The Cayuga Indian Nation paid the back taxes it owes in Cayuga and Seneca counties Thursday, a step it must take for the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs to approve the tribe's application for land to be taken into trust by the federal government.

The tribe paid $140,798.10 in Cayuga County and $14,219.85 in Seneca County for the back town and county taxes, penalties and interest assessed on the tribe's properties in the two counties.

“They came in like anyone else and paid it,” said Jim Orman, the Cayuga County treasurer. Cayuga County taxes are due today.

“I don't consider it a significant event when someone pays their taxes,” said Cayuga County Legislature Chairman George Fearon. “We all know their motive is they will never pay taxes again and the rest of us will pay for the rest of the time we are alive.”

The BIA requires the title of properties under consideration for trust status be cleared of any tax liens.

“We expected it sooner or later,” said Steven Getman, the Seneca County attorney. “We knew the BIA would require them to. This is simply, in our mind, for their strategy to get the land into trust.”

All the Cayuga County properties the Cayuga Nation owns - with the exception of a Springport farm controlled by more traditional members of the tribe who intend to use it as a spiritual and traditional cultural base - are included in the land-in-trust application. Five parcels are in Cayuga County and two parcels are in Seneca County. Most of the Cayuga County parcels are in Springport, but one small parcel is in Montezuma.

Unlike the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma, the Cayugas have been staunch that paying taxes on their land would violate their historic sovereignty. But then court decisions last year shut the door to their land claim, and with the U.S Supreme Court still undecided about considering an appeal of the land claim case, an application for their holdings being taken into trust by the federal government has been the remaining option for the tribe to secure sovereign status on their land.

Having the federal government hold the parcels in trust has forced the tribes into two moves they would rather avoid. One is paying taxes to settle outstanding tax liens, and the other is turning over the title of the land to the federal government.

While trust land is treated the same as reservation land with an exemption from regulation by localities and states, it is still the federal government that ultimately holds the title.

“This is not a process that the Cayuga Nation nor any New York Indian tribe ever thought would be necessary,” said Dan French, who represents the tribe's federally recognized representative, Clint Halftown. “That said, a return to their sovereign lands requires this step, so they are taking it.”

Today is the deadline for Cayuga and Seneca counties to file their response to the tribe's application for their land holdings to be taken into trust. The tribe's stated purpose for the property is continuing the gas station and car wash.

A public hearing on the land-in-trust application has been set for Wednesday, March 1, at the New York Chiropractic College in Seneca Falls. The official notice of the public hearing is slated to be published Monday, Feb. 13, in the federal register.

No land has ever been taken into trust in New York before, but both the Cayugas and the Oneida Indian Nation have applied for their land to be taken into trust.

Staff writer Amaris Elliott-Engel can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 282 or at amaris.elliot-engel@lee.net