Casino developer holding cards of hope

(Originally published August 9, 2005.)

The Hesperia casino proposal is simultaneously working its way through two parallel government bureaucracies: The state bureaucracy in Sacramento and the federal bureaucracy in Washington.

The progress of the proposal - which would build a casino for the Timbisha Shoshone tribe on the corner of Interstate 15 and Main Street - in Sacramento is currently up in the air, following a May proclamation by Governor Arnold Scharzenegger. In the proclamation, Scharzenegger said he would oppose casinos being built in "urbanized areas," and specifically included Hesperia in a list of forbidden areas.

The developers on the casino project, the Chicago-based Rinaldo Corporation, have been speaking to officials in Sacramento to see if the federal law granting the Timbisha a homeland will serve as a legal loophole to Schwarzenegger's prohibition.

"We have really very preliminary information from the state, from Schwarzenegger's camp," Rinaldo Vice-President Chad Presnell said last week. The corporation has brought in the big guns in their fight to build a casino in Hesperia, hiring experienced gaming lobbyists. "They're veterans in that region, and have proven themselves in the past with casinos in California."

But things are going better in Washington, he said, where the proposal is working its way through the Bureau of Indian Affairs, a subsection of the Department of the Interior. Ultimately, the proposal will have to be approved by the Secretary of the Interior, Gail Norton.

"Gail's office has said there won't be any opposition from them, unless there's opposition from one side of the aisle or the other" in Congress or the Senate, he said.

In recent months, Senators Diane Feinstein and John McCain, among other legislators, have been vocal opponents of off-reservation casinos. The Timbisha Shoshone are based in Bishop and their reservation is located within Death Valley National Park.

The casino, if approved, would be on land retroactively made part of their tribal homelands, due to lands originally intended to be part of the tribe's reservation remaining in the hands of private owners in Nevada. Casino opponents have characterized the Hesperia casino as an off-reservation casino, while proponents have said it legally is on-reservation.

Beau Yarbrough can be reached at beau@hesperiastar.com or 956-7108.