Almost as predictable as the turkeys flying back to Worthington, this past week had us witness a legislator introduce a new bill designed to raise a billion dollars. Careful now. Don't assume this billion dollars is in any way destined to help reduce our commonly held $4.6 billion state budget deficit. No, no, no, no. This bill would allow Minnesotans to authorize the expansion of gambling to permit a full-blown privately operated casino in the Twin Cities area. If approved, the Legislature could sell the rights to operate the casino to a company or individual for a billion dollars, which would be used to fund building a new stadium for the Minnesota Vikings.
(Bias declaration: I am a great the Vikings' fan; in my past business life my clients included some Indian tribes; and I have been gambling for more than 50 years, primarily in Las Vegas.)
While there are those who will attest to having seen dice accidentally fall from my grasp a few thousand times over the past half-century, I have always maintained opposition to the off-reservation expansion of gambling in my home state. Long before I worked with some of the state's tribes, I thought the idea of restricting casino gambling to reservations was a good idea.
I thought of it as "destination gambling." By restricting it to reservations, the gaming wasn't on every street corner seductively inviting you at every turn to step in and lose your money. You had to get in a car or on a bus and go someplace else—like getting on a plane to Vegas—with the full realization you were going for gambling.
Remember this exchange in the movie "Casablanca?": Captain Louis Renault: "What in heaven's name brought you to Casablanca?" Rick: "My health. I came to Casablanca for the waters." Renault: "The waters? What waters? We're in the desert!" Rick: "I was misinformed."
In Minnesota if you are heading for one of the reservations, it is highly unlikely that you are going there to participate in a bake sale. You're going to play the slots or play blackjack and maybe indulge in a repast from the buffet line. You may even be going for some of the big-name entertainment in the casino showroom, but you can't get there without walking through 20 acres of slot machines and table games.
In the more than 20 years since the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988 was enacted under President Ronald Reagan, most of the attacks on reservation gambling have been from individuals and interests who wanted a piece of the gambling pie. The familiar efforts to get state approval for slot machines in bars and beer joints or a state run full operation casino or a combination of horse race betting and slot machines, referred to as "racino," have all focused on eliminating the tribal monopoly on casinos. The arguments supporting passage of these past efforts have included everything from building other professional sports stadiums and aiding the state's horse breeding industry to creating "an even playing field" for the hospitality industry. Expansion of gambling off reservation has been suggested as a panacea for almost everything except curing the common cold, eliminating warts, and healing paper cuts.
I have yet to talk to a state legislator who tells me that his people back home are stopping him on Main Street wanting him/her to vote to expand gambling from reservations to Minnesota neighborhoods.
Minnesota lawmakers wake up each day faced with the daunting task of how to plug that $4.6 billion deficit. To turn their attention, instead, to expanding gambling to fund a new sports stadium is contrary to all reasonable, self-preservation political sense: "One does not talk about twine in the house of the hanged man."