Posted on 10/10/2005 11:14:09 AM PDT by calcowgirl
Saying he questions a sovereign Indian tribe’s role in a local government process, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger late on Friday vetoed the bill that would have made the Rumsey Band of Wintun Indians an official partner in managing Conaway Ranch, if Yolo County officials acquire it through eminent domain.
The legislation, AB 1747 by Assemblywoman Lois Wolk, D-Davis, would have made the tribe a member alongside Yolo County officials and others of the joint powers authority created for Conaway Ranch. The tribe has offered to loan the county money for the acquisition.
The county and tribe say the veto does not set them back and they will continue to pursue eminent domain on the 17,300 acres of agricultural land and habitat that sit to the east of Davis and Woodland, west of the Sacramento River. They are fighting Sacramento developer Steve Gidaro and his partners in Conaway Preservation Group, who are unwilling sellers of the property.
Both sides say they intend to preserve the ranch.
Schwarzenegger spoke highly of the Rumsey tribe in his veto message, but said tribal governments can work with local governments through agreements and memoranda of understanding, as his administration has done with tribal-state compacts.
“But allowing a tribal government that is not subject to all of the federal, state and local laws that protect the public to participate in the exercise of public power, particularly off reservation lands, diminishes public accountability and control,” the governor wrote.
It is the same tribal-state agreements that some of the bill’s supporters say represent a contradiction by the governor.
County Supervisor Helen Thomson said Saturday that the governor’s veto represents “a very strange dichotomy of thought and principle,” since he has negotiated compacts with California tribes.
Echoing Thomson’s sentiment was Doug Elmets, spokesman for the tribe.
“If tribes like the Rumsey tribe, who have demonstrated a shared commitment with local governments, are not permitted to participate in local planning decisions by formal means, the governor is then, in effect, encouraging tribes to remain aloof and apart from their communities — and it’s horrible public policy,” Elmets said in written comments on the veto.
“The governor has urged California tribes to participate in state and local governmental process,” he continued, “yet his veto of AB 1747 indicates the exact opposite.”
Elmets told The Enterprise the tribe has made a commitment to assist Yolo County in acquiring the property and will continue down that path.
Wolk’s bill was approved last month on a 21-15 Senate vote and a 43-22 Assembly vote.
Conaway Ranch is thought to be worth $50 million to $60 million.
Settlement negotiations between the county and owners of the property that began as an alternative to the court process broke down in early September, after three weeks of discussion.
Last week, the California Farm Bureau, Yolo County Farm Bureau, Family Water Alliance, Yolo County Taxpayers Association, the California Alliance to Protect Private Property Rights, state Sen. Tom McClintock, R-Ventura, and Assemblyman Doug LaMalfa, R-Yolo, urged the governor to veto the bill.
“First and foremost,” John Gamper, director for taxation and land use for the California Farm Bureau Federation, said in a news release last week, “we strongly object to the forced taking of this highly productive working ranch for an unspecified governmental use. We also oppose the notion of granting land use authority to a semi-sovereign tribal government that is not accountable to the voters.”
LaMalfa said at the time: “This highly controversial measure was brought before the Legislature for only one reason, to promote and assist an outrageous taking by Yolo County of 17,300 acres of private agricultural land from unwilling sellers using the extraordinary police power of eminent domain.”
Thomson, of Davis, said if the county prevails in the Nov. 1 court hearing on its use of eminent domain, what remains will be the question of the land’s value and working out the loan.
If the county wins, she said, it may try again to include the tribe in the JPA. That would take state legislation, according to Wolk.
“It’s the right thing to do,” Thomson said, “to make them part of the official process, part of the management, part of the governing structure.
“They are a government,” she said. “Under this bill, they would have been one of 12 votes; that’s hardly threatening. And they are contributing members of our community.”
Wolk said on Saturday that once the eminent domain question is resolved, the issue of tribal participation can be addressed.
“After the ownership of the ranch is settled and the land passes into the public domain,” she said, “there can be a better policy discussion of the benefits of tribal participation in a public JPA. I continue to strongly support Yolo County and the university, the Audubon Society and all the others who are trying to protect this land from the Sacramento developers.
“The developers worked the governor very hard,” she continued, “and he has a history of this.”
Gidaro purchased the property in 2004. Conaway Preservation Group spokesman Tovey Giezentanner declined to comment Saturday on the governor’s action, but Gidaro has maintained that he does not plan to build on the property.
County Supervisors Thomson and Mike McGowan said they are disappointed by the veto, but not discouraged.
“In many ways, nothing has changed. ... We both remain steadfast,” he said of the county and tribe, “in our determination to protect these precious resources for Yolo County and to prevent the Sacramento developers from coming in and paving over our precious farmland.”
McGowan said he does not believe Gidaro’s public statements that he does not plan to develop the property.
“I don’t believe that for a minute,” the supervisor from West Sacramento said. “The reason these Sacramento developers purchased the property was to make as much money off of it as they can. That’s what they do.
“Yolo County is committed to protecting and preserving ag land,” he said. “That’s what we do. Anybody who believes otherwise is a fool.”
He said water is a key factor in the fight over the property and he believes Gidaro and his partners would sell the property’s water out of the county.
Former state Sen. Jim Nielsen, chairman of the California Alliance to Protect Private Property Rights, said in a news release the organization is pleased with the veto.
“Clearly, tribes should not participate in, even indirectly, eminent domain actions against owners of private property. The governor’s veto is a victory for government accountability and farmland protections.”
The organization wrote that farming and property rights advocates were concerned the bill would have set a “dangerous precedent,” allowing local governments and tribes to use gambling profits to seize farmland and urban neighborhoods and benefit from land-use development and water rights.
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