Chaco buffer fight far from over, allottee says
By Donovan Quintero
Special to the Times
WINDOW ROCK – Navajo allottee and advocate Ervin Chavez says federal protections surrounding Chaco Culture National Historical Park did more than restrict energy development. He argues they crossed a line into Navajo land authority, sovereignty and intertribal relations, a conflict he says remains unresolved as Congress stalls on legislation to undo the policy.
“The work is still ongoing,” Chavez said of efforts to overturn Public Land Order 7923, the 2023 Interior Department order that imposed a 20-year ban on new oil and gas leasing within a 10-mile buffer zone around Chaco Canyon. “We were under this thinking that basically the Trump administration would have already done away with that.”
Chavez said the delay has frustrated Navajo allottees across Eastern Agency, many of whom expected the order to be swiftly reversed because it was enacted administratively rather than through Congress.
To read the full article, please see the Dec. 18, 2025, edition of the Navajo Times.
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