The Governor's View

John Myers, Sacramento Bureau Chief for KQED's "The California Report,” in an interview with Governor Schwarzenegger on May 2, 2007, asked the governor in reference to the amended compacts he signed last year, ” They would really increase the number of slot machines in the State of California. How much more Indian gaming expansion do you support? You know there are a lot of tribes looking for new compacts. How much more can California take? “

The governor responded, “I think we always, you know, have to keep in mind that we should not go overboard,” and then added, “I'm looking at that and this is why when gaming tribes ask me for 5,000 more slot machines we maybe give them 2,000 more. If another tribe comes and asks for 10,000 we maybe give them 3,000 more. We don't go unlimited. We've got to make sure - I think the state can handle a certain amount and we've been very cautious in not expanding it too fast even though people say this is a big expansion. You've given them so many slot machines. It just basically means that people are going to stay in California more rather than going to Vegas. Because, you know, we have two choices. There is a certain amount of people in the State of California that just love (emphasis added) to go and gamble and they go to Vegas or they go to Reno or somewhere else. Or they go to an Indian Gaming reservation and do it there. I want to keep the people here in this State. I want to dispense the money here. I think it has a residual effect on all kinds of other things. It creates a lot of jobs when you go to these casinos. It creates a lot of really good paying jobs. And at the same time, what is important here, is I'm looking most not for the casinos, I'm looking out for our State. I want to make sure that we have this $500 million dollars that we get from the Casinos because we get a percentage of their take. That is the important thing because that is $500 million dollars that goes to education, that goes to health care, that goes to poor people, that goes to after school programs, that goes to pre-school programs, to physical education programs, to drug programs. All kinds of things like that that is very important. This is why the legislators have to understand that I signed the compacts. Every single day that they delay signing the compacts means that we will lose millions of dollars for those programs. I have to balance the budget. That is my responsibility and we have one hundred and one point three billion dollars coming in and that is all (emphasis added) the money we can spend. So, if we have an extra $500 million dollars, then we can go and help with some of these very important programs.”

Source: http://tinyurl.com/2ln9jz