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Lawmakers invited to tour land-into-trust areas
WATERLOO — Lawmakers in Seneca and Cayuga counties are formally inviting federal representatives to meet with them on land-into-trust issues.
Letters were sent Wednesday to Reps. Sherwood Boehlert, R-24 of New Hartford, and Jim Walsh, R-25 of Syracuse; and Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Charles Schumer, both New York Democrats. They were signed by the chairs of the Seneca County Board of Supervisors and Cayuga County Legislature, Robert Shipley and George Fearon, respectively.
The county leaders want to talk about 125 acres of land in the two counties — 14 in Seneca Falls — that the Cayuga Indian Nation of New York has applied to have taken into federal trust. Both counties oppose the pending application, filed in April 2005.
If the Department of Interior, which oversees the Bureau of Indian Affairs, agrees to grant trust status, the land would be taken for the Nation to use as it sees fit, rendering it sovereign and free from local taxation or jurisdiction.
“During your visit, we would like to show you some select parcels for which trust status is being sought,” the June 23 letter says.
The representatives are also invited to meet with both boards and possibly select community leaders in affected towns and villages.
David Dresser, chairman of the Seneca County Native American Affairs Committee, said the invitations are a follow-up to his early March trip to Washington, where they were extended verbally to Boehlert and assistants of the other three.
A letter was also sent May 22 to James Cason, associate deputy secretary of the Department of the Interior, inviting him and other department representatives to visit. There has been no response yet.
Dresser said Cason led a department delegation in early May to Madison and Oneida counties regarding the Oneida Indian Nation’s trust application, prompting Seneca and Cayuga officials to write.
Among the items leaders would like to discuss are lost property and sales taxes, gambling and issues related to further development of sovereignty to adjacent properties in the two counties.
“First and foremost is the loss of property tax income,” Dresser said. “Those are a couple of the issues that bother us, not to mention the fact that we lose regulatory control, environmental restrictions and the like.”
“These invitations reflect the significance we place on the application of the Cayuga Nation for the land to be placed into trust in our counties.”
The Cayuga holdings in Seneca County include LakeSide Trading Co. gas station/convenience store on Route 89 and Garden Street Extension in the town of Seneca Falls, along with an adjacent campsite. Included is a temporarily closed gaming facility.
LakeSide Entertainment, which featured more than 30 electronic bingo machines, closed in early October shortly after the county passed a local law against illegal gaming in Seneca County.
“The issue of gambling in our county, where we have a local law preventing it, is real because if the Nation were granted sovereignty, they could reinstitute gambling parlors in our two counties and we would have no say in the matter,” Dresser said.
The Nation owns similar, but larger businesses in Union Springs, as well as other parcels in Cayuga County.
Boehlert’s 24th Congressional district includes all of Seneca County and most of Cayuga County. Walsh’s 25th district contains the northern portion of Cayuga County, the section Boehlert does not represent.
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