California Department of Parks and Recreation
The California Dept. of Parks and Recreation has the 50th largest collection of unrepatriated Native American remains in the U.S. The institution reported still having the remains of at least 300 Native Americans that it has not made available for return to tribes.
The institution has made available for return 70% of the more than 1,200 Native American remains that it reported to the federal government.
Where Native American remains reported by the California Dept. of Parks and Recreation were taken from
Timeline of Native American remains made available for return to tribes by the California Dept. of Parks and Recreation
How the California Dept. of Parks and Recreation compares to other institutions
The California Dept. of Parks and Recreation made Native American remains available for return to 67 tribes.
| Tribe | Remains Made Available for Return To |
|---|---|
| Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Mission Indians of the Santa Ynez Reservation, California | 265 |
| Mechoopda Indian Tribe of Chico Rancheria, California | 235 |
| Round Valley Indian Tribes of the Round Valley Reservation, California | 234 |
| Berry Creek Rancheria of Maidu Indians of California | 232 |
| Enterprise Rancheria of Maidu Indians of California | 232 |
| Mooretown Rancheria of Maidu Indians of California | 232 |
| Picayune Rancheria of Chukchansi Indians of California | 174 |
| Santa Rosa Indian Community of the Santa Rosa Rancheria, California | 174 |
| Table Mountain Rancheria | 174 |
| Tule River Indian Tribe of the Tule River Reservation, California | 155 |
| Campo Band of Diegueno Mission Indians of the Campo Indian Reservation, California | 72 |
| Capitan Grande Band of Diegueno Mission Indians of California | 72 |
| Ewiiaapaayp Band of Kumeyaay Indians, California | 72 |
| Iipay Nation of Santa Ysabel, California | 72 |
| Inaja Band of Diegueno Mission Indians of the Inaja and Cosmit Reservation, California | 72 |
| Jamul Indian Village of California | 72 |
| La Posta Band of Diegueno Mission Indians of the La Posta Indian Reservation, California | 72 |
| Manzanita Band of Diegueno Mission Indians of the Manzanita Reservation, California | 72 |
| Mesa Grande Band of Diegueno Mission Indians of the Mesa Grande Reservation, California | 72 |
| San Pasqual Band of Diegueno Mission Indians of California | 72 |
| Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation | 72 |
| Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria, California | 56 |
| Tuolumne Band of Me-Wuk Indians of the Tuolumne Rancheria of California | 34 |
| Buena Vista Rancheria of Me-Wuk Indians of California | 28 |
| Chicken Ranch Rancheria of Me-Wuk Indians of California | 28 |
| Ione Band of Miwok Indians of California | 28 |
| Jackson Band of Miwuk Indians | 28 |
| Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians, Shingle Springs Rancheria (Verona Tract), California | 28 |
| United Auburn Indian Community of the Auburn Rancheria of California | 28 |
| Morongo Band of Mission Indians, California | 22 |
| Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians of the Agua Caliente Indian Reservation, California | 20 |
| Augustine Band of Cahuilla Indians, California | 20 |
| Cabazon Band of Cahuilla Indians | 20 |
| Cahuilla Band of Indians | 20 |
| Los Coyotes Band of Cahuilla and Cupeno Indians, California | 20 |
| Ramona Band of Cahuilla, California | 20 |
| Santa Rosa Band of Cahuilla Indians, California | 20 |
| Torres Martinez Desert Cahuilla Indians, California | 20 |
| Yurok Tribe of the Yurok Reservation, California | 14 |
| Alturas Indian Rancheria, California | 2 |
| Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe of the Cheyenne River Reservation, South Dakota | 2 |
| Hopi Tribe of Arizona | 2 |
| Oglala Sioux Tribe | 2 |
| Pit River Tribe, California | 2 |
| Redding Rancheria, California | 2 |
| Standing Rock Sioux Tribe of North and South Dakota | 2 |
| Susanville Indian Rancheria, California | 2 |
| Yuhaaviatam of San Manuel Nation | 2 |
| Ak-Chin Indian Community | 1 |
| Bear River Band of the Rohnerville Rancheria, California | 1 |
| Big Lagoon Rancheria, California | 1 |
| Big Valley Band of Pomo Indians of the Big Valley Rancheria, California | 1 |
| Blue Lake Rancheria, California | 1 |
| Chemehuevi Indian Tribe of the Chemehuevi Reservation, California | 1 |
| Cher-Ae Heights Indian Community of the Trinidad Rancheria, California | 1 |
| Colorado River Indian Tribes of the Colorado River Indian Reservation, Arizona and California | 1 |
| Elem Indian Colony of Pomo Indians of the Sulphur Bank Rancheria, California | 1 |
| Fort Mojave Indian Tribe of Arizona, California and Nevada | 1 |
| Gila River Indian Community of the Gila River Indian Reservation, Arizona | 1 |
| Koi Nation of Northern California | 1 |
| Middletown Rancheria of Pomo Indians of California | 1 |
| Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community of the Salt River Reservation, Arizona | 1 |
| Scotts Valley Band of Pomo Indians of California | 1 |
| Tohono O'odham Nation of Arizona | 1 |
| Twenty-Nine Palms Band of Mission Indians of California | 1 |
| Wiyot Tribe, California | 1 |
| Zuni Tribe of the Zuni Reservation, New Mexico | 1 |
The California Dept. of Parks and Recreation reported making 95% of more than 143,300 associated funerary objects available for return to tribes.
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This tool presents a dataset maintained by the National Park Service containing all the Native American human remains and associated funerary objects that institutions have reported to the federal government under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. The dataset includes information about the state and county where remains and objects were taken from, which institutions hold them and whether they have been made available for return to tribes.
The data is self-reported by institutions. The amount of unrepatriated Native American remains reported by institutions is a minimum estimate of individuals and institutions frequently adjust these numbers when they reinventory groups of remains. Some institutions that are subject to NAGPRA have also entirely failed to report the remains in their possession. As a result, the numbers provided are best taken as estimates. The actual number and geographic scope of what’s held by publicly funded institutions is larger than what is presently documented.
ProPublica supplemented this dataset with information about cultural affiliation and disposition to specific tribes by systematically parsing the text of Notices of Inventory Completion published in the Federal Register. An additional dataset from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Tribal Directory Assessment Tool, was used for the section on remains not made available for return from counties that each tribe has indicated interest in to the federal government.
Institution location and tribal headquarters location information was provided by National NAGPRA. The location of some groups that are not federally recognized was provided through research by ProPublica.
Institutions that are part of a larger entity are grouped. (For example, the Mesa Verde National Park is part of the U.S. Department of the Interior.)
Institutions that have not submitted information to the federal government are not listed. The Smithsonian Institution is not listed because its repatriation process falls under the National Museum of the American Indian Act and it is not required to publicly report its holdings with the same detail as institutions subject to NAGPRA.
If you work for an institution and would like to provide comment on your institution’s repatriation efforts, please email [email protected]. If you think the data is incorrect or have a data request, please get in touch. We are aware of some issues with the accuracy of location information and tribes mistakenly being identified for disposition of Native American remains in published notices.
If you want to share something else with ProPublica, we’d like to hear from you.
If you have questions about implementing or complying with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, get in touch with National NAGPRA or the NAGPRA Community of Practice.
We use the word “tribes” to refer to all groups that institutions made Native American remains available to under NAGPRA. This includes tribes, nations, bands, pueblos, communities, Native Alaskan villages, Native Hawaiian organizations and non-federally recognized groups.
Data sources from Department of the Interior, National Park Service, National NAGPRA Program, the Federal Register, Department of Housing and Development, Tribal Directory Assessment Tool