No revenue for State from Tribal Gaming

Seattle PI Capitol Correspondent Chris McGann provides a fair description in his article toady regarding tribal gaming and the discussion that took place during yesterday’s joint hearing by the House and Senate Labor and Commerce Committees (watch the video below). 

Although the purpose of the meeting was to discuss an amendment to the 2007 Spokane compact, much of the questions and discussion focused on revenue sharing.   Rick Day, Director of the Washington State Gambling Commission, was asked if negotiating for revenue sharing would be difficult, especially sense other states are provided revenue sharing.  He replied "it is a difficult proposal," despite the fact that the Spokane Tribe had negotiated a tentative agreement for revenue sharing in 2005 that Governor Gregoire declined.

Despite the comments by the Gambling Commission Director, Senator Margarita Prentice, who coincidently is an Ex Officio member of the Gambling Commission, stated that the Cowlitz Tribe, the only remaining Washington tribe without a compact, would be seeking a revenue sharing deal with the State.  (Sen. Prentice’s remarks can be viewed at 1:05:03 of the video above)

Thus far 28 of 29 tribes in Washington have successfully negotiated Compacts without revenue sharing being part of the final agreement.  WPC recently released a study, Washington State Compacts with Tribal Businesses, which provides a comprehensive review of these compacts.

Comments

[SouthernRoots]

What Gregoire did may have been legal, but it wasn't in the best interests of the State.

Neither was it illegal to have revenue sharing in the compact and most other States with these types of compacts do get a share.

The taxpayers of Washington would be better served if the State's treasury could be added to by a sharing agreement. Without it, the taxpayers will just be asked to "sacrifice" more to make up the revenue shortfall differences.

What a campaign slogan, "I passed up $100 millionor more so that you could pay more."