Tribal Casinos Split On Internet Poker Position

Internet poker bills are circulating on both federal and state levels, and tribes operating Indian casinos are divided as to their position on regulating this online gambling.

Indian tribes operating regional casinos are divided as to if to support or oppose legislation brewing to control Internet poker. Bills both before Congress and in numerous state legislatures propose rules for online poker regulation, causing debate among tribal leaders.

Both Barney Frank's bill trying to regulate online gambling on a countrywide level and measures in states including California, Florida, Iowa, and New Jersey are designed to determine regulated intrastate online poker. Frank's bill would essentially render the UIGEA moot, while the local proposals would act under its guidance, keeping play and operation within state borders.

In California, the Morongo Band of Mission Indians was a pace-setter in advocating intrastate Internet poker. The tribe is pushing a bill that may partner tribal casinos with state-licensed card rooms as online gaming operators.

Morongo representatives say online poker players are a brand new market, cut loose the shoppers patronizing the land-based casinos, and would increase the gambling revenue of tribes. But other tribes disagree, saying Internet poker would simply divert customers from one type of gaming to another, and that online poker regulations could open the door to loopholes allowing states to cancel gambling compacts.

“Card game gambling on the net would take business clear of brick-and-mortar casinos,” Robert Smith, chairman of the Pala Band of Mission Indians said in a letter he wrote to the California legislature.

While many California tribes, possessing one of the most nation's strongest gaming compacts, are wary of cannibalization in their slot players by online poker, tribes in other states are less worried. Tribes located in less populous states see online gambling operations as their key to successfully using the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act.

“The Internet gives remote operations a possibility to generate incremental revenue they otherwise should not have gotten," said legal gaming expert Anthony Cabot to Indian Country Today. " It becomes a separate form of industry versus a complimentary kind of industry.”

Published on March 10, 2010 by TomWeston

Read More... [Source: California Gambling News]