If you’re a dice manufacturer, you might be shipping large packages to Oklahoma locations soon – the nation’s densest state for casinos is a good bet for adding craps. And roulette wheel manufacturers are likely smiling, too, because their game is also close to becoming legal in that state.
“So far, so good. You never know what’s going to happen,” said Sheila Morago, executive director of the Oklahoma Indian Gaming Association.
There are 135 casinos in Oklahoma, ranging from full-scale resort casinos to an annex of a gas stop, with at least one in each of the state’s 77 counties. All are owned by Native American tribes. They have sprung up in the past two decades, after the U.S. government, and then state voters, approved gambling. Gaming revenues are now vital in Oklahoma, which has about half a million Native Americans among its approximately 4 million residents.
The big bang came in 1988 in the form of the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, which mapped out a path for tribes to operate casinos with bingo-style games, known as Class II gaming. The first Oklahoma Indian casino opened in 1992, but some uncertainties remained for skill games and card games. So in 2004, Oklahoma’s legislature approved the State Tribal Gaming Act, which cleared the way for Class III gaming, with voters approving the measure later the same year – but no craps or roulette. (Technically, Oklahoma does allow versions of craps and roulette, but these games are played with cards.)
Here in my home state of Florida, the Seminole Tribe of Florida also is vying to get craps and roulette, but the context is much different. The Seminoles already pay the state for the exclusive rights to blackjack, so they’re ahead of their competition, the racetrack casinos. They want craps and roulette to expand their audience to South American and Northeast tourists, generating more demand for the hotel operations they are currently expanding in South Florida and Tampa.
In Oklahoma, it’s more of a game of catch-up. Oklahoma faces significant competition from neighboring states, a storyline that is playing out across the country. For example, Pennsylvania’s growth has cut into New Jersey’s revenues, and increasing numbers of Illinois and Ohio casinos and video lottery terminals have hurt gaming operations in Indiana.
Many of Oklahoma’s casinos are on its borders, and gamblers from the Dallas area are especially coveted. (Still, don’t expect Texas to approve casinos for a long, long time – if ever.) But those Dallas gamblers could almost as easily zip over to Mississippi or Louisiana and enjoy playing a wider range of games at casinos in those states.
“If you’re losing customers from Texas because Mississippi has those two other games, they might want to come here instead,” Morago said.
Oklahoma State Senator Greg McCortney said conservative estimates indicate craps and roulette would bring in $22 million next year and $49 million in the following years. That would be money on top of the $133 million paid to the state by Indian tribes from their slot operations revenues.
Adding craps and roulette would bolster an already-strong performance by Indian casinos. Oklahoma ranks No. 2 in the nation for Indian gambling revenue. Tribal casinos garnered $4.2 billion in 2015 (the most recent year available), according to Alan Meister, principal economist for Nathan Associates in Irvine, California. That ranks only behind California ($7.9 billion); it’s well ahead of Florida ($2.6 billion), Washington state ($2.5 billion), and Arizona ($1.9 billion).
Rather than negotiate compacts with each individual tribe, Oklahoma tribes themselves created a collective proposal, and worked out one deal with the state. Then they all signed individual compacts using the terms of that deal. Three-fourths of gaming tribes devote all of their (net) revenue to tribal governmental services, economic and community development, payments to local communities, and to charitable purposes. That is, they don’t give out the per capita payments like the Seminoles do. It’s an economic approach that those in the commercial casino sector likely can’t fathom, but that doesn’t mean that the results can’t be appreciated. Because in almost every corner of the nation, states and their governments are trying to find a balance of what the right kinds of gaming are for them.
