02:24 PM EDT on Saturday, May 8, 2004

Associated Press

CATAWBA INDIAN RESERVATION, S.C. — Some tribal members are speaking out against the Catawba leaders' proposed high-stakes gambling operation in Orangeburg County.

While economic development in Santee is important, the priority should remain at home, said tribal member Deborah Crisco.

"When they (leaders) talk about Santee it's never about what it will do for the tribe, it's always about what it can do for Orangeburg," Crisco said. "The executive committee needs to be thinking about economic development and creating jobs for our own people and the county we live in."

Catawba officials filed a federal lawsuit against the state earlier this week asking a judge to allow video poker on the York county-based reservation and exclude them from state laws that prohibit such gambling.

Video poker was banned in South Carolina in 2000. Tribal representatives said the lawsuit is intended to increase pressure on state legislators to approve the Santee bingo operation.

"We're controlled by a renegade government," Crisco said. "We do not support the executive committee on this lawsuit." In a letter addressed to tribal members issued Wednesday, the Catawba Indian Nation executive committee said they had been forced to fight the state to keep promises it made to the tribe. They said the lawsuit would benefit the Catawba people and lead the way to economic self-sufficiency.

Under the 1993 federal and local settlement agreement that ended a long-standing land dispute, the Catawbas were recognized by the United States as a limited sovereign Indian nation and were permitted to open two bingo halls.

According to the agreement, one of those operations had to be located within the tribe's original land claim. The first bingo hall opened in 1997.

The Catawbas announced plans in August to open a second, high-stakes bingo operation along Interstate 95 in Orangeburg County. However, state and local officials have opposed the tribe's request, which would allow for a 24-hour gaming operation, seven days a week.

Elizabeth Plyler, 75, isn't opposed to Santee bingo, she said. However, she would like to see herself and other tribal members benefit from the money the current bingo operation generates.

"I think that any lawsuit, if you're a business or a corporation trying to sue the state, it always hurts the people that's doing it," Plyler said. "The Catawbas are the people and they're not the ones suing the state, it's the chief and the executive committee."

Chief Gilbert Blue said attorneys advised him not speak about the specifics of the lawsuit.

"We feel we have certain rights," Blue said. "This is one way to get people to see we're doing what we believe is right."

Attorney Robert Gips, who has represented Indian tribes nationwide, said he has seen intra-tribal dissent in similar cases.

"Tribes are like any other democratic entity," Gips said. "Differences of opinion within a tribal community are to be expected."