Windsor Town Council to address deal with Lytton tribe over controversial development

The Windsor Town Council on Wednesday will again wade into the contentious topic of a proposed Indian housing project on its border and the tribe’s offer to build a municipal swimming complex in exchange for obtaining sewer and water service for its project.

Council members will be weighing whether they should put the issue directly on the ballot for Windsor voters to consider, or have the Lytton Band of Pomo Indians collect the signatures needed to do it.

Mayor Bruce Okrepkie said that in the meantime, the tribe continues to be open to reducing the size of a future 200-room hotel and 200,000-case winery southwest of Windsor, as well as the amount of land it could have taken into federal trust, tantamount to creating a reservation.

“We’re working hard and fast and should have those ironed out” within a month, he said of the specifics of the tribe’s scaled-down projects.

The town’s most recent meeting on the issue last month drew about 80 people, most of them voicing anger over the plans and criticism of town officials for seeking to broker a deal with the Lyttons.

Okrepkie met last week with tribal representatives, Sonoma County Supervisor James Gore and Rep. Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, to discuss potentially amending the county agreement that helps pave the way for a tribal housing project, hotel and winery, in exchange for a guarantee that the Lytton Pomos will not build a casino.

“We feel it’s important that they take steps to reduce it down,” he said of the hotel and winery, as well as amount of land to be taken into trust. He noted that the tribe has been open to negotiation.

The Lyttons’ housing and commercial development plans have stoked outrage among many Windsor residents, who packed Town Council meetings to register their opposition and concerns over the traffic that will be generated, the cutting of more than 1,500 oak trees, water depletion and loss of Windsor’s rural ambiance.

Many have expressed a sense of betrayal by their elected representatives for not opposing the tribe’s projects as well as closed-door talks with the Lyttons that officials stress are meant to help strike a deal that limits impacts from the development.

But Windsor and county officials say the tribe is likely to eventually get its land taken into trust by the federal government - making it free of local land-use regulations and restrictions. They contend that it made sense to negotiate with the tribe to obtain concessions and be good neighbors.

Okrepkie said the town and nearby residents are also looking for “an expansion of the no-gaming clause” to achieve even more certainty the tribe will not build a casino on any land it takes into trust.

Gore last week said that if the tribe wants to bring something to the county that would reduce the impacts of its projects in the form of an addendum to the agreement it struck with the county,“I’d love to see it.”

“Anything that reduced impacts is extremely important,” he said. “Anything the county can continue to do to limit gaming is extremely important to us,” he said.

The Lytton Band of Pomos, which once had a rancheria north of Healdsburg, has for years been pursuing plans to establish a tribal homeland on Windsor’s western boundary, off Windsor River Road.

With profits from its San Pablo Lytton Casino in the East Bay, the tribe has bought up scores of properties in Windsor and other parts of Sonoma County.

Six years ago, the tribe filed an application with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to take 124 acres off Windsor River Road into trust to build 147 homes for its members, along with a community center, retreat and roundhouse.

The Lyttons say they can drill their own wells and build a small sewer plant, but hooking up to town utilities is preferable.

Eager to ensure there would be no gambling, the county last spring approved an agreement with the Lyttons not to oppose the trust application. But the agreement also recognized an expanded total of 1,300 acres that could be taken into trust along with a resort-hotel and winery that may be built by the tribe, subject to environmental review.

After the county finalized its deal with the tribe last spring, it was quickly followed by federal legislation introduced by Rep. Huffman that would place much of the land into federal trust with a stipulation that the tribe could never build a casino on that land. He has since said the bill may need to be tightened to prevent the Lyttons from developing a casino on trust land that they add in the future.

Huffman said his bill, which also offset impacts of the tribe’s projects, was preferable to having the land taken into trust through an administrative process overseen by the Bureau of Indian Affairs, which would not prevent a casino.

But the county’s agreement with the tribe and especially Huffman’s pending legislation - allowing for more than 500 acres to be made into a reservation - has met with continuing resistance.

Windsor residents have repeatedly asked the Town Council to oppose Huffman’s bill. Their entreaties have prompted two council members - Sam Salmon and Dominic Foppoli - to ask their colleagues to consider whether to ask the congressman to delay its passage. That discussion is set for the council’s Oct. 21 meeting.

“It doesn’t mean we’ll send a letter (to Huffman). We can talk about it,” Salmon said.

In Wednesday’s 6 p.m. special meeting at Town Hall, the council is set to discuss the ramifications of placing a proposed agreement with the tribe on the ballot to extend utilities to the tribal property in return for the Lyttons building an aquatic center at Keiser Park.

Voters have to sign off on the proposal because it involves running sewer and water lines outside the Windsor growth boundary.

If the town places the issue before voters, rather than having the tribe circulate petitions to do so, it would require a review under state environmental laws.

The study could bring greater transparency to the process and the project, Okrepkie said.

“I’m hoping we could do it as quickly as possible, because time is of the essence,” he said.

You can reach Staff Writer Clark Mason at 521-5214 or clark.mason@pressdemocrat.com. OnTwitter@clarkmas