Ed Ide likens a proposed settlement with the Cayuga Indian Nation of New York to a crime victim submitting to an attacker in order to decrease the pain.

But before the Aurelius town supervisor will assent to the proposed settlement, Ide is “going to have clawmarks down my face.”

Ide's analogy may be dramatic, but his sentiment was not unique during last week's Cayuga County hearing on the latest settlement proposal.

In the proposed agreement, the Cayugas would give up their right to continuously apply to the federal government to take their open market property purchases into trust; to run class II, or bingo hal gaming without getting county approval first; and to their claim to their 64,000-acre historic homeland surrounding northern Cayuga Lake that is based on a disputed 1700s-era treaty.

The counties would get a portion of the casino's net slot drop. The tribe would be able to have up to 10,000 acres kept in sovereign status, but the acreage would be limited to three groups and make up no more than 20 percent of any municipality in the land claim area. The Cayugas would get a state gaming compact for a casino, most likely in the Catskills.

“This is the greatest deal in the world for the counties,” said Dan French, the attorney who negotiated on behalf of the Cayuga Nation. “We can't do any better. Cayuga and Seneca counties will be the only counties in the United States that will receive revenue from gaming facilities not within their borders, the only counties in the United states that will have veto power over class II gaming facilities within their borders.”

He said U.S. Department of Interior officials were stunned when the Cayugas reported they had agreed that the counties could veto the tribes from reopening their bingo halls on Route 89 in Seneca Falls and Route 90 in Union Springs.

But the speakers at the hearing didn't see it that way. They fumed that after winning the 25-year-old land claim litigation that there is talk of settling with the Cayugas. They vented that neither Gov. Eliot Spitzer nor former Gov. George Pataki enforced a 2005 state law requiring the collection of sales taxes on cigarette sales to non-Indians by Indian enterprises.

For many, opposing the settlement is a principle of equality and sovereignty. Rich Tallcot, the chair of the Cayuga-Seneca chapter of the Upstate Citizens for Equality, said in a recent press release that “the fundamental issue here is not casinos or how much money may go to the counties or state. At issue is the sanctity of our state's sovereignty and the U.S. Constitution. Let the Department of Interior make their decision so we can fight it in the courts.”

Risk assessment

But the attorney retained by Cayuga and Seneca counties to respond to the Cayuga Nation's land-in-trust applications has made a risk assessment analysis that a settlement is preferable to taking the chance on the result trust application process.

Brian Laudadio, an attorney with the Pittsford-based Harris Beach law firm, believes the Cayugas will reopen their bingo halls and eventually upgrade to bigger gambling enterprises and that federal courts will continue to rule that it is valid for the federal government to take American Indian land into trust.

The Cayuga Nation and the Oneida Nation both submitted land-into-trust applications following both a U.S Supreme Court decision ruling the Oneida Indian Nation cannot automatically reestablish sovereignty over land purchased on the open market and a lower federal court dismissal of the Cayugas' land claim. The Cayugas' current applications involve 180 acres.

Laudadio said James Cason, associate deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior, suggested “trying to reach a proposal” and noted the Cayugas are a landless tribe during a Washington, D.C. meeting organized last September by U.S. Senator Charles Schumer with federal and county officials.

County legislator Ray Lockwood, R-Aurelius, was at the same meeting and the message was loud and clear that the Cayugas and the county should negotiate “to everyone's satisfaction so it would be an amenable resolution,” Lockwood said.

The Cayuga Nation is the only treatied tribe in the United States without sovereign land holdings. In the fiscal year 2005, more than 90 percent of 87 applications were approved by the federal Department of Interior. On the other land, no land has ever been taken into trust by the federal government in New York.

Cason told the Cayugas negotiations were a good idea in a separate meeting in September, Laudadio said.

Laudadio reported back to Cayuga County legislators and the Seneca County Board of Supervisors in separate executive sessions to outline what had been learned on the D.C. trip. They gave the authority for the attorney to negotiate “with the recognition they may not ultimately agree to the proposal,” Laudadio said.

