In the fall of 2013, the tribe and the state reached an agreement that required all reservation gas stations owned by tribal members to charge the state tax on all sales, but then the state would return 75 percent of the collected taxes to the Yakama tribal government. The remaining 25 percent represented the state’s estimate of nontribal members who purchased gas.

This sort of arrangement is in place with other tribes in Washington. It also replaced a different, convoluted system that the state revoked in 2012 after citing missing audit reports and unpaid taxes dating back five years. Not all tribal interests accepted the new setup from the start, and earlier this year the tribe’s General Council voted to reject the agreement, meaning that now there is no tax-collection arrangement in place.

Taking advantage are tribal members who own gas stations and now are selling fuel to anyone, tribal member or not, without the state’s tax. At 37.5 cents a gallon, that’s a mighty hefty discount, and motorists have noticed; vehicles back up onto West Wapato Road at the tribal-owned Wolf Den gas station during peak business times.

All of this is draining business from non-tribal-owned businesses in reservation towns like Toppenish and Wapato, but owners of those businesses aren’t the only ones who are nervous. A massive new gas station outside Mabton could draw nontribal customers from as far as Sunnyside and Grandview, observers say.