South Mountain Freeway vote by Gila tribe could come soon

The Gila River Tribal Council may begin final deliberations on whether the planned South Mountain Freeway should be built on reservation land instead of through Ahwatukee as soon as the first week of May. Council spokeswoman Alia Maisonet said members of the Gila River Indian Community have finished reviewing a preliminary plan to move the route from north of the reservation to tribal land about a half-mile or so south of Pecos Road. The planned $1.9 billion extension of Loop 202 would link west Phoenix to Chandler with a 22-mile, eight-lane freeway. Tribe members attended meetings and took opinion surveys about the freeway location between December and early April, she said. "The results were varied," Maisonet said. "At all the meetings, people voiced concern for the cultural impact of a freeway on tribal land. People also were concerned with the loss of land belonging to the tribe and they wanted to know what the economic benefits would be." Maisonet declined to say whether the majority of people at the meetings supported or opposed the freeway. She said some members were disappointed that concrete information about how much the state would pay the tribe for the freeway land and ways that land would be developed around the freeway were not available.

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