Ramah Navajo Chapter v. Salazar, No. 08-2262 (10th Cir. 2011)
Annotate this CasePursuant to the Indian Self-determination and Education Assistance Act (ISDA), the United States enters into contracts with Indian tribes and tribal organizations for “the planning, conduct and administration of programs or services which are otherwise provided to Indian tribes and their members pursuant to Federal law.” These agreements (Contract Support Cost contracts, or CSCs) include costs which are used for the running of essential tribal services, such as law enforcement, economic development and natural resource management. Congress mandated all CSCs be provided with full funding, but then failed to appropriate funds sufficient to pay all CSCs. Instead Congress capped appropriations at a level well below the sum total of CSCs. Several tribes sued seeking to collect the promised-but-unappropriated CSC money. The government argued that the phrase “subject to the availability of appropriations” relieves it of the obligation to pay if the Congress doesn’t appropriate the funds. The tribes argued that only Congressional funding decisions—not the discretionary allocation decisions made by the Department of the Interior—can render an appropriation “unavailable.” The Tenth Circuit concluded that Plaintiffs’ interpretation is “reasonable,” and it reversed the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of the government. The Court remanded the case for further proceedings.
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