Alaska Native Village Municipal Lands Restoration Act of 2025

Mr. President, I am really very glad we were able to reach agreement today to pass these four bills by unanimous consent and will send them to the President to be signed into law.

I want to acknowledge and thank my colleague and friend from Nevada Senator Cortez Masto. I also want to acknowledge Senator Markey from Massachusetts. They worked with us to try to get us to the place we are today in which we were able to move these bills across the floor.

I also want to thank the chairman of the Energy Committee and the ranking member, Chairman Lee and Ranking Member Heinrich. Their teams worked with us on the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, as well as the cloakroom teams, to make sure we were able to be successful today.

The Senate passed all four of these measures last December, so we have seen them once. Now we have seen them twice. But the House ran out of time at the end of the last Congress to take them up, so we are where we are. But now these bills are going to be going to the President for his signature.

Two of the bills we just passed are important for Alaska Natives, and I am proud to have been able to work on these important measures. It has been a multiyear effort to get them to the President's desk. Again, I don't care, really, if we send an H.R. or if we send a Senate bill to the President; we just want to get it accomplished. We want to get some things done for Alaska.

The first measure, which is H.R. 42, amends the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, or ANCSA. It amends it to ensure that when Alaska Native elders, the blind, and the disabled receive dividends from their settlement trusts, they do not inadvertently become, then, ineligible to participate in Federal needs-based assistance programs.

This is pretty common sense. You have a situation where Alaska Natives who are aged, blind, or disabled should not have to choose between accepting the settlement trust income they are entitled to or qualifying for Federal benefits such as supplemental security income, SSI, or SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, as well as housing assistance. Now, with this bill, they are not going to have to make that choice.

The second measure is H.R. 43, the Alaska Native Village Municipal Lands Restoration Act. What this does is eliminate a requirement under ANCSA, section 14(c)(3), that Alaska Native village corporations convey land to the State of Alaska to be held in trust for future municipalities, which are not likely to ever be established.

So what we are doing with this measure is sunsetting this requirement and allowing village corporations to regain title to conveyed lands. This will allow village corporations to fully utilize their lands for the benefit of their communities. This is what we want to see happen. Again, it has been a long time coming. So I am pleased that we are here.

I am hopeful that the Senate can pass more of these similar, very noncontroversial bills through the unanimous consent process. We shouldn't get into the practice where we wait until the end of a Congress or perhaps even multiple Congresses for a package to be knit together. People in these communities are waiting on us, as Senator Cortez Masto noted in her State of Nevada and in my State of Alaska. They are waiting on us to deliver these small legislative priorities that will allow them to move forward, whether it is economic development or just making sure that there is a level of equity and fairness.

So I thank my colleagues, I thank the Energy Committee, as well as the floor team, and my staff who helped us move these measures forward.

I yield the floor.

I know of no further debate on the bills en bloc.

Finally, I ask unanimous consent that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, all en bloc.

Mr. President, we just passed a bipartisan package of bills. Some of them were passed by the Senate in the last Congress, and recently some of them were passed by the House.

The package includes one of my pieces of legislation which was needed in Nevada, which was H.R. 618, the Apex Area Technical Corrections Act. This bill will cut through redtape at the Apex Industrial Park in North Las Vegas and speed up the cumbersome and unnecessary permitting process for businesses looking to build or expand there. Here is how:

All Nevada developers know that the Federal Government owns more than 80 percent of the land in our State. That requires us to have this Federal partnership. Every time a company wants to develop a project on public land, they need a permit from the Bureau of Land Management. That process, as we all know, can take years, and in that time, we are losing out on economic growth and on new job creation. That is what is currently happening at the Apex Industrial Park in North Las Vegas.

APEX has over 7,000 acres of developable land where various companies are building new sites. That includes Air Liquide's largest hydrogen plant in the world, an 885,000 square foot distribution center for the grocery chain Smith's, and a 1 million square foot distribution center for the footwear company Crocs. The Smith's center is projected to add 250 jobs for Nevadans, while the Crocs center could create up to 1,200 jobs.

Unfortunately, because of an outdated permitting law, too many businesses that want to set up shop at APEX are bogged down by burdensome obstacles.

When the Apex Industrial site was created in 1989, Congress passed legislation to transfer Federal land to private ownership, but the Bureau of Land Management maintained control over large utility corridors that crisscrossed throughout the whole development. That means every business that wants to start constructing or even expand at APEX has to go through the complicated Federal permitting process if they want to access necessities like gas, power, sewage, access roads, and broadband lines across those BLM-controlled corridors.

In the initial law passed in 1989, Congress gave Clark County, NV, the authorization to speed up the permitting process, but since then, APEX's primary management has changed to the city of North Las Vegas and the Apex Industrial Park Owners Association as well. Unfortunately, these two entities don't have the authority to permit new pipelines, power connections, or roads for businesses and their facilities. That has caused delays that could last years.

