But Bear, the tribe's chairman, said PFS payments would allow the band to improve health care and housing. In 2000 Census reports, the tribe's population was listed at 90, not all of whom may be members of the Skull Valley Band.

The Time article, though dated March 13, is not included in the March 13 print edition available on newstands in Utah but is available on the magazine Web site. It does not show up as a link but appears when the word "Goshute" is typed in the magazine's search engine. Time magazine did not immediately answer an e-mail query seeking to clarify why Utahns could read the article on the Internet but could not find it in the magazine, though it was reportedly published elsewhere.

Asked about the $100 million figure, PFS's Martin said, "They have always considered the amount of the lease confidential. It has never been released publicly that I'm aware of."

In fact, she added in a telephone interview, she did not know the amount.

Bear also said he didn't know how much money will be involved. "When you start talking about profits . . . , I can't speculate on that," he said Wednesday.

The agreement between the Skull Valley Band and PFS "has to do with profit sharing," Bear added, "and how do I know what the profit's going to be? I know the facility's going to cost quite a bit to build," he added.

In a June 2000 article, the Deseret Morning News reported the cost of the PFS facility would be $3.1 billion, counting construction, operations and decommissioning. Since then, Congress passed the wilderness act that derails a planned rail spur line to the site. Because of that, a separate plant apparently would have to be built to unload protective casks from rail cars and load them onto trucks for the trip to the reservation.

Asked how the tribe will benefit from PFS, he said, "We're talking about putting housing up there, police station, small tribal clinic." Another possibility is health insurance for every tribe member, he said.

Bear said the band's health provider is in Fort Duchesne, Uintah County, 250 miles away. "It's hard for our people to get out there.".

For and against

Most members of the band are in favor of the project, Bear said. "We just had our meeting a couple of weeks ago, and everybody's anticipating when this is going to happen."

People wanted to know, "now that we got the license (referring to the license that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued to PFS), how come they're not building it? I just told them that you got to understand there's a lot of other things that's got to happen before they start moving dirt around."

Among these are approval by the Bureau of Land Management and the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

Who knows what bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., are going to do? Bear asked.