National organization seeks reform of Indian policies
Apr. 6, 2000

By R. PATRICK CORBETT
Observer-Dispatch

ONEIDA CASTLE — Area residents have another advocacy group to turn to in what many of them perceive as a land battle against the Oneida Indian Nation.

Utica lawyer Leon Koziol invited his audience of about 70 people Wednesday to join the local chapter of the Citizens Equal Rights Alliance, a national organization created to lobby for reform of federal Indian policies.

Many in the audience at the village hall were members of Upstate Citizens for Equality, a landowner group that claims 4,000 local members in its fight against the Oneida land claim and the business practices of the Oneida Nation.

Deborah Anderson-Gaiser is supporting the new organization’s goal of lobbying Congress to correct federal policies that she says allow unfair treatment of Indians and non-Indians on federally protected Indian land.

The Oneida Indians are seeking damages for 250,000 acres in Madison and Oneida counties they contend were taken illegally from them two centuries ago. The Oneidas want to purchase up to 40,000 acres in the two counties to be set aside as federal reservation land.

Koziol said in the wake of the failed negotiations to settle the land claim out of court, an organization such as CERA is more important to the residents’ concerns.

Anderson-Gaiser said she participated in a UCE lobbying effort in Washington, D.C., and discovered that “we have friends in Congress” on the land-claim issue. She said the best way to grow that kind of support is to keep the Indian land issue in front of the representatives, which she believes can best be done through a local CERA chapter.

Koziol said plans are being made for a “lobbying spree” in the nation’s capital in late May.

He said the efforts of local or regional organizations such as UCE, which he served as legal counsel for about a year, have impressed on Congress the seriousness of Indian land claims. He added that CERA’s national network will drive home the message even further.

Koziol said while there will be an increased emphasis on political lobbying, he also will urge the CERA chapter to support a federal court lawsuit against the Oneidas’ Turning Stone Resort Casino, paralleling a state court lawsuit filed by UCE.