Calif Gaming News

Assembly Member Pushes for Local Voter Approval of Casinos

Assembly member Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, who represents the North Bay up in the San Francisco area which includes Rohnert Park where the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria who for years have had plans to build a casino, is planning to introduce a constitutional amendment this year that would require either local voter approval of casinos or an intergovernmental agreement between the state and the immediate area involved to offset environmental impacts.

I’m rather confused on the “or” part of that as it is already a requirement of any compact struck by the Governor and tribes wishing to build casinos that the tribes come to an agreement with local counties and communities to mitigate or off-set any effects a new casino may generate. If the tribes and local officials fail to come to an agreement then the case goes to arbitration.

Perhaps the idea behind the new amendment would be to have all the mitigation agreed upon before talks between the governor and tribes seeking Class III gaming occurs. But a law like that, if passed, would most certainly see the Native Americans suing the State as it would be a HUGE infringement on their current status as quasi-sovereigns nations. I guess we will see.

Huffman also stated that he planned to work closely with Sen. Dianne Feinstein on other legislative efforts that involve Indian casinos with the perhaps the focus being on off-reservation gaming.

Huffman believes the Carcieri v. Salazar decision may have strong implications to the states proposed casinos saying, “I think that in response to this decision, Congress will do some clean-up legislation on casino matters.”

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Charity Bingo Update

A couple weeks ago the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled that state law bans charities from using the electronic games throwing out an earlier lower court order barring the state from shutting them down.

After the governor signed a bill officially prohibiting charities from using casino-style electronic bingo machines the charity groups continued operating under a court order after the law went into effect 1 January. But now due to this latest ruling, which stated,” After the initial briefing in this case was completed, the California Legislature enacted Senate Bill 1369, which unambiguously provides that the machines at issue in this case are illegal under state law,” the state is moving to shut the machines down.

Gaming tribes had threatened to withhold millions of dollars in revenue sharing as a requirement of their compact with the state if the charity groups were allowed to continue to use the electronic bingo games claiming that it violated their exclusive casino gambling rights which is also a part of their compact.

The charitable groups are taking one last shot at staying in business by filing additional motions to stop state and county authorities from shutting down the games but the outlook for them is dismal.