Bryan Newland, the Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Indian Affairs, met informally June 27 with the Osage Minerals Council, executive office and some members of Congress in a kind of get-to-know-you precursor to negotiations over the new rules for oil and gas mining on the reservation.
Newland was received warmly, but the new rules – promised as part of the $380 million trust mismanagement settlement 12 years ago – got the cold shoulder, not only for their content but for the abrupt manner in which the Bureau of Indian Affairs dropped them, allegedly without warning, into the Federal Register on Jan. 13.
“It would be nice if we had more of a personal relationship rather than an adversarial one,” Minerals Councilor Paul Revard told Newland. “We need to have friendly conversations to help us develop the mineral estate. January 13 was really harmful to us when these got published in the Federal Register. It was a surprise to us, and we have been told by multiple producers that they had production deals fall through because of the uncertainty.
“We’d really like these proposed rules to be removed. They’re an overbearing weight hanging over our head.”
Newland responded that the proposed rules, called Part 226, were first shared with Osages well over a year ago, and that the BIA withheld publishing them in 2022 because the Nation was in the middle of the election cycle for both chiefs, half of the Congress and the Minerals Council.
“The feds dropping something like that right before an election can make things worse, not better,” Newland said. “I can’t understand how the content of the rules is a surprise. The comment period was extended two times to allow for more comments.”
Newland also remarked that he saw no value in withdrawing the proposed rules, noting that he “welcomes red-line edits.”
“You have my commitment to review any edits in good faith,” Newland said, adding that he understands Osages mistrust the BIA.
Producers face higher costs while oilfield is drying up
The proposed rules, which are to be formally discussed at rulemaking sessions in Pawhuska in the middle of July, were essentially copied and pasted from Bureau of Land Management mining regulations that were, Revard said, “designed for a different kind of mineral estate.”
Oil producers, he said, are balking about new bonding requirements that would have bond amounts set at $7 per foot of well depth, which translates into a $15,000 bond per average well. “The price to work on a well has doubled,” Revard said, noting that the average well in Osage produces .77 barrels a day and that most are “mom and pop” operations.
Other point of contention: The sewing shut of historical well records, which used to be public but now are closed, according to Revard, as well as the mystery surrounding appointment of a superintendent of the Osage Agency, a hiring process in which shareholders and the Minerals Council would like to have a voice.
Principal Chief Geoffrey Standing Bear expressed some frustration, saying that the Osage Nation needs the BIA to respond to the Osage government.
“We’ve made specific requests about who’s going to be our superintendent and made specific proposals but no action was ever taken,” Standing Bear said. “It was a disappointment to see no response from the BIA.
Newland said he very much wants to appoint a new superintendent to the Osage Agency and said that if anyone knows of a tribal member who is near retirement age willing to take on the job, he’d welcome suggestions.
Chief: “I’d like to see Part 226 say: ‘See Osage Law.’”
The broader issue, Standing Bear said, is the idea of the Osage Minerals Council and other leaders writing the new rules, which would then be recognized by the BIA. Something that has been done by the Jicarilla Apache and Navajo nations.
“Navajo had 88 council members and they do it themselves then ask the BIA to recognize it,” he said. “They agreed with the BIA to write their own laws as long as they conformed with federal law.
“I’d like to see Part 226 say: ‘See Osage Law.’
“I’d like to see us do this.”
Newland seemed willing to listen. “It’s not the old BIA, to boss Indians around,” said Newland, a former president and tribal judge of the Bay Mills Indian Community (Ojibwe) in northern Michigan, which he still calls home. “I’m happy to talk about self-governance.
“We just need to know which parts) of the proposed rules you don’t like. We’ve generally been deferential to tribes … I generally like to put tribes in the driver’s seat.”
Assistant Principal Chief R.J. Walker said that Standing Bear had assigned him the “easy issues” of self-governance and Osage LLC, prompting a few guffaws and a comment from Newland: “Those are the easy issues!?”
Said Walker: “It is our responsibility to take on our responsibilities … Working though this recent self governance project has been frustrating. It hasn’t gone anywhere near as smooth as it did before.
“I feel like the BIA is here to help us be sovereign and help us responsibly take on the affairs that we have a responsibility to do. I don’t want to be cute or smart or anything like that but if we didn’t grow up and take on responsibilities, we’d still be living at our parents’ house.
“We’re going to get there – and it’s going to be with the help of the bureau.”
Throughout the meeting, Newland urged those present to give concrete feedback or “red-line edits” on the proposed rules.
“I just need our team to know which parts of the rules are troublesome and which need to be changed,” Newland said.
“I can’t just walk away from our trust obligations.”
