By Toni Johnson

 A citizens group is organizing a July 17 motorcade to protest the Cayuga land claim.

 Upstate Citizens for Equality wants hundreds of local people to join the protest, which begins at 9 a.m. in the P&C Plaza at routes 414 and 5 & 20 in Seneca Falls, Seneca County.

 Also expected to participate are landowners caught in the crossfire of two other Indian land claims. Landowners from Grand Island, where a Seneca Nation land claim is pending, and from Madison and Oneida counties, where the Oneida Nation is seeking the return of 250,000 acres, are also expected to attend.

 "People are finally beginning to wake up," said Connie Tallcot, a Union Springs woman who co-chairs the Cayuga-Seneca chapter of the citizens' group. "We're trying to raise awareness that (the) government holds our fate in their hands."

 Local and state officials have been invited, said Mel Russo, a Seneca County resident who is also a chapter co-chair.

 "This is a wake-up call to the local, state and federal elected representatives that the citizens of the area are not going to settle for any negotiated agreement," Russo said. "UCE wants this land claim to go to trial in September to stop this reverse discrimination."

 The motorcade route starts at P&C at Routes 414 and 5&20, travels east on Route 5 and 20, south on Route 414, east on Ernsberger Road, north on Route 89, west on East Bayard Street Extension, east on Route 5 and 20, east on Hyatt Road, south on Route 89 to the Peter Shuster farm.

 Shuster owns the 360-acre farm in Seneca Falls, which was offered by the state to the Cayuga Indians, according to a purported settlement leaked anonymously two weeks ago.

 The Cayuga Indian Nation filed its claim in federal district court in Syracuse in 1980. The nation claims the state illegally acquired 42,000 acres of land in Cayuga County and 22,000 acres in Seneca County, in treaties in 1795 and 1807. The tribe claims those treaties violated a 1790 federal law.

 The tribe is seeking return of the land - which forms a horseshoe around the north end of Cayuga Lake - eviction of current occupants and $350 million in trespass damages. The claim area includes all of the town of Springport and parts of the towns of Montezuma, Aurelius and Ledyard in Cayuga County. It also includes parts of the towns of Varick, Fayette and Seneca Falls in Seneca County.

 Federal District Court Judge Neal P. McCurn of Syracuse has upheld the validity of the claim and rejected all defenses, but has held off making an award while encouraging settlement talks.

 A trial has been set for Sept. 8.