The Bureau of Indian Affairs is now using $26 million in congressional appropriations to fight crime on three North Dakota reservations and others across the country.

The BIA has been conducting Operation Dakota Peacekeeper on Standing Rock Reservation and a surge of 20 additional officers has resulted in arrests and reduced crime.

The funding from the Safe Indian Communities Initiative will go toward more officers in high-crime reservations and to Standing Rock, where nearly $2 million will be used for more police and corrections officers.

Another $560,000 will go for officers at Spirit Lake Reservation near Devils Lake and $1 million for officers at Turtle Mountain reservation.

An additional $350,000 will go to fight methamphetamines at all North Dakota reservations.

Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-ND, helped secure the funding as chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee and as a senior member of the Senate Appropriations Committee.

'This new funding is a critical step forward in our effort to address crime in American Indian communities" Dorgan said.

He introduced a bill to provide tools to tribal justice officials to fight crime in their own communities, improve coordination between tribal, state and federal law enforcement agencies, and increase transparency and accountability standards to ensure more efficient spending of federal funds for tribal law enforcement programs.