cable satellite corp. 2008 the written testimony describes the needs in areas of education, the tribal priority programs, housing, trust and national resources, economic development, welfare assistance, indian health care, office of adjusted services, law enforcement, travel courts and transportation. i would like to again remind the committee as tribal nation we know what our needs are and will continue to try and satisfy these needs with every resource available. without the necessary funding levels for governmental services as obligated in our signed treaties, our needs will not be fully met. on behalf of the great plains, i thank you for your time and consideration of our needs and recommendations. thank you. for your testimony.

mr. chairman, president sharp, you mentioned tribes are ineligible for dozens of natural resource programs across federal agencies and are disproportionately under-funded per acre. how can we bring parity to tribal resource funding? >> that's an excellent question. thank you, chairman. there's a couple of things come to mind. the first would be to look at the eligibility of tribes to participate in the many opportunities throughout the federal agencies to contend with natural resource areas. we estimate there are millions of dollars available to state and local governments to contend with natural resources that tribes simply are not eligible to even compete. so, it seems if tribes can be included in many other

opportunities, it shouldn't matter where geographically, good public policy across the united states means, there aren't those type of barriers. so we have some of the most pristine areas in our tribal communities but relative to state and local governments our funding is incredibly short of where they're at. so that would be one recommendation. the other it seems that, when you look at national budgets of tribal governments, the revenue stream that comes in from grants and the federal government is just one revenue stream. there are many others that if congress were to look at one increasing private-sector development within our tribal communities. there are some initiatives in the sba and others but by increasing a private sector that allows us to increase our tax base in that those dollars would go to meet

things like natural resources. incentivizing private partnerships with tribal communities. if you look at the low-income indian housing tax credits, we are able to sell those, allowing corporations to defer their tax liability for ten years. we were able to build housing infrastructure. there's the indian employment tax credit, but it's effectively not working, because we don't have the infrastructure for businesses to locate to take advantage of those tax credits. if tribes were able to sell the tax credit for indian employment, the tax availability, we did the math at quinnault, and if we can sell those just for the employees at our businesses not counting our government but our businesses it would increase our national budget by 25%. so there's a lot of tax policy, there's a lot of economic policy that is separate and apart from the federal funding and appropriations that could increase our national treasuries

and it's sovereignty based. insulate us from the intrusion of state and local taxes. that's another drain on our economy. many, many dollars are taken -- i live on the reservation. my house is on the reservation. twice a year i write a tax check to the county. so those are just a few ideas of how we might be able to increase the parity for natural resources. thank you. >> thank you very much, president sharp. principal chief hicks, in your testimony you state that insufficient funding for contract support costs requires tribes to divert millions of dollars from health care services to fixed administrative expenses.

please discuss the impact this has on you said member tribes. and i'm asking this because you three represent different parts of our country, the western, the plain area and you, of course, the south and eastern areas as well. >> yes, sir. within any organization, of course, there are various costs. you have direct costs and indirect costs. direct cos are what put the actual services on the ground. those are the cost that you know pay for the surgeries or pay for the dental bills, et cetera. but you also have to have the administrative staff to be able to support, you know, the i.t. systems, your human resource systems, the overall management of the operation. so there has to be a balance there. and, again, through defining where the priorities are, they are both priorities.

and so in regards to, you know, the contract support cost, they are very important to the operation itself. and we are a compact hospital. we took over our hospital a few years ago. so we manage it ourselves. so those support cost dollars are extremely important to us. of course, you know, between as i mentioned in my testimony, eastern band has, is required to supplement because we're only funded at about 60% of what our operation needs to service the 15,000 eastern band members that we have in the area. so, again, it's extremely important and i hope that, you know, any restoration of these funds, you know, can be further defined in this budget process. thank you. >> thank you, principal chief. this next question is for the panel. one of the ways that the department of the interior

anticipates achieving savings in the president's budget and has been discussed is by stream lining services, reviewing personnel and functions at the region and agency level based on the needs of the tribes. my question to the panel is how would you like to see the department involve tribes in that effort? what do you think the department should take into account during this review? and let me start by asking chairman shepherd to respond to that and we'll have president sharp next. >> okay. thank you. by streamlining the money i think that would really would

get more direct services. the money would be utilized for the services. i know when you have different tiers of administrative offices, a lot of that money isn't being used for the purpose or its intend purposes. so the services that are on the ground, down on the reservations, our nations -- all the money is tied up in administrative costs. so we're stuck getting the leftovers after they pay their wages or administrative costs, we get the leftovers, and that's not enough. it's not enough for any of our regions. and through consultation i think is the way to do it and timing is, is important. having the conversation before they make their decision is where we should be having the conversations. a lot of times we get involved when it's too late and we don't really -- we're not very effective when we're too late.

so the timing is critical when we get involved with the consultation. thank you. >> president sharp? >> thank you, chairman. i would agree with my colleague direct consultation with any tribe on any proposal is absolutely vital. many times when we had to with stand across the board cuts there are those unintended consequences that look good on paper but if there's not a connection between that decision and how it's going to be implemented on the ground within indian country some of the impacts are devastating. so as soon as those recommendations are formulated in real-time, consultation, direct engagement with tribal leadership with subject matter experts in health, in all the different areas would be necessary. to your second point at what criteria we would look at, it seems you would look at various personnel.

