Story Created:
May 21, 2009 at 2:22 PM EST
Story Updated:
May 21, 2009 at 5:54 PM EST
UTICA, N.Y. (WKTV) - Nearly a full week before the Oneida County Legislature was set to vote on the Oneida County Partnership Plan between the county and the Oneida Nation, the county executive's own party killed the plan.
Legislative republicans today said they could not support the plan for a variety of reasons. Among them: the absence of a future annual revenue stream, the collection of sales tax or consideration of an agreement to collect the local sales taxes, a congressionally-instituted cap on trust lands and a general concern over the language of the agreement and the need for clarification and amendment.
The chasm that the plan created in Oneida County government was clear today, as a handful of legislative democrats stood together for a news conference, republican legislators issued a joint press release, and County Executive Anthony Picente, Jr. stood alone during a news conference at which he expressed shock and disappointment that his own party shot down what he called the best deal he could negotiate.
Picente says the notion that the Oneidas handed him a deal which he readily took back to the legislature is preposterous; he says that this agreement was reached after much back and forth during two years of negotiations.
A group of legislative democrats held a news conference during which some lauded Picente for trying to move the county forward, but said that the deal he negotiated amounted to selling out the county for millions less than they feel the Nation actually owes in back taxes.
As for where the county goes from here, Picente says he fears the answer is nowhere; that five years down the road, the county and its taxpayers will be in the same scenario characterized by court victories, but no money in county coffers. Democratic legislative minority leader Michael Hennessy says he and his colleagues have always been willing to negotiate with the Oneida Nation.
Picente says he was unsure whether he would pull the agreement before it reaches the full legislature for a vote on Wednesday.
The lack of republican support in the legislature essentially kills the agreement.
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