Casino article in the LA Times
The proposed Barstow casino is one of the casino projects touched upon in a new article from the LA Times this week:
Rich tribes also oppose two other deals the governor struck with poor tribes, which would allow off-reservation casinos. Those pacts involve the Los Coyotes band and the Big Lagoon Rancheria.
No tribe has less than Francine Kupsch’s Los Coyotes. About 70 of the 380 members live on the 25,000-acre reservation in homes built with federal aid. Many collect welfare. They receive federal commodity cheese and charity turkeys at Thanksgiving.
Casino developers have concluded that the land, in the northern San Diego County mountains, is too remote to support a casino. The nearest settlement is Warner Springs, down a narrow road. The closest city is Temecula, 40 miles away.
Now, Los Coyotes hopes to open a casino in Barstow, off Interstate 15 between Los Angeles and Las Vegas. That proposal is controversial — the desert town is two counties and more than 100 miles from the reservation. The group would need permission from the U.S. Interior Department for an off-site casino, but Congress is considering banning off-reservation gambling.
Schwarzenegger suggested that the 21 Indians who make up the Big Lagoon Rancheria join Los Coyotes in the Barstow project. The lagoon that gave the tribe its name is 700 miles from Barstow, in Humboldt County in far Northern California, and Schwarzenegger was hoping to preserve their stretch of largely undisturbed coast.
Each band could have 2,250 slot machines in the Barstow deal. But the compacts announced last year to allow the deal have languished in the Legislature.
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It’s interesting that the reporter writes:
“Casino developers have concluded that the land, in the northern San Diego County mountains, is too remote to support a casino. The nearest settlement is Warner Springs, down a narrow road. The closest city is Temecula, 40 miles away.”
It is true that Warner Springs is a small community of about 1,500 fulltime residents. They do have their own schools system. And the Los Coyotes tribal addresses are located in Warner Springs. Warner Springs has an historic ranch resort with 234 private casitas on an eighteen hole golf course. And NBC’s Today Show host Lester Holt travelled to Warner Springs in December to do a Segment on “Sky Sailing” for the morning program. It’s two hours by car from Los Angeles and 1 hour 15 minutes from downtown San Diego.
An even less fortunate tribe, the Santa Ysabel band of Diegueno Indians are building a casino less than 10 miles from the Los Coyotes Reservation.
And within 10-20 miles of the Los Coyotes Reservation are five other Indian Casinos/Casino Resorts including one managed by Harrah’s.
It is doubtful that any editor or reporter other than Chet Barfield at the San Diego Untion Tribune, nor any Sacramento policy maker (Governor Schwarzenegger, his negotiator Dan Kolkey or any leadership in the legislature) has been to the northeastern San Diego County Reservation and the surrounding region yet they all write or pontificate about circumstances there. They must get what they “know” from the Michigan PR machine directing the two California tribes.
It is scarey that we put our trust in these authorities and even more scarey that they speak as if they’ve got firsthand knowledge.
Comment by Frank Lee — January 27, 2007 @ 15:31