TRIBAL GAMING IN CALIFORNIA
THE GREATER GOOD Despite being hard hit by the pandemic with furloughs, layoffs and squeezed revenue, tribal gaming in California has been a benchmark for perseverance. Ezra Amacher examines the hard work and patience required by tribes, especially those in the Central Valley, to enable not just growth in gaming, but more prosperous communities. As general manager of Eagle Mountain Casino in California’s Central Valley, Matthew Mingrone is as aware as anyone of the role Golden State tribal casinos perform for their communities. When Eagle Mountain is financially successful, the casino’s revenue funds roads, housing, health care, education and other programs for the Tule River Indian Tribe. The casino gives residents of Tule River Reservation and nearby Porterville a place to congregate and escape the social isolation induced by the COVID-19 pandemic. Eagle Mountain leaves guests fed and entertained and, on a good day, with a bit more spare change in their pocket. Mingrone is also witness to the unique challenges placed on sovereign nations like the Tule River Tribe, which relies heavily on gaming revenue in lieu of a tax base to support itself. The tribe’s reservation is tucked into the Sierra Nevada foothills, land that was designated by the federal government in 1873. Though the area is rich in natural beauty – grasslands and oak woodlandssavannah turning into conifer forest as elevation increases, with the Tule River running through the middle of the reservation – the land can be dangerous to reach by car. Water, the most crucial of resources, is pumped unequally into Eagle Mountain, which requires 40,000 to 50,000 gallons a day. “When you’re using that much water, that means houses can’t be built, because as the whole state is experiencing, we are in a very sensitive drought situation,” Mingrone says. “I know that a lot of parts of the state get publicity for running out of water over the years, as it’s been put to me by tribal elders and tribal chairmen, but it’s an every summer occurrence here.” Not long after Eagle Mountain opened in 1996, Tule River Tribe leaders began crafting ideas to relocate the casino to a more sustainable, easy-to-access location. The tribe spent 24 GAMINGAMERICA
20 years planning for relocation. Then in 2016, it sent the Department of the Interior Bureau of Indian Affairs an application requesting approximately 40 acres of land in trust by the US government to develop a casino, which would be built 15 miles west of the reservation inside the City of Porterville. In early December 2020, the tribe at last got word from the DOI. Its request had been approved. “It was celebration,” Mingrone tells Gaming America. “It’s been 25 years of hard work, different various councils and chairmen as well as management. It was definitely a sense of relief but still there is a lot of work ahead of us, but excitement I guess would be a great way to summarize it.”
MATTHEW MINGRONE
