Excuse the cross post

For those of you in California there are just a few days left to comment
on the Draft Guidelines for SB 18 which mandates tribal consultation
between tribes and city/county (local) govenments whenever there are
proposed changes to a local governemnts general plan. The bill is supposed
to protect Traditional Cultural Properties. Though SB 18 passed back in
September 2004 the draft guidelines for "applying" the bill were just
released to the public on February 22 with a comment period ending on
February 28th! During a meeting in Sacramento on Friday over a dozen
tribes from all over California attended. The themes that came up multiple
times during the meeting included:

*not enough time to comment on the draft guidelines [this was a huge issue
because many of the people at the meeting had only briefly examined the
draft guidelines]
*Definition/criteria of non-federally recognized tribes
*Protecting confidentiality [Biggest issue for the tribes]
*Tone and language of the document

More information on SB 18 is on the Governor's Office of Planning and
Research web site at:

http://www.opr.ca.gov/

You can view the draft guidelines pdf here:

http://www.opr.ca.gov/SB182004/PUBLIC_DRAFT_02_22_05.pdf


Matthew Brickley