“At that particular meeting, we were told regardless of what we do, the (Bureau of Indian Affairs) had in mind to give land to the Native Americans. At that point, we said we have we got to lose” by negotiating, said Chuck Lafler, a Seneca County Board of Supervisors member.

Laudadio and French, the Cayuga Nation's attorney, began discussions within a week after their separate meetings in the U.S. capitol. Bill Dorr, Cayuga County's long-time land claim attorney, is now semi-retired but had some minor involvement with the latest deal. He notes that everyone involved has been told that the Interior Department's Bureau of Indian Affairs was likely going to grant the Cayugas land-in-trust applications. Laudadio is a Syracuse University law school-trained attorney and has worked for Harris Beach for a decade.

“We tried to come in with a fresh set of eyes,” Laudadio said. “Obviously the prior settlements didn't work.”

Two of the primary issues were whether a casino would be involved and if the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma - which has a reservation in Oklahoma but members descended from the Cayugas of New York - would be prohibited from taking land into trust. The Seneca-Cayugas' have a pending land-in-trust application for their farm in Aurelius.

During a meeting last December with Richard Rifkin, Gov. Eliot Spitzer's incoming special counsel on tribal issues, both sides got confirmation that the Cayugas' were a candidate for one of three casinos allowed by state law in the Catskills and the state would support precluding the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma from securing trust lands. Spitzer has already negotiated a gaming compact with the St. Regis Mohawk Tribe to build an off-reservation casino at the Monticello Raceway in Sullivan County.

The executive branch's opinion is that settlements are the best way to handle American Indian land disputes based on their historic land loss due to 1780s and 1790s-era treaties negotiated by the state of New York in violation of a federal rule requiring Congressional approval of all acquisition of tribal lands.

“The settlement agreement is an extraordinary development and very important to Cayuga and Seneca counties,” said Christine Pritchard, a Spitzer spokeswoman.

Pritchard confirmed the governor's office is negotiating with the Cayugas regarding a casino compact and supported the provision of shutting the Seneca-Cayugas out from trust land.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs encouraged negotiations but didn't indicate if they would support the proposal if it included the prohibition of the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma, Laudadio said.

“Any deal that tries to exclude us cannot,” said Paul Spicer, chief of the Seneca-Cayugas. “We have treaty rights in New York.”

The deal-breakers were numerous for the Cayugas.

“They need gaming somewhere as an economic engine, both for themselves and to make payments to the county,” Laudadio said. “They would simply not agree for the Seneca-Cayugas to have sovereign land in the state. They simply would not waive sovereignty in respect to regulation and local taxation. They wouldn't agree to any zoning agreement on restricted fee lands. They wouldn't agree to taxation.”

On Laudadio's side, counties had to be held harmless from any tax base loss from the tribe gaining sovereign land; the land would have to be restricted to three clumps; the counties must have “veto power” over gaming within the county; the agreement would have to be enforceable via lawsuits; and Congress would have to ratify the agreement and disestablish the Cayugas' land claim, or original reservation.

Laudadio was “very aggressive on the need to provide revenues to the county,” French said. “These are the only counties in America that would receive revenue share from a casino that is not in their county.”

“Dan is a good attorney. He's knowledgeable in the area of Indian law,” Laudadio said. “I think he was doing his best to put together a reasonable proposal that could be presented to his client.”

The Cayugas have rejected all developers and asked to work the Empire State Development Corp., French said.

In a poll of Cayugas, 90 percent responded in favor of the proposed settlement; they weren't happy at sacrificing the right to 64,000 acres but the 10,000 acres was the acceptable minimum, French said. The 10,000-acre mark was based off a 2004 proposed settlement agreement, he added.

“It's a compromise,” French said. “No one's thrilled. The sad thing is the counties have an agreement in their hands that isn't going to get better. (Otherwise) the Cayuga Nation is a treatied nation and they're going to have trust lands.”

“We negotiated as far as we could,” Laudadio said. “We're kind of at the end of the process.”

