INDIAN ISLAND (AP) – Monday marked the 25th anniversary of the Maine Indian Claims Settlement Act, a unique agreement that marked a new chapter for the state’s Indian tribes.

On Oct. 10, 1980, President Jimmy Carter signed the act into law that resulted in the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes each receiving $26.8 million to buy more than 300,000 total acres of land, putting them among the state’s largest landowners.

The Houlton Band of Maliseets, a smaller tribe in Aroostook County, received $900,000 to acquire land.

The settlement also included an additional $13.5 million each for the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes, to be held in federal trust accounts.

In return for the $81.5 million in federal money, the tribes dropped their claim to 12.5 million acres of land, or about two-thirds of the state, and agreed to abide by most state laws and provide services similar to a municipality.

Although tribal members disagree on the net impact of the settlement, it brought about substantial change, good and bad. Twenty-five years later, poverty still persists on the state’s three Indian reservations despite general improvements in housing, employment and education.

Penobscot tribal members disagree on the net impact of the settlement. But since 1980, the reservation’s population has risen to nearly 600 people – about one-third of the Penobscot tribe’s total membership – from 474.

In the 1970s, the tribe’s annual budget totaled about $11,000, with most of the money used to pay electricity and heating bills at the tribe’s meeting hall. The tribe’s annual general fund now averages about $1 million, including about $250,000 per year from the tribe’s high-stakes bingo operation.

Since the settlement, the tribes have used their bolstered financial strength to engage in business deals. Some have been successful, such as the Passamaquoddy Tribe’s purchase of Dragon Cement in Thomaston in 1983 for $2 million and $23 million in loans. The Passamaquoddies later sold the property for $80 million.

But some ventures, such as the Penobscots’ $1.2 million loss on the Schiavi Homes of Holden, did not work out well.

The settlement allowed the tribes to have a combined $27 million trust fund privately managed.

They allow the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs to invest the money in government bonds, with interest distributed among individual members.