Digital Scholarship and Initiatives

This article announces that North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper signed into law, Senate Bill 218. The signing ceremony was held in Pembroke, NC at the tribe’s administrative building, The Turtle.

The article notes the following features of the new state law. It:

• “grants the tribe the same state recognition as any municipality”;

• “opens the door to more sources of [grant] funding” in areas such as health and education;

• could help the tribe achieve full federal recognition;

• creates a trust fund so that the tribe can use the natural resources (such as timber) at the Lumbee Tribe Cultural Center.

Dr. Freda Porter, Tribal Administrator, commented that “the tribe will have no city limits or other financial or legal controls that municipalities have under dominion of the state.”