Mescalero Apache to send members lawsuit checks

LAS CRUCES, N.M. (AP) – Members of the Mescalero Apache tribe are scheduled to receive checks of $1,500 each as part of a $32.8 million windfall received through federal settlement.

The Albuquerque Journal reports that Tribal Council decided to issue the checks next week after getting pressured by community members to split up the entire $32.8 million settlement, though it was not clear the council’s decision resulted from the pressure. A tribal official confirmed last week that checks will be issued.

The remaining $10 million is expected to be set aside to pay tribal members dividends next year.

The Mescalero Apache’s windfall of nearly $33 million came from an agreement, announced by the Interior Department in early April, to pay more than $1 billion to 41 tribes across the country to settle dozens of lawsuits over the mismanagement of funds and natural resources held in trust by the federal government for the benefit of tribes.

Tribal member Joseph Geronimo, a 63-year-old former council member, said that he handed the secretary of the Tribal Council petitions with the signatures of more than 700 tribal members calling for a lump sum payment of $5,000 to each of roughly 5,000 tribal members, with the remainder to be used for scholarships.

Geronimo said he was told that the petitions were not presented to the entire Tribal Council for consideration.

The Tribal Council, however, decided to issue $1,500 checks to each tribal member by Dec. 5, a total disbursement of about $7.5 million from the settlement

The Tribal Council has already decided to use $12.5 million from the settlement to replace two chairlifts and a gondola that were damaged by last summer’s Little Bear Fire at Ski Apache. The Council also used about $2.5 million to pay each member a $500 back-to-school dividend check on Aug. 2.

Geronimo said supporters of his effort to secure a larger pay-out to tribal members were not satisfied, and some suggested the $1,500 payment was simply an attempt to “keep people quiet.”