Officers in Flandreau, South Dakota, had been working on tribal and non-tribal land under a joint powers agreement. Photo from FPD

The Flandreau Santee Sioux Tribe of South Dakota has contacted the Bureau of Indian Affairs with the goal of establishing its own police force, The Moody County Enterprise reports.

The tribe had a joint law enforcement agreement with the city of Flandreau for 15 years. A new contract was expected to be signed last week but the tribe has decided to go its own way, President Tony Reider.

“This move will give us input and oversight of our own police force and a hand in the decision process that goes along with having your own force with federally certified officers,” Reider told the Enterprise.

The tribe's decision surprised city leaders. But Mayor Mark Bonrud said the city will work with the tribe over the next 90 days to determine how to move forward.

The joint powers agreement was unique in Indian Country. The tribe and the city chose representatives for a public service commission, which oversaw a police department whose officers worked on tribal and non-tribal land.

"The department consolidates resources, delivers law enforcement services for the city of Flandreau and for all the tribe’s trust lands, while training officers to deal respectfully and responsibly with all citizens, Native and non-Native," the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development said in choosing the department for an Honoring Nations award in 2006. "The tribe is pioneering a genuinely new intergovernmental relationship in a crucial area of public life."

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City-Tribe: Joint Powers Agreement Dissolves (The Moody County Enterprise 6/8)