KVIG Informative

Nevada shares its map with 20 federally recognized Tribal governments. State law spells out how Nevada agencies must deal with them, and a state department exists to hold that relationship together.

The Nevada Department of Native American Affairs describes its job as serving as the liaison between the state and 20 federally recognized Tribes, which together make up 28 Tribal communities. Its online directory runs from the Confederated Tribes of the Goshute Reservation on the Utah border to the Fort Mojave Indian Tribe at the state’s southern tip.

The gap between 20 and 28 comes from how some nations are organized. The Te-Moak Tribe of Western Shoshone is a coalition government based in Elko that serves four bands: Battle Mountain, Elko, Wells and South Fork. The Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California governs four communities: Carson Colony, Dresslerville, Stewart and Woodfords, the last of which sits just across the California line.

Southern Nevada The department’s directory lists three nations with land in the southern part of the state. The Las Vegas Paiute Tribe’s colony near downtown Las Vegas began with a 10-acre purchase from Helen J. Stewart in 1912, and federal legislation added more than 3,800 acres north of the city in the 1980s. The Moapa Band of Paiutes saw an 1873 executive order set aside roughly 2 million acres, an 1875 federal act cut that to 1,000 acres, and a 1980 law restored about 70,500 acres. The Fort Mojave Indian Tribe holds 5,582 acres in Nevada as part of a reservation that spans three states.

From commission to department Nevada created the Nevada Indian Commission by statute in 1965 to study the social and economic welfare of Native Americans living in the state. In 2023, lawmakers passed Assembly Bill 516, which turned that small office into a standalone Department of Native American Affairs. The change took effect July 1, 2024.

Under Nevada Revised Statutes 233A.1003, the department has three parts: an executive director, the five-member Nevada Indian Commission and the Stewart Indian School Cultural Center and Museum in Carson City. The law requires the governor to appoint at least three Native American commissioners and two members of the general public. The department says its current five commissioners are all Native American. The governor appoints the executive director on the commission’s recommendation, and department documents from 2026 list Stacey Montooth in that role.

The same law includes a legislative declaration that creating the department is not meant to infringe on the sovereignty of federally recognized Tribes. That line matters. Tribal nations are governments with their own constitutions, councils and courts, and the department works between governments rather than over them.

What state agencies owe Tribes A 2019 law, now NRS 233A.260, requires the department to write a policy for how state agencies communicate and collaborate with Tribes. Every state agency that deals with Tribes on a regular basis must name a Tribal liaison who reports directly to the agency head. Agencies must make a reasonable effort to work with Tribes on policies, agreements and programs that directly affect them.

Under NRS 233A.270, the governor must meet with Tribal leaders at least once a year in a state-Tribal summit. Agency heads and staff who work with Tribes must complete training. By July 1 of each year, each of those agencies must report to the department on its programs that affect Tribes, including how much money each program receives. The law also says these provisions do not create a right to sue an agency.

A new health council The 2025 Legislature added a Tribal Health Authority Council to the department’s statutes. Its voting members are the directors of Tribally operated health facilities in Nevada that choose to participate, with a nonvoting representative of the federal Indian Health Service. The council advises the department, the governor’s office and the state Department of Human Services, and it must adopt a plan to reduce barriers to health care for Native Nevadans.

The department’s website publishes the directory of Tribal leaders and agency liaisons the law requires, and it posts agendas and minutes for commission meetings. The agency reports due each July are compiled and sent to the governor and the Legislature, which next convenes in February 2027. Those reports show, agency by agency, what Nevada says it is doing with Tribal governments and how much it spends doing it.