Indian Slot Machine Expansion Under Fire

Come February, the residents of California will have a chance to vote on the slot machine expansion that Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has negotiated. There are two groups of people who would really like to see that slot machine expansion fail, and that is the labor and horse racing groups. They have decided to team up against the expansion, and try to convince voters that it is a bad idea.

They are hoping to overturn the legislation that the governor signed into law this past July, which would allow four tribes in Riverside and San Diego to increase the number of slot machines in their casinos exponentially. The law that was just signed does not enable the unions to organize workers which is why the unions do not want to see the slot machine compacts passed.

The unions say that if the legislation is passed, workers will not have real rights for the next 23 years, and considering the amount of money that they are helping the tribes bring in, the slot machine compacts can allow for provisions for them. Plus they complain that the poorer tribes will continue to get poorer, while the richer ones continue to get richer.

They are joining forces with Bay Meadows Land Co, which owns Bay Meadows near San Francisco and Hollywood Park in Inglewood. They say that more slot machines at the casinos pulls more business from the tracks, and that if the slot machine compacts are signed they would risk putting more than 5,000 people out of work. They say that the tribes need to pay them a portion of the slot machine revenue to boost purses and ensure the future of the industry.

 

Back to August 2007 Archive.