Elected Term: 2024-2026

Cheryl Demmert Fairbanks, Esq. works in the area of Indian law as an Attorney and Tribal Court of Appeals Justice. Currently she is the Interim Co- Director for the University of New Mexico’s Native American Budget and Policy Institute. She recently was in Oregon serving as the Walter R. Echo-Hawk Distinguished Visiting Professor of Law at Lewis and Clark; and also, she was a visiting Professor of Law at the University of New Mexico’s Southwest Indian Law Clinic. Formerly a partner at Cuddy McCarthy LLP, she had a general practice in Indian law, including tribal-state relations, personnel, tribal courts, peacemaking and family conferencing, mediation, family, school, education, and indigenous law.

Ms. Fairbanks was a partner with the law firm of Roth, VanAmberg, Rogers, Ortiz, Fairbanks & Yepa, LLP, where she specialized in Indian law. She also worked as Senior Policy Analyst with the New Mexico Office of Indian Affairs in the area of state-tribal relations. There, she was instrumental in establishing the Indian Child Welfare Desk, New Mexico Office of Indian Tourism, the University of New Mexico Indian Law Clinic, and the passage of the New Mexico Indian Arts and Crafts Act.

Ms. Fairbanks is Tlingit-Tsimshian and was born in Ketchikan, Alaska. She obtained her Bachelor of Arts degree from Fort Lewis College in 1969 and her Juris Doctorate in 1987 from the University of New Mexico. Prior to her law career, she served as a teacher for the Albuquerque Public Schools, Zia Day School, and Administrator for Acomita Day School and the Albuquerque/Santa Fe Indian Schools.

Ms. Fairbanks’ publications include:

Indigenous Justice as a Concept in American Jurisprudence, @LAW (NALS) (Summer 2005 reporter)

The Sacred Trust: Our Children, Our Tribal Sovereignty, and the Indian Child Welfare Act, Inside the Minds, Emerging Issues in Tribal-State Relations (2012 Ed.) (Aspatore)

Indian Child Welfare Act Checklists for Juvenile and Family Court Judges, NCJFCJ, June 2003 (Reviewer and Contributor)