Mashpees near federal recognition

MASHPEE -- The federal government gave preliminary recognition yesterday to the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe, setting the stage for possibly contentious negotiations with state officials over the right to build a casino in Massachusetts.

The 1,468-member Cape Cod tribe, descendants of Indians who met the Pilgrims in 1621, has sought federal recognition for 31 years. Anyone opposing the recognition has a year to try to persuade the government to reverse its decision.

If the federal recognition stands, the state would be required to negotiate a compact with the tribe involving gambling rights, and the tribe would become eligible for a host of federal benefits and would gain power as a sovereign entity within the state.

The tribe could seek land for a large-scale bingo-style operation shortly after winning final recognition because bingo is legal in Massachusetts. But the Mashpees would need state approval to build the kind of casino-style operation with gaming tables and slot machines that is not legal in the state but has become a multibillion-dollar business for tribes in Connecticut.

If the Massachusetts Legislature passes a pending bill allowing slot machines, that would remove a huge hurdle. Opponents of allowing slot machines at racetracks are using the Mashpee recognition to warn of the consequences of expanding gambling.

But at a celebration at tribal headquarters after the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs' announcement, tribal leaders did not want to discuss gambling.

''I don't have anything to say about that," said Glenn Marshall, tribal chairman. ''Until the state does something, we can't do anything anyway. This is not about gaming. This is about recognition. Right now, my focus is on health, housing, and education."

The late afternoon announcement was greeted with tears, howls of jubilation, and the beating of drums by tribal members.

''We've been waiting so long," sobbed Doris Middleton, 89. ''I've lost so many members of the family who were waiting for this day. We've all been waiting."

Marshall added, ''I think this is the first day of peace with the US national government and the start of government-to-government relations."

Nonetheless, tribal members were mindful of what happened to the Nipmucs, a Massachusetts tribe that received preliminary recognition in 2001 in the last days of the Clinton administration. That approval was overturned nine months later by Bush administration officials.

But Kevin Gover, a former assistant secretary of the Interior for Indian Affairs in the Clinton administration, said yesterday ''it is extraordinarily unlikely" that the Mashpees' recognition will be reversed because the same administration will be in charge when the final decision is made next year.

Gover, now a law professor at Arizona State University, said that in every case where a tribe has received final approval, the state involved eventually agreed to allow a casino.

If the state does not negotiate in ''good faith," Gover added, the tribe could sue the state and ask the federal government to give it the right to run a casino.

While the tribe owns 160 acres of land in Mashpee, it has pledged not to try to build a casino on Cape Cod, according to tribal spokesman Scott Ferson. Instead, the tribe is expected to try to acquire land elsewhere in the state, probably in an economically depressed area that would welcome a casino because of the jobs it would create.

The tribe then would need the federal government's approval to put that land into trust, a move that would exempt the land from most local zoning. It is possible that the tribe could try to negotiate a deal in which the tribe pays a percentage of revenues to the state and to the town in which a casino is built.

One of those in attendance at the celebration was a Detroit casino developer, Herbert J. Strather, chairman of Strather and Associates, a real estate development company that financially backed the Mashpee tribe as it researched and presented its case for recognition.

Asked about the tribe's interest in building a casino, he said, ''It's certainly an interest, but at the same the tribe has said there will be no gaming on Cape Cod."

He would not say which towns, if any, had expressed interest in hosting a casino. ''The Wampanoags will be good neighbors," he said.

The recognition question facing the federal government was whether the tribe had a continuous history in the area, along with whether the 1,468 people who said they belonged to the tribe had proven ties to it.

Some tribal members had worried their effort to win recognition would get caught up in the scandal surrounding former lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who has pleaded guilty to defrauding Indian tribes of millions of dollars.

Strather had paid $50,000 to Abramoff's firm and another $50,000 to Americans for Tax Reform at the suggestion of Abramoff's firm, Ferson said. The antitax group is run by Grover Norquist, a longtime friend of Abramoff. Strather and some tribal members also gave donations to some Congress members, some of whom urged the Interior Department to consider the Mashpees' case more quickly.

But the tribe's work with Abramoff's firm was small by comparison to payments by other Indian clients, and the association with Abramoff apparently did not hurt the application. Two of Abramoff's former partners continued to work for the tribe.

The Mashpees are a separate band from the Wampanoag tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah) on Martha's Vineyard. The 1,100-member Aquinnah branch was federally recognized in 1987 and it remains the only tribe in the state with the recognition. The Aquinnah branch has failed to win approval for a casino and does not have a current proposal for one.

Donald Widdiss, chairman of the Aquinnah band, said yesterday he would be watching to see whether the Mashpee band tries to establish a gambling enterprise. ''If the opportunity was there" for a gambling enterprise, ''we would have to look at it," he said.

Megan Tench reported from Mashpee; Michael Kranish from Washington.