Where I Stand — Mike O’Callaghan: Nevada’s Indian casinos

Tuesday, Nov. 10, 1998 | 11:50 a.m.

THE GOOD HUMOR MAN has had a ball watching the expenditure of millions of dollars and Nevada casinos tap dancing in the recent California election. Proposition 5, which allows the expansion of Indian gaming in California, passed despite all of the money spent by some Nevada casinos to oppose it.

I say some casinos, because not all of them participated in the battle. Some of the casinos, Harrah's for example, probably had good reason to contribute money to help in the passage of Proposition 5. This is the way it has been since the big boys saw the need to take casino gambling into Atlantic City 20 years ago. That's when we heard all of the chatter about how good the spread of gambling would be for Nevada. Nevadans who opposed the move were shouted down as getting in the way of interstate commerce and penalizing holders of gaming stock.

I remember writing a column more than 19 years ago that drew some fire from the people headed toward Atlantic City. The next two paragraphs set up my argument:

Nevadans have watched warily as gamblers take vast sums of money gathered in Nevada and make open plans to enter New Jersey gambling. Some gaming figures and corporations have gone as far as purchasing land, tearing down old buildings and applying for New Jersey gaming licenses. Millions of Nevada dollars have already been spent on these ventures.

You really don't see a problem? Showing concern may be construed as a little jealousy, or a lack of understanding of the free enterprise system and corporate gambling. After all, any Nevadan knowing the history of his state should be able to accept Nevada money and enterprise building Atlantic City. Documentation that the Comstock lode built San Francisco is familiar to any historian writing about ghost towns in Nevada or the metropolitan success of the California Bay Area. But nothing serious. Guess again.

Well, that warning only drew criticism and is now not even a concern because Nevada gamblers have created even bigger problems for their home base. Don't blame the Indians for the spread of gaming. Indian gaming was encouraged by several Nevada gamblers who could only see more dollars flowing into their coffers. Some of these same people spent millions to stop the passage of California's Prop 5.

The federal government has failed to provide adequate controls for Indian gaming and the Nevada Legislature and Gaming Commission have relaxed their oversight of Nevada companies participating in foreign gaming. This free-wheeling attitude will eventually come back and bite the people of Nevada who work in the casinos. Don't worry about owners because they will be OK. The workers in overbuilt hotels with fewer California customers are the people we should be concerned about.

It was four years ago that Ken Westin of the Arizona Republic newspaper wrote about the opening of the Ak-Chin Indian Community Harrah's casino. Westin told his readers, "The casino is expected to serve as a model for other Harrah's Indian casinos and already has drawn visits from other tribes, including the Cheyenne and Cherokee.

"Harrah's is managing the casino for the 580-member Ak-Chin community under a five-year contract. It will be the 11th Indian casino to open in the state, providing jobs for 700 people, of whom 85 are Indians."

So the gamblers playing the Indians' game shouldn't be surprised by the voters of California. Six years ago, during a visit to Las Vegas, Secretary of the Interior Manuel Lujan predicted that Indian gaming would be operating in or around most major U.S. cities in a few years. This remark was made at the same time Steve Wynn was pushing his plans with the Indians in Connecticut. One lawmaker remarked that the energetic Wynn could "sell snowballs in Iceland." This snowball melted and Steve didn't get the Indians' prize operation.

But have the Nevada gamblers learned their lesson or is it too late? That will be answered as more Silver State gamblers jump into the promotion and profit-making guaranteed by California's Indian casinos. Then they may take time to think about the health of their home base that gave them the financial means to expand. They have met similar challenges in the past. Can they continue their winning streak?