US forest managers finalize land exchange with Native American tribe in Arizona

U.S. forest managers have finalized a land exchange in Arizona with the Yavapai-Apache Nation. The exchange announced Tuesday has been decades in the making and will significantly expand the size of the tribe's reservation. The tribe will host a signing ceremony next week to celebrate the exchange. It was first proposed in 1996. As part of the arrangement, six parcels of private land acquired over the years by the tribe will be traded to the U.S. Forest Service in exchange for the tribe gaining ownership of 5 square miles of national forest land near Camp Verde. The land is part of the tribe's ancestral homelands.