A U.S. Senate committee heard testimony Wednesday -- on the 50th anniversary of the dedication of Garrison Dam -- about the need for a clinic to replace a hospital swallowed by the dam's reservoir.
Tex Hall, chairman of the Three Affiliated Tribes, urged passage of legislation introduced by Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., to authorize funding for a $20 million clinic on the Fort Berthold Reservation.
The 24-hour clinic would replace the hospital in Elbowoods, the reservation's central village, long submerged by Lake Sakakawea, which flooded the heart of the reservation.
More than 300 Fort Berthold families, totaling more than 1,700 residents, were displaced by the permanent flood. The reservation, now home to 3,776 residents, has waited 50 years for clinic to take the hospital's place.
The central point of the hearing was the promises that the government made to replace the hospital, Conrad said.
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"At the time of the flooding, the federal government made a number of commitments to the tribe," he told the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs. "One of those was a commitment to replace this hospital."
That commitment was reaffirmed 36 years later, Conrad said, by a federal panel that examined the need for further compensation for land and infrastructure lost to Garrison Dam.
The committee noted, in 1986, that the replacement of the health facility is "an emergency need that should be pursued immediately."
In 1992, when the tribe was awarded $149.2 million in further compensation, the urgent need for a clinic was again acknowledged -- so far, however, budget limitations have kept the clinic from materializing.
Because of changes in health-care delivery, Hall and Conrad agree that a clinic is appropriate to replace the hospital. But the clinic would be equipped to stabilize patients requiring emergency care before they are transported to a medical center.
The proposal received a bipartisan boost when Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell, R-Colo., chairman of the Committee on Indian Affairs, announced his support for the measure in Wednesday's hearing. Campbell will join Conrad and Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., as co-sponsors.
Readers can reach Forum reporter Patrick Springer at (701) 241-5522
