Santa Ynez, Ca. Feb. 18, 2010: Grass roots citizen groups continue battle against Federal government in a fight to protect their community from additional tribal land and gambling expansion. Preservation of Los Olivos, P.O.L.O., and Preservation of Santa Ynez, POSY, v. the United States Department of the Interior. (see www.polosyv.org)

On February 8, 2010 grass roots citizen groups Preservation of Los Olivos, P.O.L.O., and Preservation of Santa Ynez, POSY filed their opening brief arguing the merits of their case with the Interior Board of Indian Appeals.

This litigation began in 2005 when the Bureau of Indian Affairs approved that 6.9 acres be taken out of local and state taxation and regulatory authority and into federal trust to benefit the 154 member Santa Ynez Band of Mission Indians. The Santa Ynez Band operates the Chumash Casino with estimated revenue of 250 million dollars a year. Tribal governments operate under their own constitutions and are closed governments.

P.O.L.O. and POSY filed private litigation when their county government ignored over 1,000 people and hours of public testimony requesting county intervention.

Removing land from local and state jurisdiction and taxation for closed tribal governments that are not accountable to the people they impact and harm, or to state and county government for that matter, is a nightmare for our country, stated Kathy Cleary, P.O.L.O. Board President. Tribal casino interests are operating outside the United States Constitution. If thats not bad enough, they use their gambling windfall to make campaign contributions and affect legislation to benefit themselves.

The impacts of these casino interests on politics and the public are state and nationwide.

In 2008 Governor Schwarzenegger promised voters billions of dollars if they approved four casino tribe compacts. Recently the Fresno Bee tried to determine how much that California was actually receiving. The Bee found that Schwarzenegger-negotiated compacts exempt information that tribes provide to the state from disclosure under the California Public Records Act. As a result, the amounts that individual tribes pay to the state is secret. http://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/story/1818372.html

The litigation on the 6.9 acres was filed because of the aggressiveness of the Santa Ynez Band and other casino governments all over the country, and the harm being done to impacted communities.

In 2008 Santa Ynez Tribal Chairman Armenta testified before the House Committee of Natural Resources saying, We would hope that the Secretary would work with us to re-establish the former aboriginal territories of our tribe. And, The Chumash desire to regain the lands of their ancestors even if it means buying them a piece at a time. http://resourcescommittee.house.gov/images/Docume nts/20080227/testimony_armenta.pdf

In the House testimony Chairman Armenta claims 7,000 square miles of aboriginal territory. With the windfall of his 250 million dollar a year untaxed casino profits and now millions of dollars of federal stimulus money they certainly have the ability to buy a lot of land, said Cleary. Word now has it they are about to buy 1,200 acres.

The merits of the case argued in the recent February brief include research documenting that in the early 1900's five families were given legal permission to live on a parcel of land as long as they, and their descendents, were alive, and when all were deceased the land was supposed to revert back to the original property owner. There are no longer any living descendents.

A document from the Bureau of Indian Affairs states the Santa Ynez Band was federally recognized on a list in 1972.

As presented in the P.O.L.O. and POSY Opening Brief, the recent Supreme Court decisions Carcieri and Hawaii should mean that the Santa Ynez Band is not a tribal government and the 6.9 acres should not be able to be removed from state authority.

We are very curious to see how the Federal government answers our brief. For years they have been able to get away with whatever they wanted because the public was ignorant of the facts. We are no longer ignorant, nor are others across the country, concluded Cleary.

The P.O.L.O. and POSY Feb. 8th, 2010 Opening Brief that includes supporting documents can be found at www.polosyv.org. Other legal documents are also on the website.

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P.O.L.O.

email: info@polosyv.org