On Tulalip Reservation, gas prices fall below $3
TULALIP — Gas prices at two stations on the Tulalip Reservation plummeted to $2.99 a gallon on Thursday, thanks to a deal the tribes struck with a Yakama Nation-owned distributor.
The Tulalip Market gas station at 2832 116th St. NE in Tulalip, just north of the tribes’ Quil Ceda Village shopping center, was bustling Thursday afternoon. No pump was left unoccupied for more than a moment before another vehicle pulled up. An electronic sign on the street corner nearby advertised the switch to a new, less-expensive fuel. The tribes’ other gas station at 3110 Marine Drive showed the same low prices.
The drastic price drop comes courtesy of the Tulalip Tribes’ recent switch from its previous Chevron distributor to Cougar Den, a fuel distribution company owned by the Yakama Nation, said Quil Ceda Village general manager Martin Napeahi.
Napeahi said that since fuel is being sold from one Indigenous tribe to another, it’s not subject to state gas taxes. In 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the Yakama Nation Treaty of 1855 preempted a Washington state law claiming the ability to tax fuel bought by a tribal corporation for sale to tribal members. The result is that the tribes can pass on those savings to consumers, Napeahi said.
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