Alaska Native Claims Settlement Improvement Act of 2017

Alaska Native Claims Settlement Improvement Act of 2017

This bill revises provisions concerning Alaska Natives claims to land and Alaska Native regional, village, or urban corporations.

The bill amends the Barrow Gas Field Transfer Act of 1984 to require the Department of the Interior to convey to the Ukpeagvik Inupiat Corporation certain sand and gravel deposits.

Interior must grant the Shishmaref Native Corporation a transportation easement.

Shee Atika Incorporated may opt to receive credits from the Department of Agriculture (USDA) for the sale of Cube Cove in Admiralty Island, Alaska, that may be used to acquire federal property sold at public sales.

The bill authorizes a land exchange between the USDA and the Sealaska Corporation.

Cook Inlet Region, Inc. may satisfy its land claim under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA).

Interior must convey a surface estate to the Kaktovik Inupiat Corporation, a subsurface estate to the Arctic Slope Regional Corporation, a surface estate to Kian Tr'ee Corporation, and a subsurface estate to Doyon Limited.

The bill amends ANCSA to require Interior to pay compensation to Nagamut Limited and the Calista Corporation in lieu of conveying land to Nagamut and a subsurface estate to Calista.

Native residents of the villages of Haines, Ketchikan, Petersburg, Tenakee, and Wrangell, Alaska, may organize as urban corporations. Upon incorporation, Interior must offer each corporation 23,040 acres of land.

Alaska Native veterans who served during the Vietnam War may receive an allotment of federal land.

For purposes of determining eligibility for need-based federal programs, the amount of cash an Alaska Native receives from a Native corporation that is disregarded is increased.

Under certain circumstances, Alaska Native village corporations may reincorporate after they are involuntarily dissolved.

Written by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service. All summary versions on Congress.gov