An Update on Elders Program Litigation
The lawsuit filed by a group of shareholders challenging CIRI's elders' program is proceeding in court. CIRI has asked the federal court to hear the case, because ANCSA provides the legal authority on which CIRI relied in establishing the elders' program. The shareholders that have sued CIRI over the program are fighting federal court jurisdiction and have asked to have the case transferred back to state court. That issue has to be decided before the case can proceed further.
The group of shareholders who filed the lawsuit are arguing that CIRI should not have established a program to pay elders a special amount, and that the distributions have to be made to all shareholders on the basis of how many shares they own. CIRI disagrees. We argue that ANCSA allows the company to set up a special program for payments to elders. Unfortunately, because of the lawsuit, payments under the program were suspended until the lawsuit is resolved. The corporation is currently making the payments into a special interest-bearing account. CIRI hopes that the lawsuit will be resolved in the company's favor, and plans that the amounts in the account, along with the interest, will be distributed to elders in this event.

Previous Article | Top | Next Article | Return to the list of newsletters