Tribal member appointed to head BIA

Tribal member Bryan Mercier has been selected as the next director for the Bureau of Indian Affairs in the U.S. Department of the Interior.

Mercier, 50, has been serving as director of the BIA’s Northwest Regional Office since 2018.

He began as acting BIA director on Sept. 8, and will be formally appointed to the position when current director Darryl LaCounte retires later this year.

Mercier was selected out of what Assistant Secretary Bryan Newland described as “a comprehensive recruitment and selection process.”

“Bryan stood out for his vision of the future of BIA and skills to achieve that vision,” Newland said in a press release.

According to the press release, Mercier has spent two decades working in public service. His federal career started with the U.S. Forest Service, followed by a few years as a program manager at the Department of the Treasury’s Community Development Financial Institution Fund.

Prior to joining the BIA, Mercier served as the executive manager of fish and wildlife for the Bonneville Power Administration’s Environment, Fish and Wildlife Program, which is the largest environmental mitigation program in the United States.

An interview with Mercier will be in a future edition of Smoke Signals.