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INTERNET POKER: Tribes working to craft online poker bill
Web image/CONTRIBUTED IMAGE Ultimate Poker's web site went live Tuesday, April 30 in Nevada. It's the only legal online poker site for money in the country. 3 0 37
A Text Size BY JIM MILLER The Press Enterprise
BY JIM MILLER | SACRAMENTO BUREAU | Published: May 07, 2013; 06:29 PM | Comments (0) SACRAMENTO — Representatives of some of the state’s most successful tribes with casinos have met privately to hammer out a proposal to legalize online poker, tribal leaders and others said Tuesday.
Deep divisions among the state’s politically influential tribal casino industry — including tribes in Riverside and San Bernardino counties — thwarted past attempts to advance legislation to license online poker in California, one of the world’s largest potential markets.
In recent months, though, tribes that previously opposed online poker because they said it threatened their casino businesses have begun to warm to the idea. Nevada, Delaware and New Jersey have authorized Internet gaming. And a legal site, Ultimate Poker, started taking bets in Nevada last week.
Congress, meanwhile, could adopt nationwide rules harmful to tribes’ interests.
“Tribes are primed right now to begin moving it, to begin working with state legislators to see something to fruition,” Mark Macarro, chairman of the Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians near Temecula, said at an online gaming conference sponsored by Capitol Weekly, a publication that covers California government and politics.
The Pechanga band and others opposed past proposals to legalize online poker because of fears that online gambling would undercut tribes’ casinos. Macarro, though, said the tribe’s position on that issue “is evolving.”
Another Riverside County tribe, the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians, also is part of the tribal talks. The tribe operates two casinos in the Coachella Valley.
Barry Brokaw, an Agua Caliente lobbyist, said “there has been a great commonality of purpose” among tribes and online poker.
“A lot of those tribes have been working together and we’ve made strides,” Brokaw told the Capitol Weekly audience. “I think there is a possibility that something may develop pretty soon, and we can have some serious discussions with lawmakers in the building and see what we can come up with.”
In addition, the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians near San Bernardino has also been involved. San Manual, along with the Morongo Band of Mission Indians near Banning, was a member of a now-defunct group that sponsored an online poker proposal last year.
Jerry Levine, an attorney working with the San Manuel band, said he thinks the tribes can craft a unified proposal.
Federal law prohibits online gambling but allows states to authorize games inside their borders. Millions of Californians, though, play unregulated online poker games through illegal sites based outside the United States.
In the more than three years since some tribes and card clubs began lobbying lawmakers to legalize online poker, there have been hundreds of hours of public hearings and private negotiations. Yet there has not been a single legislative vote.
Any proposal by tribes would join, and potentially conflict with, a bill that’s already been put forward on the issue. A second measure lacks any detail.
State Sen. Rod Wright, D-Inglewood, who leads the Senate committee that oversees gambling, re-introduced last year’s legislation to legalize and regulate online poker. His measure would authorize tribes and other entities, such as horse tracks, to apply for five-year licenses to operate intrastate online poker websites.
Some tribal groups strongly oppose Wright’s approach and the disagreement turned testy Tuesday. During a lunchtime discussion, Wright traded sharp words with Leslie Lohse, chairwoman of the California Tribal Business Alliance.
Lohse complained that Wright interrupted her and Wright said Lohse didn’t understand relevant federal law and the state constitution.
