Paterson wants to meet with Seneca leaders
ALBANY — Gov. David A. Paterson on Wednesday defended the state’s right to collect taxes on cigarette sales by Indian retailers but said he wants to meet with Seneca Nation leaders to discuss their differences.
He also talked of the state being compensated for the “privileges and benefits” the Senecas enjoy being located in New York.
The governor’s comments came a day after Seneca Nation President Barry E. Snyder Sr. said the tribe wants to begin collecting $2 tolls on vehicles traveling the Thruway through reservation land in Irving and called on President-elect Barack Obama to send in federal troops to protect the tribe’s sovereignty from New York’s efforts.
“We have an interpretation, that’s a judicial interpretation, on our ability to collect taxes,” Paterson said in an apparent reference to a 1994 U. S. Supreme Court ruling upholding New York’s right to collect taxes on cigarette sales by Indian retailers to non-Indian consumers.
The state has been temporarily blocked by a judge from enforcing a new law that would begin the process of ending the tax-free sales by making wholesalers attest — with criminal penalties for violations — that they do not supply tax-free cigarettes to Indian retailers.
Paterson said he thinks he will approach the Senecas to talk about the situation.
“Because . . . even though they are a sovereign and theoretically separate nation, they do enjoy a lot of privileges and benefits from being in the geographic perimeters of New York State, for which we feel there should be compensation, and I would like to sit down and talk with them about that,” Paterson told reporters Wednesday.
Snyder on Tuesday told Senecas to stockpile provisions and said $1 million was being allotted for “emergency response personnel” who would act like a civil patrol to deal with any actions that arise with the tax dispute. These personnel would be military veterans.
“The [Seneca Tribal] Council and I believe the state once again is intending to take action to impose an embargo on tobacco products, which poses a grave threat to recent progress the nation made to recover from the historic economic limitations inflicted on the Seneca people by the state and federal governments,” Snyder said.
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