Sponsors
Introduced January 7, 2025 by Chuck Fleischmann · Last progress February 5, 2025
The bill transfers specific TVA-managed lands and easements into trust to secure tribal stewardship, cultural preservation, and better-defined land records while preserving TVA operational control — but it shifts local fiscal and access impacts, limits some tribal revenue options (gaming), and creates risks of property impacts, operational conflicts, and ongoing maintenance or legal costs.
Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (and other Cherokee tribes) gain clear legal ownership and control of specified museum, memorial, and shoreline parcels as trust land, consolidating tribal stewardship over important cultural sites.
Tribal and local communities gain funded cultural and interpretive facilities (Sequoyah birthplace museum, Chota and Tanasi memorials, Trail of Tears interpretation) and recreational trails, expanding cultural education, tourism, and outdoor access.
The bill requires TVA to produce revised, corrected maps and clarifies land status, improving transparency and certainty in land records for tribes, local and state governments, and utilities.
Homeowners and nearby landowners below certain reservoir contours face risk of temporary flooding, wave action, or permanent inundation from TVA-managed reservoir operations, and the bill disclaims U.S. liability for such losses.
The ban on class II/III gaming on the specified lands eliminates a potential source of tribal revenue and jobs, reducing economic opportunities the Eastern Band (and other tribes) might have used to fund services.
Local governments and taxpayers may lose taxing authority and regulatory control over lands moved into trust, potentially reducing local revenues and shifting fiscal impacts to other jurisdictions or to federal entities.
Based on analysis of 7 sections of legislative text.
Transfers specified TVA land into trust and permanent easements for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians for museum, memorial, reinterment, and trail uses; preserves TVA water-control rights and bans class II/III gaming.
Transfers specified Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) land along Tellico Reservoir into federal trust for the benefit of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, establishes permanent easements for shoreline and trail areas, and sets permitted uses focused on memorials, museum, cultural interpretation, recreation, and reinterment. The measure preserves TVA’s reservoir and river-control rights (including temporary flooding and drawdowns), requires TVA to handle environmental assessments and cleanup liability for the transferred lands, and expressly prohibits class II and class III gaming on those lands.