living on a fixed income of his social security payments and his quarterly headright payment. For four years his rent was $273 a month, utilities included. In December, he said it was raised to $995.
After he learned of his rent increase, he questioned apartment management as to why. According to Gray, they told him that after reviewing his annual income recertification paperwork, his headright income put him over their income threshold. They have never counted his headright income before, Gray said.
He protested, notifying them that according to the Federal Register, his headright income was a federally mandated exclusion and was not to be included for income verification purposes for a HUD-funded facility. They disagreed.

HUD
Gray isn’t wrong in his interpretation of the law. However, Madison Village Apartments isn’t wrong either.
In HUD’s Jan. 31, 2024, updated list of federally mandated exclusions from income, it does list in section (4), “Income derived from certain submarginal land of the United States that is held in trust for certain Indian tribes,” is an exempt income, such as headright interest from the Osage Mineral Estate. Just like Gray said.
However, the list then contradicts itself.
In section (7), it states as an income exemption, “… the interests of individual Indians in trust or restricted lands, and the first $2000 per year of income received by individual Indians from funds derived from interests held in such trust or restricted lands.”
This is where the list opens the door for interpretation, said Osage Nation Attorney General Clint Patterson. Section (7) can, and has, been interpreted to mean that headright income of more than $2,000 a year is no longer an exempt income and can be counted by the HUD entity, such as in Gray’s case.
But why is the apartment complex counting Gray’s headright income when they didn’t count it for four years prior?
Management for Madison Village Apartments did not respond to requests for comment.
File your taxes
The Osage Nation Housing Department, which built its senior housing facilities in Pawhuska, Fairfax and Hominy with federal money, also has to go by HUD’s low-income guidelines but there’s a difference with tribes – they follow the Native American Housing Assistance and Self Determination Act (NAHASDA).
NAHASDA has two requirements up front, tenants must be low-income and Native American. However, NAHASDA allows tribes the flexibility to choose from three methods of determining income eligibility, the U.S. Census method, the IRS method and the Section 8 method.
“Our preferred method that HUD allows us to choose on eligibility is the IRS method. So, if they file taxes, we do not have to include IIM (Individual Indian Money/headright payments). If they do not file taxes, then HUD’s rule is we have to use the Section 8 method, where we gather all their forms of income and we have to project what they would get for the year,” said Marissa Turley, housing program coordinator. “The part where we do not count headrights is in the rent calculation. That’s where our sovereignty comes in, and we get to make policy about how we’re going to calculate rent. That’s when we exclude the IIM, unless that is their only form of income.”
Turley said HUD’s 2024 threshold for one person’s yearly income was $54,768. She said the threshold updates every year and if your income is over the threshold then you can’t live in HUD housing. She said they had to deny one person for their senior housing units in Fairfax because that person was still working and they understood they were over income. But someone who is retired shouldn’t be over income, she said.
As for calculating headright interest, the ON Housing Department counts the last four quarterly payments received by the shareholder.
“Let’s say they worked all their life and they are retired and they were on Social Security. They got $2,000 a month in Social Security. If they would go file their taxes, and we advise all of our elders to file taxes, that takes the IIM out of play and then they would initially qualify,” Turley said. “And I advise every single person that doesn’t want their IIM money counted in anything, then file your taxes. Bring me an IRS 1040 form and I don’t have to even look at your IIM.
“So, I do advise a lot of our elders to file their taxes.”
Housing
Louis Gray files his taxes jointly with his wife, so he doesn’t think the IRS method will help him in his case presently. But, he is going to keep that in mind for the future.
Unfortunately, all three complexes of the Osage Nation’s senior housing units are full, but he plans to put in his application.
Turley said they rank their applicants on a point system and applicants can receive extra points for being a veteran, being Osage, or disabled. They also receive a point for every year they are over the age of 54. How many points applicants have determines where they go on the waiting list. The waiting list for Pawhuska has over 10 applicants, and both Hominy and Fairfax have over three applicants waiting.
She does have some good news. The ON Housing Department just received funding for additional units in the Hominy senior housing complex.
“My best advice would be … come in and talk to me. Let’s look at what’s going on. Let’s see if we need to file our taxes,” she said. “Let’s see what we need to do and see if we can’t get on the list.”
Gray said he’s very appreciative of everyone who has tried to help thus far and that he would be applying for crisis assistance from the Nation’s Financial Assistance office. However, he felt some advocacy for Osage shareholders at the federal level with HUD is needed.
“I’ve been made to feel very vulnerable, and where at one time I used to look at my Osage income as a thing I could use to my benefit and live comfortably without having to report it,” he said. “And now at this age, you know, I can’t do things that allow me to live comfortably. And now I’m worried. I’m pretty much filled with anxiety, and you know, just and right now – I don’t know where I’m going to live, and I’ve not been in this situation for a long time.”
He recently paid his last month’s rent.
“I’ve asked for a rationalization for the hike. But no response. HUD guidelines state they can’t charge more than a 1/4 or 1/3 of your total monthly income,” Gray said. “I didn’t sign the yearly contract for a triple increase and sure didn’t sign for a quadruple increase.”