The proposal was presented in executive session to the Cayuga County Legislature and the Seneca County Board of Supervisors May 22 and announced publicly a day later.

Following several months of negotiations by Laudadio and French, “when it came back to us it was pretty much a package,” said George Fearon, chairman of the Cayuga County Legislature and legislator for Ledyard, Scipio and Springport.

“Whole new ballgame”

David Dresser once remarked in a 2006 interview that “you can never be strong enough for me” about the revival of sovereign American Indian land in Cayuga and Seneca counties and holding the counties' harmless against the implications of a mix of sovereign and taxable parcels.

But the counties' are facing a different beast in the land-in-trust application process authorized by Congress in 1934 following the loss of tribal lands because of federal government policies in the 1800s, says Dresser, Ovid town supervisor and chairman of the Seneca County Board of Supervisors' Native American Affairs Committee,

“It's a whole new ballgame,” Dresser said.

He believes residents may be hung up on the sales tax issue, which must be handled at a state level and can't be handled within a local “settlement in lieu of land-in-trust applications,” Dresser said.

“Persons do not understand the stakes involved, the advantage, the pluses,” Dresser said.

Much of Seneca County's concern is how money from a settlement would be dispersed.

At the request of Seneca County Board of Supervisors Chairman Ed Barto, R-Fayette, Dresser is preparing a revenue-sharing plan for the land claim localities that will be impacted the most if the settlement is accepted. He will present the plan at Seneca County's Monday hearing on the proposed settlement.

Peter Same, the Democratic town supervisor of Seneca Falls, is one of the people at whom a revenue sharing plan is directed.

He's upset about the basic issue of checkerboard sovereignty, upset about applying to an eastern state a land-in-trust process that is used in western states with sparser populations and upset about the amount of acreage that involves Seneca Falls.

“Some people just thought it was over,” Same said. “Why is this coming back again? It's a whole different process and people can't comprehend that. We fought this for 25 years and won. They have no rights to our land. Because of old, federal antiquated laws they have the right to do just what they're doing.”

Land claim concerns

The boards of the town of Springport, the village of Union Springs and the Union Springs School District voted unanimously last week in opposition to the proposed settlement.

“We have had zero input in this,” said Ed Trufant, mayor of Union Springs. “We have not been consulted or contacted or even made known that there were settlement negotiations going on.”

He thinks the payments to the hold the county harmless will be eaten up quickly in comparison to the rate of lost taxes. He thinks it's ridiculous to negotiate a settlement involving 10,000 acres when there's only 180 acres pending for land-in-trust consideration. He mourns the loss of the Nice N Easy gas station to a fire and an apparent decision to not rebuild the gas station because of the Cayugas' tax-free gasoline and cigarettes.

Lockwood also balks at the acreage involved in the agreement. His dairy farm in Aurelius is 450 acres, and he thinks about the deal involving the equivalent of 22 of his farms.

“This agreement makes people as happy as it makes people mad. Probably from that viewpoint, it's a good agreement,” Lockwood said.

But he considers the settlement a “back door tactic. They don't get it through the front door so they come through the back door. It would be nice to finally have an end. But 6,000 acres is pretty unacceptable, especially in a small rural community,” Lockwood said.

The agreement would split the 10,000 acres - 6,600 acres in Cayuga County and 3,300 acres in Seneca County.

It would be ideal to have the acceptance of the settlement decided by ballot, Lockwood said.

James Mooney, Waterloo town supervisor, doesn't know which way to go regarding the proposal. He wants more public engagement on the issue so Seneca County supervisors can make as informed of a decision as a possible. He thinks a referendum, or at least straw polls, would be prudent.

He's concerned that the process is moving too fast because the Cayugas indicated they hoped the counties would decide within a month.

“Are we biting off our nose to spite our face? We want to do the right thing,” Mooney said.

Lafler, the Seneca Falls at-large supervisor, also is undecided. He also feels there's a rush to judgment to settle quickly.

“Fayette, Varick and Seneca Falls are the ones that stand to lose,” Lafler said. “If there was a settlement, finances should be directed to them; they're the ones that would be affected.”

