He is the first American Indian general authority since George P. Lee. Before that, he was the Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Indian Affairs (May 22, 2009 – April 27, 2012).
His department was in violation of Federal law for failing to release tribal economic and employment reports. He left to become a Mormon general authority and his assistant had to answer to congress.
http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork...
See the gap in these reports during Larry's tenure.
http://www.bia.gov/WhatWeDo/Knowledge...
Another federal law was broken during Larry's time in the BIA. This one was a failure to publish the list of federally recognized tribes.
http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork...
Now for the really good stuff.
These letters were sent to Larry Echo Hawk on the subject of South Dakota foster care system violating the Indian Child Welfare Act.
http://www.lakotalaw.org/wp-content/u...
http://www.lakotalaw.org/wp-content/u...
Larry responded that a summit would be held.
http://www.lakotalaw.org/wp-content/u...
It never happened and Larry moved into LDS leadership.
http://www.lakotalaw.org/wp-content/u...
"We were buoyed by former Assistant Secretary Echo Hawk's commitment, made not only to us but also to other members of Congress who expressed concern over this serious issue, and awaited the outcome of such a summit. Fourteen months have passed since our initial inquiry and it appears that a summit, or stakeholder meeting of any kind, has yet to materialize."
A Salt Lake Tribune story mentioned the problems from the Mormon placement program.
More than 33 years after Congress passed the Indian Child Welfare Act, American Indian children in Utah are still being removed from
their homes and placed in foster care far too often – a troubling statistic that is the focus of the state's tribes and government officials.
True, there has been a vast improvement in out-of-home placements over those decades. In 1976, two years before passage of the act,
American Indian children in Utah were 1,500 times more likely to be in foster care than other children in the state, said Utah Appeals
Court Judge William Thorne, who spoke March 16 at the first Indian Child Welfare Conference to be held in Salt Lake City.
Today, American Indian children are four times more likely to be in foster care, a rate still significant enough to place Utah in the top 10
states for disproportionate rates.
http://www.lakotalaw.org/wp-content/u...
Elder Echo Hawk's conference talk of October 2012 "asked" American Indians to read the Book of Mormon.
"I especially ask the remnant of the house of Israel, the descendants of the people of the Book of Mormon, wherever you may be, to read and reread the Book of Mormon."
http://www.lds.org/general-conference...
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