Before the 1970s, the area of land now held by the Katiti ALT was considered crown land by the government. The region to the southwest had been declared an Aboriginal reservation in 1920. An area of land around Uluṟu and Kata Tjuṯa had been made into the Ayers Rock–Mt Olga National Park in 1958. The Katiti block, however, was considered unused. In 1976, the Australian Federal Government passed the Aboriginal Land Rights Act. This law allowed Aboriginal communities to claim ownership of unused land, and to be granted freehold title to that land if they could show that they had a historical association with it. Section 4 of the act gave the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs the power to establish Land Trusts to look after the title.