OurView : Life, liberty and the pursuit of casinos

Quick, name a high-growth U.S. industry.

Biotechnology.

Aerospace.

Energy.

Financial services.

Health care.

Yes, all good bets. But how about the Indian gaming industry?

The latest numbers from the National Indian Gaming Commission in Washington, D.C., show that through the end of June 2006, there were 391 operations in the United States with revenues totaling $22,629,575,000. Yes, that’s billion. That amount is double the $10.9 billion the industry took in for fiscal year 2000 when there were 311 gaming sites. In its first year, the Indian gaming industry had only about $100 million in revenues. Talk about a growth industry. The industry today exceeds the amount that gambling meccas Las Vegas and Atlantic City pull in combined.

It’s no wonder Gov. Eliot Spitzer wants the St. Regis Mohawk Tribe to build a casino in the Catskills. Sure it’s a few hundred miles from the tribe’s native land up near the Canadian border and would need the approval of the U.S. Department of the Interior, which is not big on casinos off Indian land, but what a boost to the regional and state economy it would be.

Just look at what the two Connecticut casinos have accomplished since opening in the 1990s. Foxwoods, operated by the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation, opened in 1986 as a high-stakes bingo hall. After the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA) was passed by Congress on Oct. 17, 1988, the tribe started planning for its future and opened a casino in 1992. Foxwoods today bills itself as the largest casino in the world at 4.7 million square feet, with 340,000 set aside for gaming. Two weeks ago it had a topping off ceremony for a 2 million-square-foot addition that should be finished in summer 2008.

Down the road at Mohegan Sun, which was opened in 1996 by the Mohegan Tribe of Connecticut, construction is set to begin in the summer on a hotel and casino. Dubbed Project Horizon, it is expected to add more than 1.4 million square feet.

The casinos’ ability to thrive is beneficial for their combined 21,000 employees and the state treasury, which received $427.5 million last year in Indian Gaming Payments, according to the Connecticut state budget. Since Indian gaming operations are not subject to taxation, special compacts are created so the state can benefit. Under Gov. M. Jodi Rell’s proposed 2007-08 budget, projected revenue from the casinos to the state is expected to rise to $446.3 million.

Under the compact proposed by Spitzer, the state would receive 20 percent of revenues from slot machines for the first two years, 23 percent for the next two years and 25 percent for the following years.

If the video lottery terminals at Empire City at Yonkers Raceway are any indication, the money will be good. During its first full week of operation in October, Yonkers netted $3,770,378, with $2,036,004 going to education. For the week ending March 3, the raceway netted $6,559,471, with $3,738,898 going to aid education. The Yonkers facility is outpacing its closest competitor in the state by nearly 3 to 1. Saratoga Gaming and Raceway netted $2,489,894 for the same week.

New York already has six Indian gaming operations.
• The Oneida Indian Nation of New York operates the Turning Stone Casino in Verona.

•

The Seneca Nation of Indians operates three gaming operations in Salamanca and one in Niagara Falls.

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The St. Regis Mohawk Tribe has two gaming operations in Akwesasne.

As for the proposed operation in the Catskills adjacent to Monticello Gaming and Raceway, one fly in the ointment as mentioned earlier remains – what happens if the U.S. Department of the Interior rejects the plan? Spitzer has said he will lobby Washington to approve it. All well and good to restart an economy long a former shell of its once vibrant self during the heyday of the Borscht Belt. But why not allow non-Indians to open casinos? Indians don’t have a birthright to running casinos. Looking through some history books, we can’t find any references to Indians running games, although the tribe in the 1960s TV sitcom “F Troop” engaged in bunco-type businesses.

John Gallus, a New Hampshire Republican state lawmaker, is suggesting non-Indian operated casinos for the Granite state. Fed up with the droves of residents heading south into Connecticut to gamble, he has authored Senate Bill 225, which calls for video gaming, the building of economic development resorts and casinos in northern New Hampshire and Pease International Tradeport in Portsmouth and establishing an education property-tax rebate fund from gambling proceeds.

The state’s take would be enormous, but the bill appears to be dead on arrival. Lawmakers say gambling is just plain bad, ignoring a study done by the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Center for Policy Analysis that found New Hampshire residents gambled away some $73 million at Connecticut’s casinos.

One person who says he’s committed to the Catskills regardless if the casino comes or not is Louis Cappelli, a Westchester developer who owns the former Concord and Grossingers resort properties, long mainstays of the region. Last summer he submitted a long-range master plan for the redevelopment of the former Concord Hotel property into an all-seasons resort. According to his plan, it would create more than 10,000 construction and new permanent jobs.

Couple that number with the thousands of workers needed for the casino, and it should jolt that economy out of its long nap like literary native Rip Van Winkle.

So if Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne rejects the Catskill plan, how about letting a non-Indian run a casino on the already designated land, Mr. Spitzer?

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