The legislation was, in effect, an experiment by a mostly white Congress pulled between two conflicting approaches to Indigenous people: self-determination, and assimilation and termination - the concept of ending the government’s obligations to Natives.īy creating more than 200 Native-owned corporations like ASRC and seeding them with 44 million acres of land and $1 billion, the legislation was one of the most progressive land deals ever struck between the U.S. That tension between monetary wealth and lost land is at the heart of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, which President Richard Nixon signed into law in December 1971. And nearly all of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is in federal hands, frustrating ASRC’s efforts to open it to oil development and provoking routine clashes over access and management with the Iñupiat residents of Kaktovik, the only village that lies within the refuge’s boundaries. To the east, Prudhoe Bay, one of North America’s largest oil fields, belongs to the state of Alaska, which receives royalty and tax revenue from the $35 million in crude piped off the North Slope every day. government, which established the area as a naval oil reserve in the 1920s before later designating it the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska. Congress in a landmark land claims deal with Alaska Native leaders that turns 50 years old this month.īut while the deal helped create monetary wealth for ASRC’s 13,000 shareholders and those of dozens of other Alaska Native-owned corporations, it also came at a huge cost.įor all of ASRC’s assets, its shareholders still cannot claim title to their ancestral Iñupiat lands 25 miles from the corporation’s Utqiaġvik headquarters - or to any oil that might lie beneath them. This unique ownership structure was created by the U.S. chairman Crawford Patkotak's office in Utqiaġvik. And the shares cannot be sold, only issued directly by the corporation or passed from existing shareholders to their loved ones.Ī picture of whaling crews sits alongside a bumper sticker for U.S. Only people with Alaska Native heritage can own shares, with a few exceptions. Since its inception, ASRC has paid out more than $1 billion in dividends, with recent per-shareholder payments as high as $7,000 a year.
#BIG FISH GAMES SETTLEMENT CLAIM FORM SKIN#
UTQIAĠVIK - The portfolio of Alaska’s largest corporation includes two oil refineries, a construction business and one of the North Slope’s few hotels.Īt Arctic Slope Regional Corp.’s headquarters in Alaska’s northernmost community, Utqiaġvik, the richly decorated boardroom features a skin boat used for whaling that rests on the floor, encircled by the conference table. Funding for the project was provided by the Alaska Center for Excellence in Journalism. This story is part of a reporting collaboration between Alaska Public Media, the Anchorage Daily News and Indian Country Today on the 50th anniversary of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. Waves churn newly-forming ice next to the shoreline in Utqiagvik on Nov.