if that personnel, if their work involves procession, administrative functions that are time sensitive those are some things that we've experienced in the past where personnel are cut but that results in a six-month delay in getting an appraisal, those sort of things. it seems that the criteria that we would look at is the function that those, that personnel, those administrative functions, procedures, how that directly relates to our implementation. so i commend the department for looking at stream lining in indian country. we've lived that. we've had to be very efficient and very lean in our operations, and we all should be looking at how dollars, precious dollars could be used to directly benefit indian people. >> thank you. principal chief hicks. >> i think first of all, each

system that and within each tribe is unique. i think the first -- one of the most important things i think we can do, instead of talking first and i'm speaking from an agency perspective, i think listen first is -- and then we can get to the point we need to be. you know stream lining is simply not cutting a percentage out of the budget and say we fixed it. we have to under what the process are. we have to under what the goal is. of course setting those priorities to make sure that, you know, the system is working to its best interest on behalf of each tribe and progressing the tribe. i think as we look at this entire process it obviously involves the parties and in this case the tribes, but, you know, to make sure that, again we listen first and not just dictate this is how we'll do things. i've never believed in across the board cuts, but do i believe in, if you base, you know, in

this case realignment and/or re-evaluation based on need then you can go places. so that's my recommendation as it relates to streamlining. >> this next question is to the entire panel again. unless congress acts the federal budget faces sequestration measures which could mean across the board cuts in many indian programs. can you describe the impact this could have on your members? president sharp? >> sure. the impact would be devastating. right now, the funding for basic services, as i mentioned with our natural resources and law enforcement, basic governmental

services are already in desperate need and for some areas the level of cuts that we're facing may seem to be a sliver but for indian country it's a gash in an open wound. the needs are desperate. going back to the first question i would encourage this committee to seriously consider an overall financial fiscal strategy for indian country that includes those things outside of federal appropriations. i think there's an affirmative duty on this, this congress knowing that those cuts are imminent. knowing that those cuts will run deep into its trust obligations to indian tribes. there is a duty to look at alternative sources of increasing revenue into tribal budget, into our treasuries and there are many, many other

creative ways strategic ways to garner precious dollars and resources outside of federal appropriations with the private-sector, with small business development investment. so to answer the question it would be devastating and that want requires a positive duty to look at other approaches to funding our most basic services. >> again, i go back to my comments about the principal foundation is you know, before you cut the programs, understand what the needs of the service are. and again, i don't believe in across the board cuts. i think that potentially they're detrimental whether it's a large and or small service that's being provided. so you know, i believe that as this budget process rolls out, again, that's my recommendation. let's look at the needs of the people and again, native peoples needs are just as important as anybody in this great united states. and you know, as tribal leaders, i know that we're going to fight

for every dime that we can get. and you know, cutting funding for programs that are already underfunded is just simply you know, not the right solution. i mean, native -- we're also survivors. i mean, you know, as we've gone through our histories and you know, with the land takings and again, not receiving our due share, we're going to survive. but we definitely need help with these services and programs. thank you. >> thank you. mr. chairman shepherd. >> thank you. i agree that it would be devastating to our tribe, to our region, to indian country as a whole and again, i agree that across the board cuts aren't the way to go. historically, tribes have been underfunded for -- since the beginning. and also, in the beginning, too, tribes were predominant lit

self-sufficient prior to the everything that's been happening and us assimilating to the new way of life that we're attempting to still live. and to cut budgets even further, i mean, the treaties, the treaties have been around for a long time. the trust responsibility has been around a long time. and it's never been fully met financially. and -- the services i guess is what it comes back to, the services from the government. we're trying to run our own tribal governments. we have our own services. we provide the best we can, and you start cutting the dollars, it's going to take away from the people and it will be devastating for us to continue to cut over the years. thank you.

>> well, i want to thank you very much for your patience here and we, i thank you very much for your responses through the questions and your testimony. and i want to again express mahalo, thank you to the witnesses at today's hearing. >> mahalo. >> the testimony we have heard today makes it evident that the president's budget request for native programs reflects a concerted effort to fulfill the trust responsibility. however, we heard significant concerns about the potential impacts of streamlining sequestration and balancing fiscal responsibility wind-chill

the trust responsibility. i look forward to continuing these conversations with administration, tribal leaders, like you and tribal organizations. finally, i would like to once again express the importance of hearing from all interested stakeholders on these matters. the hearing record will remain open for written testimony for two weeks from today. so mahalo, thank you very much. and thank you for being here to help us work together with you to help indian country and the indigenous people of our country. so thank you very much. this hearing is adjourned. >> thank you, chairman. >> thank you. >> mahalo.

