Interests of Individual Indians in Trust or Restricted Lands

Interests of Individual Indians in Trust or Restricted Lands. A. Certain types of Indian-specific property are excluded from being considered as resources in determining Medicaid eligibility for an individual who is an Indian. These excluded resources include the following: 1. Property Connected to the Political Relationship between Indian Tribes and the Federal Government; a) This exclusion includes any Indian trust or restricted land, or any other property under the supervision of the Secretary of the Interior located on a reservation, including any federally-recognized Indian Tribe’s reservation, pueblo or colony, and including Indian allotments on or near a reservation as designated and approved by the Bureau of Indian Affairs of the Department of the Interior; and b) Individual Indian Monies (IIM) accounts, which are under the supervision of the Secretary of the Interior, and considered to be inaccessible; and c) Property located within the most recent boundaries of a prior Federal reservation including former reservations in Oklahoma and Alaska Native regions established by the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act; d) Ownership interest in rents, leases, royalties or usage rights related to natural resources (including extraction of natural resources or harvesting of timber, other plants and plant products, animals, fish, and shellfish) resulting from the exercise of federally-protected rights Monies received from the lease or sale of these natural resources remain excluded while in an IIM account. 2. Property with Unique Indian Significance, such as: a) Ownership interest in or usage rights to items not covered under the above provisions that have unique religious, spiritual, traditional, or cultural significance or rights that support subsistence or traditional lifestyle according to Tribal law or custom. b) While the above identified assets are excluded in determining eligibility, if the assets are converted to a non-excluded asset, they become countable. 1) For instance money in an IIM account is excluded; however, once the money is removed from the IIM account it becomes a countable asset. 2) Money received by Indians from the lease or sale of natural resources, and rent or lease income, resulting from the exercise of federally-protected rights on excluded Indian property, is considered an asset conversion. Therefore, this money is not considered income, but is an excluded resource in the month the money is received (This is true even if the money is taken out of the IIM account in the same month it was deposited into the account). If some or all of the money is retained at the end of the month in which received, it is either counted or excluded based on the type of resource in which the money is retained after month of receipt. 3. Distributions of per capita judgment funds or property earnings held in trust for a Tribe by the Secretary of the Interior. a) However, this does not include local Tribal funds that a Tribe distributes to individuals on a per capita basis, but which have not been held in trust by the Secretary of the Interior (e.g., tribally managed gaming revenues, which are countable income).