Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe negotiates for a new casino site

Friday, May 14, 2010  

The Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe is in talks to buy land in Fall River, Massachusetts, for a casino.

The tribe wouldn't comment but a state lawmaker told The Brockton Enterprise that negotiations are underway. That would apparently mean the tribe's plans for a casino in Middleboro are dead.

“I’m very disappointed, but it doesn’t surprise me,” Middleboro Town Manager Charles J. Cristello told the paper. “Where’s there’s smoke, there’s fire.”

The tribe reached an intergovernmental agreement with Middleboro in 2007 and started the land-into-trust process in August of that year. But the tribe changed investors and started looking at other locations for a casino.

The tribe's land-into-trust application also faces questions under the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Carcieri v. Salazar, which restricts the land-into-trust process to tribes that were "under federal jurisdiction" in 1934. The Mashpees didn't gain formal recognition until May 2007

Get the Story:
Fall River land deal could spell end for a casino in Middleboro (The Brockton Enterprise 5/14)

Related Stories:
Town presses Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe about casino bid (5/12)