Bill Would Curb Dumps on Reservations : Indians: Legislation aims at enforcing stricter state regulation of a looming ‘garbage Gold Rush.’

Picking what promises to be another emotional fight with Indian tribes and waste management firms, Assemblyman Steve Peace (D-Rancho San Diego) on Tuesday began pushing a bill that requires the state to oversee any landfill or toxic dump built on sovereign Native American lands.

Peace said the legislation is necessary to help thwart an unfolding strategy by “renegade” solid and hazardous waste firms to “exploit” the sovereignty of California’s Indian tribes as a way around the state’s stringent environmental standards.

Swayed by his arguments, the Assembly’s Toxic Waste Committee voted 10-1 to pass the bill, which prohibits anyone from operating a garbage dump on Indian reservations without first submitting to state inspection and permitting requirements.

But testimony at Tuesday’s hearing underscored the fierce political battle that is sure to ensue over the legislation, which has many other hurdles to clear this year. A number of angry tribal representatives and their attorneys vowed they would fight--and defeat--the bill in court if it ever passes the Legislature and is signed into law.

They said the measure not only tramples on the long-held legal precedent that Indian lands are sovereign states, bound only by federal law, but it also insults the Indian people.

“Assemblyman Peace’s bill challenges our sincerity, our religion, our philosophy and our integrity,” said Barbara Risling, legislative consultant for the Hoopa Indian Tribe of Northern California.

Added Ralph Goff, tribal chairman of the Campo Indians of rural southeast San Diego County: “It’s just an insult to us, our tribal governments. He’s making it seem like we are unable to govern ourselves.”

In many ways, the arguments and complaints hurled by both sides Tuesday were the same as those used last year, when Peace pushed a similar measure through the Legislature requiring state regulation of waste dumps on 55 Indian reservations in Central and Southern California.

At the time, Peace was reacting to plans by the Campo Indians to lease out a remote corner of their 15,480-acre reservation to a private firm for use as a garbage dump. The idea was that the tribe could use a portion of its biggest asset--land--to bring in money to its impoverished population of 115.

However, the plans drew vocal opposition from ranchers and other neighbors, who said sloppy waste management practices could contaminate their ground water supply and cause environmental damage.

Taking up their cause, Peace also charged that East Coast-based management firms, whom he dubbed as “sleaze merchants,” were preying on the Indians to use their sovereignty to get around California’s tough environmental standards and stiff permitting fees. Under current law, the companies would only be bound by weaker federal Environmental Protection Agency regulations in constructing and operating a landfill or toxic dump, says Peace.

Peace prevailed with his legislative colleagues, but then-Gov. George Deukmejian vetoed the bill last October. And now, the lawmaker is starting over with a tougher version that would regulate all Indian reservations.

Meanwhile, the Campo Indians have signed a contract with Mid-American Waste Systems of Ohio to allow a landfill on a square mile of their reservation near the Mexican border.

And two other San Diego County Indian tribes have also signed contracts with waste firms. Leaders at La Posta Indian Reservation in North County have agreed to host an 80-foot, hazardous waste incinerator, while Los Coyotes Reservation expects Chambers Development of Pennsylvania will build a 300-acre landfill in East San Diego County.

Peace said Tuesday his new bill would apply to the three San Diego projects, which he and his supporters argued were part of a “national garbage Gold Rush” that has also spawned proposals or signed contracts in Arizona, New York, Oklahoma, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and even the Sioux Indian reservation in North Dakota that serves as the setting for the Academy Award winning film “Dances With Wolves.”

“They’re coming into my reservation because there are no laws,” said Catherine Saubelid in a prehearing press conference about the plan to build a 300- to 500-acre landfill on her native Los Coyotes Reservation.

“That’s the land that our Creator gave to us so we could live from it. And now they’re going to take all this away to put the dump in there, and we are very much afraid of what’s going to happen to all of the Indian reservations if we all don’t stand together,” she said.

Among those backing the Peace bill this year are environmental groups such as the Sierra Club, trial lawyers, district attorneys, the state integrated waste management board, state water quality control officials, and county supervisors.

But attorneys for the Indian tribes and waste management firms say even that impressive array of supporters will not help the Peace measure if it becomes law. Kevin Gover, lawyer for the Campo Indians, guaranteed the Assembly committee he would take the state to court and win on the issue of tribal sovereignty.

“The whole fight between the Indians and the state is do we have the right to govern ourselves?” said Gover, a Comanche and Pawnee Indian, before the committee hearing. “If you don’t understand that, then don’t go talking to me about ‘Dances With Wolves.’ That just shows you’re a racist.”