By John M. Glionna, TIMES STAFF WRITER

WINDSOR, Calif. -- The tiny Lytton Band of Pomo Indians suffers from an identity crisis.
With no reservation, few assets and a staggering unemployment rate, the Native American nation of 230 must hold tribal meetings in shabby rented community centers. Traditionally private outdoor ceremonials are staged in a public park, where tourists gawk and snap pictures.  One of a dozen landless California tribes, the Sonoma County band says this lack of spiritual center has caused members to drift from their culture like smoke from a fire. All they want is to buy 50 acres and build four dozen homes, a cultural center and ceremonial lodge to re-root a way of life that dates back centuries in this wooded region an hour north of San Francisco.

"Land represents something sacred among Indians," said tribal Chairwoman Margie Mejia. "Without land of your own, there's no place to practice your culture. You become nothing but a stepchild, a black sheep." Yet people already living near where the Lyttons want to build fear an identity crisis of their own. Residents say the development would violate Sonoma County's low-density general plan, bringing a host of environmental problems to an area prized for its rustic character.

They say local officials are being bullied into considering the development out of a politically correct notion that the federal government wrongly seized other land from the Lyttons 43 years ago.  Residents such as Deborah Bailey say the housing development would amount to a public eyesore.  "I don't want to live next to an Indian reservation, at least not like the ones I've seen," she said. "They're not very pretty. There's garbage, abandoned refrigerators and old vehicles strewn all over."

It's a conflict as old as the West: a divisive struggle over the control of land, in this case complicated by an undercurrent of race and the specter of casino gambling.
 To pay for the housing development, the Lyttons hope to turn a defunct card room in nearby Contra Costa County into a Las Vegas-style casino.

Windsor residents fear that the Lyttons won't stop there. Once the tribe gains control of any Sonoma County property, they say, it can declare the land sovereign territory and build whatever it pleases--including another casino.

Residents collected 2,000 signatures against the Lytton development and gained support from the Windsor Town Council. Everyone knows, however, that the final decision will come from the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs. And that angers resident Ed Amormino, who fears that the tribe will be favored.  "Nobody will stand up for us," said the 64-year-old computer software executive. "Not our congressman or anyone else. They're all afraid of appearing anti-Indian, so they're playing politics."

Windsor Mayor Sam Salmon admits feeling some "white man's guilt."  "We forget this was once their land," Salmon said of the tribe. "Instead, we grouse about them wanting to build casinos on what little stake they have left."

Mejia acknowledges that the Lytton proposal exceeds community density standards. But she says residents are using the issue as a convenient roadblock.  "White settlers didn't consider the Indian general plan when they moved here. They steamrolled right over it," she said. "General plans have been broken in the past--just not by Indians."  And she bristles at criticism over the tribe's funding.  "I wish we didn't have to run a casino to buy this land," she said. "But you tell me what other way a tribe with no assets can make that kind of money. If they gave us back the vineyard land, we wouldn't need to build a casino."

Crippled by double-digit unemployment, many of the tribe's families rent apartments, but some resort to homeless shelters or even sleeping in their cars. Only one owns a house. Especially embarrassing, the Lyttons say, is that the tribe cannot properly care for its elders.

The 45-year-old Mejia has emerged as the tribe's emotional center. A former congressional aide, she has used her political acumen to solicit financial backing and legal counsel and to hire a public affairs firm to help make the Lyttons' case.  She says the lack of land touches a nerve that makes the Lyttons "sad to the point of anger." When meeting with other tribes, Mejia blanches when the question inevitably comes: "So where exactly is your land?" She is determined to soon respond: "Windsor."

"These people don't know what they're up against," she said of the residents. "My grandmother used to say that my tongue was so sharp it could cut my lip. And I'm not backing down on this."  'We Don't Owe These People Anything'

Neighbors reject Mejia's claim to any Sonoma County land, questioning the recognition of her ancestors as a legitimate tribe: "We don't owe these people anything," fumes resident Roger Branscomb.

The roots of the clash date back to the 1930s when Bert Steele, Mejia's great-grandfather, and another family worked a 50-acre parcel in the fertile Alexander Valley. Known as the Lytton Rancheria, the land was held in trust by the federal government as part of a Native American reparations effort.

But that changed in 1959, when the Eisenhower administration pursued a new policy of "assimilating" tribes into mainstream white culture: As a result, the Lyttons and dozens of other small tribes statewide were stripped of their federal recognition.  The Lyttons' land was taken out of trust and deeded to several of Steele's surviving ancestors. Federal officials also pledged to install sewage systems and electricity--a promise that Mejia says wasn't kept.