That is why I am fighting to pass the Apex Area Technical Corrections Act. This bill will give the city of North Las Vegas and the Apex Industrial Park Owners Association the authority they need to issue permits and get new and existing businesses the utilities they need to operate.

This legislation cuts through unnecessary government obstacles and allows our businesses to grow at a sustainable pace. It is essential to ensure businesses can efficiently continue to build and expand in Nevada, including at the Apex Industrial Park, bring new jobs to North Las Vegas, and continue to strengthen our economy.

This bill has already passed through the House of Representatives, and I look forward to the President signing it into law soon.

With that, I yield the floor.

Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 43) to amend the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act to provide that Village Corporations shall not be required to convey land in trust to the State of Alaska for the establishment of Municipal Corporations, and for other purposes.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and to add extraneous material on H.R. 43, the bill now under consideration.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

H.R. 43, the Alaska Native Village Municipal Lands Restoration Act of 2025, would amend the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, or ANCSA, and to return lands back to Alaska Native Village Corporations that are currently held in trust by the State of Alaska for future municipalities.

ANCSA was enacted to settle aboriginal land claims of Alaska Natives, and in doing so Alaska Native corporations were created to receive land and disburse payments to Alaska Natives.

ANCSA required Alaska Native Village Corporations that received land to convey some land to an existing municipality. If no municipality existed, the land was conveyed to the State of Alaska to be held in trust for a future municipality.

Over the past 53 years, only eight Village Corporations have seen a municipality created, with the most recent municipality created in 1995. This leaves 11,500 acres throughout 83 villages unable to be developed because it must be held in trust by Alaska in perpetuity for the unlikely creation of a municipality.

H.R. 43 would end this requirement for Village Corporations to reconvey lands for a potential municipality and return land already conveyed under this provision to Village Corporations. If returned, Village Corporations anticipate developing this land for housing, community buildings, and other economic development projects.

There is widespread support for H.R. 43 within the State of Alaska.

The Alaska State Senate unanimously passed S.J. Res. 13 on May 9, 2024, which encouraged the enactment of Federal legislation to return the reconveyed lands to Alaska Native Village Corporations. Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy is also supportive of the legislative fix that H.R. 43 would provide.

Again, Madam Speaker, I thank the sponsor of this legislation, Mr. Begich, for his work to introduce this bill on the first day of the 119th Congress so that we could bring it to the floor quickly. I appreciate his diligence and swift work on behalf of Alaska, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Begich), who is the lead sponsor of the bill.

Madam Speaker, I have no further requests for time. I am prepared to close, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, again, this legislation would amend ANCSA to return the land in question to impacted Alaska Native Village Corporations and eliminate the unnecessary land conveyance requirement in the statute.

I thank Mr. Begich for his leadership and working on this important issue for his constituents in Alaska.

Madam Speaker, I urge adoption of H.R. 43, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of Representative Begich's H.R. 43, the Alaska Native Village Municipal Lands Restoration Act of 2025.

Under current law, when an Alaska Native Village Corporation receives land pursuant to the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, then the Village Corporation must convey certain lands to its municipal government. If none exists, then the law requires them to convey the land to the State of Alaska to be held in trust for when a municipality is established in the future.

The problem is that in many remote Alaska Native communities, it is unlikely that a municipal government will ever be formed, which means the land being held in trust won't ever be used for its intended purpose.

In fact, since the passage of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act in 1971, 101 Village Corporations have had lands held in trust by the State but only 8 of those villages have incorporated into a municipality, and none have done so since 1995.

This bill would remove the requirement that Alaska Native Village Corporations convey land in trust to the State of Alaska for the hypothetical establishment of Municipal Corporations, and it would allow the Village Corporations to have the State of Alaska reconvey such lands back to them.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this bill, which will allow communities themselves to make decisions about how best to utilize their own lands. I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the legislation, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 43, the Alaska Native Village Municipal Lands Restoration Act. This bill corrects a decades-old oversight in the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act to ensure Alaska Native communities can fully use their own land.

In 1971, ANCSA granted fee simple land ownership to Alaska Natives, resolving historic land claims and enabling statehood land entitlements. However, section 14(c)(3) required Native Village Corporations to transfer land to the State of Alaska to be held in trust for future municipalities. More than 50 years later, only 8 of 101 affected villages have incorporated, leaving 11,500 acres in 83 villages frozen in bureaucratic limbo.

H.R. 43 eliminates this outdated requirement and returns these lands to Village Corporations, allowing for housing, economic development, and community expansion. This bill restores self-determination, ensuring Alaska Natives, not government bureaucracy, decide how to use their own land.

This legislation has broad support, as was mentioned, including from the Alaska Governor and State Legislature, and was unanimously passed by the Senate in the last Congress. I urge my colleagues to support this commonsense fix and allow these lands to be used by their owners to support their own communities.