California Progress: Rejection of gaming compacts

Friday, September 1, 2006  

"The California State Legislature has rejected on this last day of the two-year session a half dozen Indian gaming pacts, many of them signed by Arnold Schwarzenegger and sent to them in a steady trickle in the past few days when they surfaced for the first time. They would have added 19,500 slot machines to those already in the state and allowed mega casinos to be built that would have been among the largest in the United States and dwarfing most of those in Las Vegas.

Sources in the Capitol attribute the late compacts to a desire of the Governor to tie up the money that the tribes would contribute and make sure that it did not go to his opponent, or to Democrats in general. They expressed doubt that the Governor was really interested in the welfare of the members of the tribes or noble sentiments involving Indian sovereignty.

It was pointed out that the Yurok Tribe, a poor band compared with the Agua Caliente and other tribes that contribute buckets of money to candidates for state office, had been unsuccessful in renegotiating their proposal o a year ago so that it would pass legislative muster. All that was involved in their proposed compact was 99 slot machines in their region in the far north of California.

The knives are already out with Republicans blaming Democrats for the failure to move on both of these areas. In a Los Angeles Times article appearing in tomorrow’s print edition, Repubican Assemblyman Russ Bogh is quoted as saying "The way the Democrats have treated the Indians is shameful. The Indians learned this week who their friends are." It is not a coincidence that the term “friends” is frequently used to describe political contributors. The Times article is most instructive on both the prisons and the gaming compacts."

Get the Story:
Frank D. Russo: The Politics and Policy Behind the Legislature's Rejection of Last Minute Tribal Gaming Pacts and Prison Bills (The California Progress Report 8/31)