What happened next remains unclear. But within a few years, the land was either sold or lost in bankruptcy or foreclosure. Mejia says rancheria proceeds went to pay back taxes that the tribe was never told it was responsible for.  After the Lyttons and other tribes sued the U.S. government over their loss of recognition, a federal court reinstated their tribal status--with the Lyttons settling their case in 1991.  But gone for good was the Alexander Valley land--now home to some of the region's most valuable vineyards. Mejia can only drive past the battlefield rows of grapes and wistfully recall the past.

She says the tribe deserves some leeway in replacing the land it lost.

A Philadelphia financial backer who is assisting the Lyttons in their Contra Costa casino effort has purchased an option on 50 Sonoma County acres near a winding two-lane country road just outside Windsor. Although the Lyttons decline to reveal the asking price for the parcel, similar land sells for as much as $40,000 an acre. The property has emotional value, they say, because of its proximity to Steele's old Alexander Valley land.  Different Version of Local History

Everyone agrees that the West has a long history of short-changing Native Americans over land. But California has among the poorest records for preserving property for its Native American population, said Carole Goldberg, director of UCLA's joint degree program in law and American Indian studies.

 For their part, Windsor residents tell a different story about the Alexander Valley land.  They believe the Lytton descendants sold the parcel outright and that it was not lost to pay taxes. They say Mejia and others concocted claims of tribal status to take advantage of the Indian Gaming Act of 1988, which allows Native Americans to establish gambling only on property they owned before that year.

Bob Rawlins, a retired Navy captain, says he researched archival records to uncover what he calls the Lyttons' secret.  "They were never a legal Indian tribe," he said. "A tribe is defined as a group of Native Americans with a government structure. The people who lived on this land were two families, that's all. Two families doesn't make an Indian tribe."  Rawlins says the Lyttons were only recognized as a tribe by the 1991 government settlement, giving them no claim to Sonoma County land before 1988.  "It's a real tear-jerker to cry about being Indians without land," he said. "These people are a bunch of opportunists, using a clever ploy to cash in on public sympathy."

Tribal attorney Tony Cohen says the 1991 federal settlement identifies the families who lived on the
Alexander Valley land in 1959 as a bona fide tribe. Those residents who question the Lyttons' government status, he says, are showing what little they know about Native American history.  "They only think of Indian tribes by what they see in the movies," he said. "These California Indian bands were often small family groups without a formal tribal structure. But they still met the government's definition of what constitutes a tribe."

As proof that they have no plans to build a casino in Windsor, Cohen says the Lyttons will formally agree to never bring casino gambling to the site. Before the federal government can approve putting the Sonoma County land into trust for the Lyttons, he says, there must be a public hearing on the environmental issues and on balancing the Lyttons' need for housing versus the development's effect on the county general plan.

But Cohen added a caveat: "If the [Contra Costa County] casino plan dies, that doesn't mean the Lyttons won't look somewhere else in Sonoma County to develop a casino--just not on the Windsor land."  With the help of its Philadelphia backers, the Lyttons are poised to buy a card club in the Contra Costa County city of San Pablo, which could bring $150 million in annual profits that would be used to develop the Windsor site.  'Non-Indians Just Don't Care ... '

An act pushed through Congress in 2000 by Rep. George Miller (D-Martinez) opened the door for the business to be declared tribal trust land. The bill stipulated that the tribe could develop the San Pablo casino even though it didn't own the land before 1988.  "The move came as a result of the government's illegal termination of the Lyttons' tribal status," tribal lawyer Cohen said. "Because if the Lyttons weren't terminated as a tribe, they would have owned land somewhere else [on which] to open a casino."  The Lyttons are awaiting the result of a lawsuit filed by Bay Area card club owners and also mustnegotiate a compact--or regulatory agreement--with Gov. Gray Davis before they can operate slot machines on the site.

They also hope to receive a decision from the Bureau of Indian Affairs on the Windsor development early next year.  Meanwhile, the leader of another Sonoma County tribe summed up the Windsor debate this way:  "You can sing the blues about our horrible history all you want, but non-Indians just don't care," said Greg Sarris of the Coast Miwok Indians. "Their only concern is whether you'll bring gambling to their backyard."

When Mejia visited her proposed community recently, a woman yelled obscenities from a passing car. But the Lyttons' leader remains unfazed.  "At stake here is the pride and quality of life of my people," she said. "Each time a tribal member brings in a new baby for me to hold, I tell myself: 'This child needs a culture. This child needs a place to call its own.'