Members of Fort Berthold Indian Reservation have waited 50 years to get back land taken from them for the permanent flooding of Lake Sakakawea.

They may be within months of getting about 25 percent of that land back, but from comments at a hearing on a proposed transfer Tuesday night in Bismarck, the idea faces some stiff resistance.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says it has authority to transfer land above 1,854 feet elevation within reservation boundaries that's no longer needed to maintain or operate the dam. It proposes to transfer about 36,000 acres of the 156,000 acres originally taken when Garrison Dam was built in the 1950s. The authority comes from a 1984 federal law, the Fort Berthold Mineral Restoration Act.

The transfer would be a several-step process and include more hearings and a report on the effects of the transfer before any final action, possibly later this year.

Members of the Three Affiliated Tribes said the transfer helps right an old wrong, created when the reservation was forced to give nearly 70 percent of all the land needed in North Dakota to hold back the Missouri River from flooding downstream.

John Danks, a reservation member, reminded the 200 or so at the hearing that the tribes were once given 12 million acres in treaty, now reduced to 450,000 acres by one taking after another. About one-third of the people who attended were tribal members.

"Why does the public want these few acres in the heart of our reservation?" Danks asked. "Why would they?"

The corps has leased some of that land to state and local public users over the years and several state officials stepped up to provide that answer.

State Game and Fish Commissioner Dean Hildebrand said he is diametrically opposed to the transfer as proposed because of the state's investment in 7,000 wildlife management areas around the lake. The areas are managed for recreation and hunting.

He said the wildlife management areas would become tribal lands and non-tribal members would have to buy tribal hunting licenses to use them. He said the state and tribes should at least have the same "sideboards" of opening seasons and bag limits.

Gov. John Hoeven said the corps should not abandon its responsibility to provide recreation on Lake Sakakawea, which is outlined in the corps' master manual for Missouri River operations.

Doug Prchal, director of the State Parks Department, said there are state and federal cooperative recreation projects on the lake that could be affected by the transfer.

"What does the future hold should this transfer proceed?" he asked.

The transfer would consist of varying widths of land, rimming the reservation on both sides of the lake. The land is closest to the water, where boat ramps and public use occurs.

Prchal's question got to the heart of the matter.

David Johnson, a member of a cabin owner's association at McKenzie Bay, said people simply need more information about what would happen if the tribe takes over leases like the one McKenzie County and Watford City have with the corps for a $2.5 million public and private recreation area there.

Byron Holtan, owner of Indian Hills resort on the lake's north shore, raised a question of fairness. Holtan said he is a non-tribal member, living within the boundaries, whose family also had land taken for the dam. Now he's leasing some of that land back to operate a resort and said it's in jeopardy of being included in the transfer.

He said his grandfather had an old farm truck in which he used to help reservation members move out of their homes ahead of the rising water.

"There were a lot of tears shed in that truck," Holtan said. "Why shed tears again?"

Holtan said the land should be returned to reservation and non-reservation members alike.

Russell Gillette is the son of George Gillette, who was tribal chairman when the federal law was signed to flood the reservation members' ancestral home. In a photo that went around the world, George Gillette was overcome with emotion among stoic bureaucrats.

Russell Gillette said the Three Affiliated Tribes are still reeling from the trauma caused by the dam.

"We all have to work together," he said. "We're all human."

The corps plans to make an agency-to-agency transfer to the Bureau of Indian Affairs, which will hold all of the transferred land in trust.

Paul Danks, tribes' natural resource manager, said the Three Affiliated Tribes still has to clarify whether it would take over the corps' leases for wildlife management areas and public recreation areas or whether those would be managed by the BIA.

Tribal chairman Tex Hall sent a statement to the hearing. He said the tribe has questions about the transfer, too.

"The tribes recognize and understand that many of you are fearful of the proposed transfer," Hall said. "… understand that the tribes do not have any desire to obstruct your interests as we recognize that it is in the tribes' best interest to promote economic activity on and around Lake Sakakawea."

The corps will hold a hearing at 4 p.m. today at the Dickinson Days Inn and at 4 p.m. Thursday at the Williston Airport International Inn. Public comment will be taken from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

(Reach reporter Lauren Donovan at 888-303-5511 or lauren@westriv.com.)