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Where a conflict between two or more allotment applications exists due to overlapping land descriptions, the Secretary shall adjust the descriptions to eliminate conflicts, and in so doing, consistent with other existing rights, if any, may expand or alter the applied-for allotment boundaries or increase or decrease acreage in one or more of the allotment applications to achieve an adjustment which, to the extent practicable, is consistent with prior use of the allotted land and is beneficial to the affected parties: Provided, That the Secretary shall, to the extent feasible, implement an adjustment proposed by the affected parties: Provided further, That the Secretary’s decision concerning adjustment of conflicting land descriptions shall be final and unreviewable in all cases in which the reduction, if any, of the affected allottee’s claim is less than 30 percent of the acreage contained in the parcel originally described and the adjustment does not exclude from the allotment improvements claimed by the allottee: Provided further, That where an allotment application describes more than one hundred and sixty acres, the Secretary shall at any time prior to or during survey reduce the acreage to one hundred and sixty acres and shall attempt to accomplish said reduction in the manner least detrimental to the applicant.

An allotment applicant may amend the land description contained in his or her application if said description designates land other than that which the applicant intended to claim at the time of application and if the description as amended describes the land originally intended to be claimed. If the allotment application is amended, this section shall operate to approve the application or to require its adjudication, as the case may be, with reference to the amended land description only: Provided, That the Secretary shall notify the State of Alaska and all interested parties, as shown by the records of the Department of the Interior, of the intended correction of the allotment’s location, and any such party shall have until the one hundred and eightieth day following December 2, 1980, or sixty days following mailing of the notice, whichever is later, to file with the Department of the Interior a protest as provided in subsection (a)(5) of this section, which protest, if timely, shall be deemed filed within one hundred and eighty days of December 2, 1980, notwithstanding the actual date of filing: Provided further, That the Secretary may require that all allotment applications designating land in a specified area be amended, if at all, prior to a date certain, which date shall be calculated to allow for orderly adoption of a plan of survey for the specified area, and the Secretary shall mail notification of the final date for amendment to each affected allotment applicant, and shall provide such other notice as the Secretary deems appropriate, at least sixty days prior to said date: Provided further, That no allotment application may be amended for location following adoption of a final plan of survey which includes the location of the allotment as described in the application or its location as desired by amendment.

Where the land described in an allotment application pending before the Department of the Interior on or before December 18, 1971 (or such an application as adjusted or amended pursuant to subsection (b) or (c) of this section), was on that date withdrawn, reserved, or classified for powersite or power-project purposes, notwithstanding such withdrawal, reservation, or classification the described land shall be deemed vacant, unappropriated, and unreserved within the meaning of the Act of May 17, 1906, as amended, and, as such, shall be subject to adjudication or approval pursuant to the terms of this section: Provided, however, That if the described land is included as part of a project licensed under part I of the Federal Power Act of June 10, 1920 (41 Stat. 24), as amended [16 U.S.C. 791a et seq.], or is presently utilized for purposes of generating or transmitting electrical power or for any other project authorized by Act of Congress, the foregoing provision shall not apply and the allotment application shall be adjudicated pursuant to the Act of May 17, 1906, as amended: Provided further, That where the allotment applicant commenced use of the land after its withdrawal or classification for powersite purposes, the allotment shall be made subject to the right of reentry provided the United States by section 24 of the Federal Power Act, as amended [16 U.S.C. 818]: Provided further, That any right of reentry reserved in a certificate of allotment pursuant to this section shall expire twenty years after December 2, 1980, if at that time the allotted land is not subject to a license or an application for a license under part I of the Federal Power Act, as amended [16 U.S.C. 791a et seq.], or actually utilized or being developed for a purpose authorized by that Act, as amended [16 U.S.C. 791a et seq.], or other Act of Congress.

Prior to issuing a certificate for an allotment subject to this section, the Secretary shall identify and adjudicate any record entry or application for title made under an Act other than the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act [43 U.S.C. 1601 et seq.], the Alaska Statehood Act, or the Act of May 17, 1906, as amended, which entry or application claims land also described in the allotment application, and shall determine whether such entry or application represents a valid existing right to which the allotment application is subject. Nothing in this section shall be construed to affect rights, if any, acquired by actual use of the described land prior to its withdrawal or classification, or as affecting national forest lands.