Before you head to the polls...

... you might want to read this if you still have any confusion regarding 94, 95, 96 and 97. One of our regular readers sent this out to family members forwarded a copy to me. I thought it would be a good post for today, election day.


Dear friends and family,

Why we should vote note on 94 - 97.

At stake there is a supposed 9 Billion dollars of revenue for the State of California, and for the tribes almost 20,000 slot machines. California will far surpass Nevada as a gambling State with the addition of these slots.

It is 9 billion over 20 years, around 200 million per year. It is less then .5 percent of the estimated revenue from these tribes - a FRACTION of a percent of what they would have to pay if they were any other business. Businesses and individuals pay taxes in our country to support all the infrastructure we have and need. (emergency services, roads etc. Imagine what would happen if we suddenly had no money for these things. Imagine what happens just when one business increases traffic and visits to its facility by over a million people a year, with ZERO money going to the government to cover costs related to all those new visitors, not to mention regular employees and contractors.)

Will it it actually be 9 billion? Most economists who have been crunching the numbers agree that it could be as little as half that amount. The sad fact is Indian casinos are unregulated. There is no one checking to see if they had the revenue they claim. They can and do say anything they want under the protection of their 'sovereign immunity'. They can actually decide not to pay and the state has no recourse. Once the slots are in they are in. Right now there have been lawsuits filed because they have not paid on the old compacts. Matter of fact the tribes have paid LESS THAN 10 PERCENT on the old compacts, so why should we think they will pay more on a new agreement? These lawsuits will likely be thrown out because you cannot sue a sovereign nation. So the answer is NO the state will probably not collect what is being promised and there is no recourse to do so.

Where does the 9 billion really come from? California gamblers will have to LOSE 60 BILLION dollars in the slot machines first. This is 60 billion that will not pay mortgages, utility bills, tuition or get donated to charities. It is 60 billion that will not pay for other entertainment venues where taxes to the state are generated. It is 60 billion dollars down the toilet, there are no residual taxes that will help the State. Add to that for every dollar of revenue a casino makes - there is $3 - $5 dollars in social costs (addiction and crime etc). You don't have to be a math genius to see where this is going. If you don't believe that crime and casinos go hand in hand, take a little trip to your nearest Indian casino and talk to some of the business owners and residents in the area. By the way, thats 60 billion lost in slots only. This does not include millions spent on rooms, meals and merchandise. Rooms, meals and merchandise they will charge YOU state tax on but THEY will NOT remit to the state. Illegal you say? For any other business yes but Indian casinos are immune.

Another nifty little deal that was written into these compacts was to do away with what is called the 'special distribution fund'. This fund is currently what the Indian casinos pay into and from there the money is supposed to be earmarked for certain things like helping non-casino Indian tribes, education etc. Lets forget for a moment that there are lawsuits pending because money has not been paid into the special fund properly at this time. What the governor has now arranged is for the money to go into the general fund. Where it can be used for anything, anything at all. Things like special interest projects for taking care of high-paying donors to political campaigns. So you can kiss that money good bye.

Then there are the politics behind these referendums - and this is where it gets very murky and the implications are very disturbing. This summer our Governor in a bid to secure these deals NO MATTER WHAT THE CALIFORNIA VOTERS DECIDE, sent them off for approval to the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. See, by getting federal government approval it is thought that it will trump any vote by Californians. Tribes are under federal jurisdiction NOT the State. It gets more twisted. The Department of Interior LOST this paperwork for over 80 days. They are given 45 days to review and approve, otherwise by default, the agreements are AUTOMATICALLY APPROVED. So these compacts were approved by default without review by the feds. If you think I am nuts, just google it, it was all over the web and news 2 weeks ago. (or go to the website at the bottom of the page - it has links to original news stories)

There is much, much more. The Pechanga tribe has been taken over by outsiders and the real Pechangas have been ousted. The San Bernardino tribe is being run by the Mexican Mafia. Workers at these casinos are not protected like workers in any other business in the US, nor are visitors to Indian Casinos. The laws of the United States are not valid on tribal lands. But what you are seeing on TV is an ad blitz funded by $120,000 million dollars of gambling money telling you things that are simply not true. There is no money earmarked for education or to help poorer needier tribes, there is no guarantee the funds will be paid at all, there are no economic studies that support any of the claims the tribes are making. They are NOT creating NEW revenue - it is simply money that is going from one venue to another, and this new venue is a black hole that generates no tax money for the state. The iffy 9 billion is a mere drop in the bucket of what that money would do if it were spent elsewhere.

The tribes will say anything at all to get these slots. Not a word of it has to be true. Who is going to sue them if it isn't true? What court will allow a suit against a sovereign nation? No one and none. There are many tribes who are not included in these compacts who are against them, but they cannot afford to fight the kind of money that is being dumped into the campaign. Indeed there are tribal members within these four that are against the compacts but they cannot speak up for fear of being disenrolled.

Indian casinos for better or worse might be here to stay, but Californians could do a lot better than this measly deal by our Governor and members of the Legislature. Vote NO on 94, 95, 96 and 97.