Column: Small tribes get small share of gaming funds

Wednesday, May 30, 2007  

"Fifty-eight of the state's 107 tribes currently operate casinos. Under terms of the 1999 state-tribal compacts, most of the casino tribes pay into a fund that supplies the noncasino tribes most of which are too far out in the sticks to even contemplate a casino of their own with $1.1 million a year.

Inflation has eroded the buying power of that $1.1 million by 20 percent in seven years. Meanwhile, the casino tribes' annual take has ballooned to more than $7.5 billion.

Assuming that California casino tribes have made $25 billion in the past six years, noncasino tribes have been given less than 1 percent of that.

Moreover, new deals Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and five of the mega-casino tribes have stewing in the Assembly do nothing to close the gap. It's true the tribes seeking thousands of new slot machines in addition to ones they already operate would greatly increase the amount of money paid into the fund that distributes money to noncasino tribes. But they will stop paying into another fund that makes up for shortages in the revenue-sharing fund. The net result is noncasino tribes will continue to get no more than the $1.1 million, even as the richest tribes get richer. This clearly is not what voters had in mind."

Get the Story:
Steve Wiegland: Some tribes get only a stinky slice of casino revenues (The Ventura County Star 5/30)
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