Halbritter: Oneidas made 'fair' land offer
Apr. 6, 2000

By R. PATRICK CORBETT
Observer-Dispatch

VERONA — The leader of the Oneida Indian Nation of New York called on the people of the region Wednesday to rise up and force their political leaders to accept the Oneidas’ “fair” offer to settle the land-claim dispute.

Oneida Indian Nation Representative Raymond Halbritter said there is an offer on the table that not only would compensate the Oneidas for their land but would resolve sales and property-tax issues for Madison and Oneida counties.

He said it also would remove the legal cloud hanging over thousands of property owners.

County and state leaders don’t see it that way.

At a news conference at the Oneidas’ Turning Stone Casino Resort Wednesday, Halbritter spread the blame for the failed land-claim negotiations around the bargaining table without accepting a role in that failure.

He said the talks collapsed Tuesday after Madison and Oneida counties rejected a $45 million cash offer, and the state would not back off from its demand for a 25 percent share of casino profits.

Michael McKeon, Gov. George Pataki’s press secretary, said Wednesday the land claim is going to court because the Oneidas “walked away from the table over the land cap, pure and simple.”

The Oneidas want a 40,000-acre reservation as part of the settlement, but the counties want the reservation limited, or capped, at 25,000 acres.

Halbritter said even though the case appears headed for federal court, the Oneidas “still are committed that no landowner is going to face eviction.”

The other side
Oneida County Executive Ralph J. Eannace Jr. said he remains willing to negotiate, but “we cannot settle on terms that will not be favorable to the people who live here.”

He said the Oneidas must be willing to pay property and sales taxes and share the casino profits with the state as other tribes around the nation do.

“We were reasonable and aggressive in efforts to find ways to reach a settlement,” Eannace said, “and we did not walk away from the table. We are still willing to negotiate.”

He added that settlement efforts were stymied by the Oneidas’ refusal to stop buying property during the talks.

The Oneidas’ offers “threaten the stability of our communities,” he said.
There are approximately 20,000 parcels of privately owned property in the 250,000-acre land-claim area. The Oneidas claim the state took the land in violation of federal treaties in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The Supreme Court ruled in 1985 that the Oneidas could sue the counties and state for damages.

Efforts to settle the case languished until the Oneidas asked the court in late 1998 to add the individual property owners as defendants. A federal judge has not ruled on that motion yet, but the threat helped bring the parties to the bargaining table.

McKeon said when the case goes to court, “We will do everything we can to protect the landowners.”

Profit sharing
Halbritter said the state could go a long way toward easing the landowners’ concerns if it would drop its demand for a share of the casino profits to help pay the state’s share of the cash settlement.

Keller George, a member of the Men’s Council of the Oneida Nation of New York, asked at the news conference, “Have you ever heard of the plaintiffs paying the defendants for a settlement?”

Susan Galbraith, a leader of the Upstate Citizens for Equality landowner group, had a rhetorical question of her own on the subject: “It’s all spin, isn’t it?

“The people putting money into the Instant Multi-Games (the video gambling machines at Turning Stone) are primarily non-Indians, so it’s not really Indian money,” she said.

Halbritter also accused settlement master Ronald Riccio of being part of the problem Wednesday.

Riccio ended 15 months of talks Tuesday stating, “There is really no hope of settling.”

George said he was upset with Riccio’s call because “we have leaned over backward” to make the settlement talks work.

Riccio's role
Halbritter said Riccio, who has mediated the talks from the start, “created false expectations” in the public that did not facilitate the negotiations.
The Oneida leader said: “He’s a bloody mediator who’s making media announcements.”

He added that while Riccio has met several times with county officials and landowners in the land-claim area, “He hasn’t met with us since last summer” away from the bargaining table.

Riccio said Wednesday, “I’m not going to engage in that kind of rhetoric. My status report (to U.S District Court Judge Neal P. McCurn) speaks for itself and I don’t intend to engage in any finger pointing.”

McCurn said in March it would be months before the trial starts, and it could take “three or four years” before it ends.

Failed proposals
Parties in the Oneida Indian land claim remain bound by a confidentiality order imposed by U.S. District Court Judge Neal P. McCurn, but several key players gave a snapshot Wednesday of what was on the table when the talks fell through Tuesday:

• The state and federal government offered $500 million to be split among the Oneida Indian Nation of New York, the Wisconsin Oneidas and Thames Band Oneidas of Canada.

• The Oneida Indian Nation of New York offered to pay Oneida and Madison counties a $25 million lump-sum payment and $1 million a year for the next 20 years. Oneidas’ representative Raymond Halbritter said the Nation also offered to impose its own sales tax on Nation sales so its businesses would not have that advantage over non-Indian businesses. The Oneidas would use the sales tax to benefit their people, he said. He didn’t offer specifics.

• The state wanted a 25 percent share of the revenues from Turning Stone Casino Resort.

• The Oneidas wanted to increase their current land holdings of more than 12,000 acres by 30,000 acres over the next 50 years, and add up to 10,000 acres after 50 years. They would buy all the land for the reservation. County leaders have said they wouldn’t agree to anything past 25,000 acres.

Koziol said he understands their reticence.

“Settlement talks are always a part of litigation, even during the trial phase,” he said.

Because there is still a chance for a settlement before a jury decides the case, he said, the parties do not want to do anything that might further harden the positions of their opponents.

Oneida Indian Nation spokesman Mark Emery said Nation officials would release a statement today.

“We are extremely disappointed that a compromise could not be reached,” Madison County Board of Supervisors Chairman Rocco DiVeronica said Tuesday.

Perhaps no one was more disappointed than Riccio.

In March, Riccio was ready to call an end to the talks because the parties were getting off track and into “extraneous matters,” he said.

McCurn also was ready to send the case back to court, and he ordered the lawyers into his temporary courtroom in Florida to explain their failure to settle.

But the attorneys said they were “90 percent” in agreement, so the judge relented and gave them until the end of April to work out a deal.

The lawyers told McCurn the key points in the land claim are money, land and issues involving the sovereignty of the Oneidas, with overtones of casino gambling coloring the mix.

Riccio agreed to stay on the job and redouble his efforts to forge a settlement. It was a decision that seemed to mock him Tuesday.

“There was promise it would happen,” he said on his cell phone as he prepared to head home to New Jersey Tuesday night. “I’m very disappointed.”