WASHINGTON – Bureau of Indian Affairs Director W. Patrick Ragsdale today announced that Allen J. Anspach, acting regional director of the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) Western Regional Office in Phoenix, Ariz., has been confirmed in that position effective May 23.  Anspach, a member of the Blackfeet Tribe of Montana and a certified Senior Executive Service (SES) administrator, had served in an acting capacity since January 2006.  The Western Regional Office serves the federally recognized tribes located in Arizona (except the Navajo Nation), Nevada and Utah.

“Allen Anspach is a solid Bureau of Indian Affairs manager who brings 28 years of tribal relations and policy experience to his new post,” Ragsdale said.  “I am pleased that he has joined our regional senior management team.”

Anspach’s federal career began in 1978 when he joined the BIA’s Phoenix Area Office (now Western Regional Office) as a tribal operations officer intern, a position he held until 1981 when he became a tribal operations specialist.  He served in the Phoenix Area Office until 1985, where he spent 10 months during the years 1982 to 1983 at the Interior Department headquarters in Washington, D.C., as a trainee in its Departmental Management Development Program.  His training assignment included helping to develop, as a member of the Assistant Secretary – Indian Affairs staff, President Reagan’s Indian policy and a stint at the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs.

After his training assignment, Anspach returned to the Bureau where, in January 1985, he was appointed superintendent of its Pawnee Agency, which services the Kaw Nation, the Otoe-Missouria Tribe, the Pawnee Nation, the Ponca Tribe, and the Tonkawa Tribe who live in north-central Oklahoma.  He went on to serve as superintendent at three BIA agencies in Arizona:  the San Carlos Agency on the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation (appointed November 1988); the Colorado River Agency on the Colorado River Indian Reservation (appointed June 1993); and the Fort Apache Agency on the White Mountain Apache Indian Reservation (appointed September 2005).

“I am honored to have been given this tremendous opportunity to serve the tribes in the Western Region,” Anspach said.  “I look forward to continuing our efforts to support tribal self-determination and economic prosperity.”

Anspach received a bachelor of science degree from the University of Arizona-Tucson in 1975.  While attending UA he worked as a seasonal wildland firefighter, helitack crew member and helitack foreman at the San Carlos Agency.  After graduation, he taught vocational agriculture on the Navajo Nation Reservation at Ganado High School in Ganado, Ariz., and on the Tohono O’odham Nation Reservation at Baboquivari High School in Sells, Ariz.