the road the first weekend of each month, march featured shreveport, louisiana with book tv at the know el memorial library. >> mr. know el was born here and lived here most of his life. he started accumulating books. over his lifetime he accumulated over 200,000 volumes. if we have a gem in the collection it is probably going to be this one, one of the books we're most proud of. it's in the original binding from 1699 and once owned by a famous scientist. he's written his name, i. newton

and we're not pulling it out so much anymore because it is starting to flake away on the title page. >> american history tv looked at civil war era medical practices at the pioneer heritage museum. >> pioneer medicine is a long stretch from what it is today. you consider the things we take for granted when we go to the doctor, things like the instruments being as germ free as possible or the doctor has washed his hands before he's, decides to work on us. we use the term loosely for doctors when we're talking early medicine. a lot of these doctors were self-taught or worked under somebody else who had been self-taught and getting ready to retire. they would learn as they went. >> our lcv continues from little rock, arkansas, on c-span2 and 3.

now a discussion about consumer protection. senior regulators explain the effect of the dodd-frank wall street bill. chairman martin gruenberg was among the featured speakers. this is about 40 minutes. >> this is theirs. >> okay. okay. i'd like to welcome everybody back for our afternoon program, please. we hope you enjoyed a good lunch. we've had a very interesting morning, we're delighted now to have the privilege and honor of hearing from chairman martin j. gruenberg, acting chairman of the federal deposit and insurance corporation, chairman gruenberg has a number of d distinctions but one of them which is relevant for today's event is that he worked very actively on the senate banking committee for a number of years, served under senator paul

sarbanes, actively involved in the drafting of that statute, along with chairman gensel and professor goldsmith was involved. obviously steve harris also we've heard from this morning, so we have a number of folks with us this morning who are truly veterans of that effort and can give us some perspective on that statute. chairman gruenberg served on the senate banking committee i believe i'm right in saying from 1987 until 2005. previously he had received his law degree from case western reserve, and undergraduate degree from princeton. he became vice chairman of the federal deposit insurance corporation in august, 2005, and then became acting chairman when

chairman powell stepped down, and more recently became acting chairman when chairman sheila baer stepped down last july. so he's certainly a person with broad experience in the legislative branch. obviously for the last several years has been deeply involved in the regulatory policy arena. the fdic has been at the center of efforts to contain the financial crisis, certainly very much at the center of legislative drafting efforts with the dodd-frank act has certainly picked up new systemic responsibilities under dodd-frank so we're delighted to welcome chairman gruenberg to speak to us today. i suspect he'll be telling us something about the fdic's new responsibilities under dodd-frank and how those are being implemented.

he's findly agreed to take a few questions after his prepared remarks. please join me in welcoming chairman gruenberg. [ applause ] >> thank you for that kind droe duction. art is an old friend and served as an adviser to us on any number of bills that we considered on the senate banking committee while i was there. this is a bit of an old home week. i know steve harris was here earl goer, gary ginsler just left, professor gulchman is here, all of whom played very central roles in the formulation of the sarbanes-oxley certainly, and certainly in its implementation as well. so it's a pleasure for me to be here. you made reference to former

fdic chairman sheila bair who i think was an outstanding leader of the fdci. sheila told me two things before she left, one, being chairman of the fdic is a very tough job, and i can now vouch for that. the second thing, and so she was right on that point. the second thing she told me was, "everything will be okay," before she left. that she wasn't quite as right. [ laughter ] >> she didn't tell you about europe? >> and some other things as well, but if nothing else, it's been an interesting and challenging experience. and i think the role of the fdic during the course of this financial crisis really has been a very important one, and i think if i may say, i think history will look back upon the performance of the fdic over these past three or four years and i think the performance will

hold up pretty well. two things i really wanted to talk with you about this afternoon. i want to take just a moment to talk about the condition of the banking industry. just earlier this week, on tuesday, the fdic released its quarterly banking profile, so i just wanted to share some of the results of that with you and then i'll spend really the remainder of the time talking about the big, new responsibility that the fdic has under the dodd-frank act, which is the responsibility for the resolution of systemically important financial institutions. that really is one of the key new authorities as provided under the dodd-frank legislation, and i believe is crucial if we're to deal with the systemic risk and too about igto fail and under the

legislation the fdic really has the core responsibility for carrying out that very, very challenging responsibility p but if i may, let me start for a minute on the condition of the banking industry. 2011 represented the second full year of improving performance by the banking system. the latest data, as i indicated, we released it earlier this week in our quarterly banking profile, indicate that banks have continued to make gradual but steady progress in recovering from the financial market turmoil, and severe recession that unfolded from 2007 through 2009. during the past two years, the banking industry has undergone a difficult process of balance sheet strengthening, capital has been increased, asset quality has improved, and banks have

bolstered their liquidity. i think it's fair to say that the industry today is in a much better position to support the economy through expanded lending. however, levels of troubled assets and problem banks are still high, and while the economy is showing signs of improvement, downside risks clearly remain a concern. the fdic data does show a continuation during the fourth quarter of last year of a trend in overall improvement in the condition of ensured institutions. industry earnings have grown over the past eight consecutive quarters. the percent of non-current loans on the books of fdic insured institutions has declined for seven consecutive quarters, reflecting approved credit quality. the number of institutions on the fdic's problemnk