Bernard Smith, the legislator for Mentz, Montezuma and Throop, declined to say what his opinion of the settlement was and said he was going to be meeting with constituents at a time and a place he did not want to specify.

Fearon also was not comfortable stating where he stands. “On an important issue, I want to hear from the people prior to making a commitment because my commitment needs to relate from the input,” Fearon said.

Two other legislators have made up their minds to vote against the settlement.

Paul Dudley, the legislator for Cato, Conquest and Ira, said he will vote no because of the concerns raised at the public hearing last week and because of his own moral qualms with gaming.

“For me, the biggest thing is gambling, be it here or someplace else,” Dudley said. “It's a sin. But if you tax it enough, then it becomes OK. That's the rationale and I'm just opposed to that.”

Francis Mitchell, legislator for Genoa, Locke and Venice, said it's the residents within the land claim area who should have the ultimate say about the settlement. While he knows there's the risk of the Cayugas acting unilaterally regarding their sovereign land, it's a risk he's willing to take if land claim residents are willing to take it. Based on the public input at last week's meeting, Mitchell does not think there is another conscionable decision that can be made.

“That's the other side of the puzzle. They are going to act unilaterally. That's the decision,” Mitchell said. “Land claim residents didn't leave any room to say no as far as I'm concerned. You can't in good conscience.”

State legislators' skepticism

Lockwood, who has been the county's point man on the land-in-trust issue, said he heard loud and clear from state Assemblyman Gary Finch, R-Springport, Assemblyman Brian Kolb, R-Canandaigua, and Sen. Michael Nozzolio, R-Fayette, that they had no appetite for the proposed settlement.

His personal appetite for the agreement was already weak, but it's now gone between the feedback from the state representatives and constituents.

Finch has always supported whatever issues county legislators have asked him to support, but he said he would have a difficult time supporting the proposed settlement on behalf of the counties.

“We are providing the Cayuga Nation with a billion-dollar franchise to operate a casino in New York state. Almost a monopoly. In return for that, we're receiving some profits which comes off the net drop,” Finch said.

He worries what will happen if the movement to legalize gambling in the state is successful, if gaming expands and dries up the payments that are tied to the casino's profitability. He also worries about the reliability of an American Indian tribe to adhere to an agreement considering situations like the Seneca Nation of New York delivering a bill to the state for cars driving through the Nation's territory on the thruway. He is not happy about the 6,600 acres that the Cayuga could secure sovereign status for in Cayuga County.

Nozzolio thinks the land involved in a settlement should be limited to the parcel the tribe would use for a Catskills casino.

“It's much, too much land to establish a trust territory of almost the size of Manhattan island within the middle of the central Finger Lakes,” Nozzolio said.

Kolb said based upon what he's heard from constituents in the land claim area, he is against the settlement.

“I don't think we should be giving up any land acreage as part of the proposal. If there's financial incentives to be considered, I don't think it should be to give up a significant amount of acreage.”

Cort Ruddy, spokesman for Senator David Valesky, D-Oneida, said Valesky will support whatever local leaders decide.

“We are still examining the details of the proposed settlement and listening closely to feedback from the affected local communities,” said Alex Detrick, a spokesman for U.S. Senator Charles Schumer.

The agreement is subject to approval by the state, the Department of Interior and the U.S. Congress.

“Silent majority”

Michele Sedor, the legislator for Owasco and Sennett, has two questions about the proposed settlement: What mechanism will the county use to decide whether or not it hosts gaming? What mechanism will the county use to distribute revenue from the Cayugas?

She's not comfortable with leaving a decision about a casino to the political winds of the composition of the legislature. In the time she's been a legislator, she has seen the legislature shift from a majority that supported a casino to a majority that is against a casino.

“I do think there's a silent majority within this county and this community that supports a settlement and the idea of a casino,” Sedor said.

She is open to a settlement but she wants answers to her questions before she supports this particular settlement. She is open to hosting a casino in Cayuga County, especially because of the interest piqued in Sennett by the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma's casino pitch.

