Leonard Burch, 69; Helped Free Southern Utes From Poverty

Leonard C. Burch, 69, the longtime chairman of the Southern Utes credited with helping to lead the tribe out of poverty, died Friday in a Durango, Colo., hospital after a heart attack.

For three decades, Burch led the tribe’s struggle out of poverty and obscurity to become, by the mid-1990s, one of America’s richest and most sophisticated Indian nations and a major power in the Four Corners. He retired as chairman last year.

Under the soft-spoken Burch, the tribe parlayed its energy resources and ties with non-Indian neighbors into an empire with assets of at least $1.5 billion.

Burch, the youngest chairman when he gained office in 1966 at the age of 32, guided the tribe in its battle with the Bureau of Indian Affairs and other federal agencies to run its own enterprises. One such enterprise, Red Willow Production Co., is among the state’s largest natural gas producers.