Interior and State Departments Consult Before Drafting Regulations to Implement STOP Act

The U.S. Department of the Interior (Interior, Department) and the U.S. Department of State are seeking input from Tribes and the Native Hawaiian Community on the development of regulations to implement the Safeguarding Tribal Objects of Patrimony (STOP) Act. The STOP Act aims to prevent the international export of cultural items prohibited from trafficking under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) and the Archeological Resources Protection Act (ARPA).

The STOP Act directs Interior, in coordination with the Departments of State, Justice, and Homeland Security, to regulate export of Native American, including Native Hawaiian, cultural items and to facilitate the voluntary repatriation of Native American human remains and cultural items from overseas back to Tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations (NHO) in the United States.

The Departments will consider all timely input and are specifically seeking your advice on practical implementation aspects where the STOP Act is either silent or its provisions do not go into detail. Questions linked below are intended to highlight some of these aspects and your answers will be used to help inform writing the initial draft of the regulations.

Please register for one or both of the sessions below to receive an overview of the STOP Act and provide input.

In-Person at 5:00 pm HST on Wednesday, August 23, 2023
State of Hawaiʻi Office of Hawaiian Affairs
560 N. Nimitz Hwy., Suite 200, Honolulu, Hawaiʻi
Register through the Office of Native Hawaiian Relations at https://forms.office.com/g/VsU2Zwf452.

Virtually at 9:00 am HST on Thursday, August 24, 2023
Via Zoom hosted by the Department's Bureau of Land Management
Register at:
https://blm.zoomgov.com/webinar/register/WN_MQ7zFYw6QdGsW_xi0wxKAw.

Written comments must be submitted by 6:00 p.m. HST on Friday, September 1, 2023 for consideration, either using the form at https://forms.office.com/g/VsU2Zwf452 or by email to doi_onhr_hhl@ios.doi.gov.

Related Resources

Consultation Framing Questions for STOP Act Draft Regulations Development