enlarge Gordon Chibroski/Staff Photographer

Chief Kirk Francis says the Penobscots have plans to increase gambling operations.

enlarge Gordon Chibroski/Staff Photographer

Maria Girouard, director of the Penobscot’s Cultural and Historic Preservation Center, says the upcoming casino vote means little to her. ‘We don’t have a horse in that race,’ she says.

enlarge Gordon Chibroski/Staff Photographer

The Penobscots hold their high-stakes bingo games in the Bingo Palace on the Indian Island Reservation. The games are held eight weekends a year.

INDIAN ISLAND — You'd think members of Penobscot Indian Nation would be keenly interested in the Nov. 4 ballot question that would legalize a casino in Oxford County.

For years, they've pushed unsuccessfully to expand their gambling operations in the state beyond the high-stakes bingo they operate on their reservation here.

Voters statewide turned down a 2003 proposal backed by the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes to operate a tribal casino in Sanford. This spring, Gov. John Baldacci – who has consistently opposed gambling initiatives – vetoed a bill that would have allowed the Penobscots to operate slots on Indian Island, in conjunction with their bingo games.

But Penobscot Chief Kirk Francis said he considered the pending Oxford County vote to be "kind of insignificant," though at one point earlier in the year, the tribe was in talks to take over that campaign.

OWN PLANS IN WORKS

Frustrated with the veto, the legislative process and what the tribe views as a lack of recognition of tribal sovereignty, the Penobscots say they are moving toward severing their relationship with the state.

They've told the state to stay off tribal lands. They held their own lottery for moose licenses this year to hunt on the 150,000 acres the Penobscots own.

And they're moving ahead with plans to put slots on Indian Island, with a Taiwanese manufacturer now modifying slot machines so they're legal under state law as the tribe believes it applies to the Penobscot Nation. Francis said he has a 35-page legal position drafted by two former Maine attorneys general, whom he would not identify, that interprets how the state's gambling laws apply to the tribe.

The Penobscots believe the slot machines would be an internal tribal matter, as long as the money is going to tribal operations, said Francis. He declined to elaborate on how the machines are being modified, or on the legal interpretation they've developed.

Sometime in the next three to four months, the tribe expects to make its plans public.

"We have gambling aspirations," Francis said. "We expect that's going to be a very contentious situation."

The tribe doesn't want to be seen as renegade, Francis said. And the people of Maine "won't look at outright lawlessness as a respectable act." Francis declined to discuss the specifics of the plans any further.

David Farmer, Baldacci's deputy chief of staff, said the administration didn't have any specific information about what the tribe was doing to modify slot machines.

"What I can say is that state law applies to the entire state and if they move forward with some sort of plan based on slot machine gambling, it would be necessary to look at that in a consistent legal framework across the state," said Farmer. "Eventually, I imagine, it would fall to the attorney general and the courts to determine if they're breaking the law. You can't have two systems of law when it comes to things as important and consequential as gambling."

Though the Oxford County casino question is "insignificant," said Francis, the Penobscots are watching it. While the tribe supports casino gambling in the state, it is concerned over language in the referendum question that would put a moratorium on new casinos for 10 years.

"I don't think that's good for Maine, and it certainly goes against what our future plans are," said Francis.

Wayne Mitchell, the tribe's newly elected representative to the Maine Legislature, said he hasn't heard a lot of talk in the community about the Oxford County vote.

"From my own personal perspective, I'm just watching," said Mitchell. "We've already been slapped down twice."

He added, "We have to move on, we've got to provide for our people through economic development. We're looking for ways to do that; we've got several things going on."

Maria Girouard, director of the tribe's Cultural and Historic...