New York State and the Seneca Nation of Indians have taken turns pointing fingers as to who is responsible for a badly-deteriorating section of the New York State thruway that runs through the reservation.

The state said the Senecas have refused to give permission for the Thruway Authority to enter sovereign territory and fix the road. The Senecas said they can’t seem to schedule a meeting with the authority to discuss their transportation needs.

Documents obtained by Spectrum News at least appear to back up claims Thruway Authority Executive Director Matthew Driscoll made, in a September 15 letter, the state has been trying to fix the road for more than five years.

“To put it mildly, we have been frustrated that multiple attempts to secure this permission – going back to written requests in May‎ 2014 and September 2017, and an attempt to raise this project again in a meeting this past January – were either met with silence or outright rejection by your Nation’s leadership,” Driscoll wrote to the Senecas this weekend.

 

 

 

2014

In a May 2014, NYSTA Environmental Specialist Thomas Moore wrote to Seneca Nation Transportation Project Coordinator Jody Clark requesting permission to initiate and complete a maintenance paving project on Interstate 90. Moore called the work a “stopgap” measure to correct severe pavement deficiencies in the short-term.

He said the state would continue to work with the Nation on a long-term major rehabilitation solution.

“The preferred maintenance paving project would consist of milling and paving both the eastbound and westbound driving lanes between Milepost 451.6 and 455.1,” Moore wrote.

However, another document, less than a month later, showed the Seneca Council tabled a resolution that would have allowed the state to proceed with the short-term work.

2017

In June 2017, Moore wrote another letter to Clark, again asking for permission to move forward with the “stopgap” measure – ideally by July. He again noted the conditions were a hazard to the traveling public and that the preferred option would be to mill and pave the road.

Moore sent a follow up email to Clark in September 2017 with details of the scope of a proposed rehabilitation project. It included milling approximately 7 inches of asphalt to concrete, removing deteriorating sections of concrete sub-base as needed, and installing a “three-course overlay over the existing concrete sub-base.”

A state source said the September email was the last correspondence about the Thruway issue until talks started up again this summer. The source said the parties did discuss bridge inspections in the interim.

Seneca Nation Response

The Senecas conceded the letters and email showed some level of desire from the state to fix the stretch of Thruway, however they argued it did not portray the entire story. A spokesperson said, during the course of the correspondence in the summer of 2017, NYSTA canceled or rescheduled multiple meetings between the two parties. President Rickey Armstrong has said there are “larger transportation infrastructure needs that need to be addressed in comprehensive way” and they have not been able to get the state to the table for discussions.

The Senecas also provided Spectrum News with an email the Nation’s Department of Transportation sent to Driscoll on September 12 of this year.

“The Seneca Nation Council and Executives would like to schedule a meeting with the NYSTA regarding repairs to that portion of the I-90 that is located on the Nation’s Cattaraugus Territory,” the acting director wrote. “To prepare for a productive discussion the Nation Council requests any reports on the current condition of the roadway, as well as what steps the NYSTA is proposing to address the deficiencies, prior to our meeting.”

Days later, Driscoll sent a response to the Senecas, but also directly to the media, expressing frustration about the state’s “multiple attempts to secure this permission” to fix the road.

Moving Forward

The blame-shifting narrative aside, the Senecas and the state may finally be on the same page when it comes to the heavily traffic section of I-90. On September 16, Seneca President Rickey Armstrong requested a copy of the state’s repair plans and to arrange a meeting “as soon as practicable” to discuss details.

“If the Thruway Authority is ready to address the glaring need for repairs in an expedient and cooperative way, as your letter suggests, the Seneca Nation is ready to have that important dialogue,” Armstrong concluded.

Thursday, the president said the Senecas had received and were reviewing information from NYSTA.

 

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