David Pappert, a city of Auburn legislator, has decided against voting for the settlement. Since the settlement is not open for negotiation, according to Laudadio, he is opposing the settlement because it gives the county veto power over whether the city of Auburn pursues a casino.

“It's heavy-handed for the county to have a veto over what the biggest city in the county wants to do for themselves,” Pappert said.

He is not opposed to a settlement, but he thinks this settlement has many weaknesses. Most glaring, he said, is the lack of guarantee of payments from the Cayugas, because the payments would be tied up in the profitability of the casino's slot machines.

“The only sure thing is we give up our right to fight land-in-trust applications. That's the only sure thing in this deal as far as I can see,” Pappert said.

Peter Tortorici, a city of Auburn legislator, felt that Auburn constituents and the Auburn City Council should have had a greater presence at the public hearing. He wants clarity on how money from the settlement would be dispersed.

He acknowledged the passion of land claim residents, but he wonders what kind of contingencies they are preparing for if the settlement is rejected and if they've thought about how it will affect the county's tax base without ever limiting the tribe's ability to access sovereign land.

“What is the response of Mr. Ide and the mayor of Union Springs? Do they have a plan in place?” Tortorici asked. “I'd hate to drive through Union Springs and have a sign, 'Welcome to the Cayuga Nation,' instead of 'Welcome to Union Springs.'”

Because of his questions, Tortorici will vote against the settlement if it comes to a vote on June 26. But he is not closed-minded about a settlement. He just wants more time to digest it.

“It's probably one of the toughest decisions I'll make as a legislator that will affect my kids and my grandkids. With that kind of weight on your shoulders, try to make a decision within two weeks,” Tortorici said.

Mayor Tim Lattimore believes the settlement is in everyone's best interest considering the Bureau of Indian Affairs is going to favor tribes' land-in-trust applications. He thinks it could “minimize the land area and maximize the cash flow.”

He is concerned that the proposed agreement precludes the Seneca-Cayugas, with whom he has allied with regarding a proposed casino in Auburn. He says a legal challenge by the Seneca-Cayugas might block the settlement.

An ideal settlement would involve by the Cayugas of New York and the Seneca-Cayugas of Oklahoma opening casinos in the same area and building joint infrastructure, the mayor said

“The only industry that wins from not having a settlement is (the Oneida Indian Nation's Ray) Halbritter. My hat's off to him, being a Harvard graduate, for building an industry in a corn field in the last 15 years,” Lattimore said.

Dan Schuster, another Auburn legislator, is still on the fence about the settlement. He finds it compelling that the settlement might provide some control over the land claim issues. He does not feel that all of the county residents fully fathom the risk of the land-in-trust process.

“We need to hear from everybody. If we do this agreement it's basically forever. It's an important decision that has to be made. I'm not comfortable making it until I've heard from people,” Schuster said.

One shot only

Many public leaders are concerned that the proposed settlement is tentatively slated to be voted on June 26 by both the Cayuga County Legislature and the Seneca County Board of Supervisors.

While the Cayugas did not set a deadline of one month for the counties to consider the settlement, they did ask the counties to decide within a month because of the need, if the agreement is passed, to begin lobbying at state and federal levels, French said. A reasonable delay would be OK, but the Cayugas won't wait forever, the attorney said.

“I'm not sure the decision is like wine,” French said. “It doesn't get better with time.”

French said this agreement would be the last effort the tribe would make for a universal settlement. More minor issues would always be open for dialogue as a matter of neighborliness, he said.

“In terms of providing a final global resolution this is probably the end of it,” Laudadio said.

“The Cayuga Nation is interested in cooperating with its neighbors and understands its neighbors desperately wants finality. This does it in a way their counties know what they're going to be faced with. The alternative's not bad though for the Cayuga Nation.”

French envisions a future in which the tribe will be able to consistently buy land on the open market and successfully seek for it to be put into trust.

“If (the agreement) doesn't work it's almost liberating,” French said. “The Nation knows in its heart it went as far as it could go to settle this issue.”

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