Court says a tribe can't sue its health consortium in state court

Dot Lake Village cannot pursue its bylaws lawsuit against the Tanana Chiefs Conference — the Interior Alaska consortium that runs its health programs — in state court. The Alaska Supreme Court ruled Friday that TCC holds tribal sovereign immunity as an arm of its member tribes, and that no exception applies, affirming the case's dismissal for lack of jurisdiction. The court did not decide whether TCC broke its bylaws, only that no state court can take up the question.

Dot Lake, a federally recognized tribe and TCC member, sued in March 2022 after the TCC board voted in December 2021 to recall president Chief P.J. Simon. The village asked the court to void the recall and to make the board follow its own bylaws.

The consortium's healthcare role weighed most heavily toward immunity. TCC — 42 Alaska Native villages and urban Native groups, 37 of them federally recognized tribes — provides health services under federal self-determination law and the Alaska Tribal Health Compact, and a money judgment against it, Justice Oravec wrote for the court, "would divert funds from tribal healthcare services."

The outcome turned on a 2024 decision, Ito v. Copper River Native Association, which set a five-factor test for whether an entity counts as an arm of the tribe — weighing its purpose, creation, control, tribal intent and finances, with no single factor deciding. TCC's incorporation under Alaska law cut against immunity, but its creation in 1962 by sovereign tribes, and above all its healthcare role, carried the day.

The court also affirmed $11,888 in attorney's fees against Dot Lake, holding it gave up its own immunity on that question by suing. And it rejected the village's remaining arguments, including that a member tribe outranks the consortium it helped create. Dot Lake was represented by a single Fairbanks lawyer, TCC by four from two Anchorage firms.