Indian gaming revenue grew 3.9 percent in 2017 to $32.4 billion, its seventh straight annual increase, an indicator that the chairman of the National Indian Gaming Commission said Tuesday spoke to the ongoing health of the tribal casino industry.
At a press conference in Washington, D.C., several Indian gaming leaders hinted that tribes are closely monitoring changes surrounding legal sports wagering, with tribal sovereignty an overriding factor.
NIGC Chairman Jonodev Osceola Chaudhuri, a member of the Muscogee Creek tribe in Oklahoma, said any efforts to expand sports betting to tribal casino markets “will be based on whatever compacts there are in a given state.”
Two weeks ago, the Mississippi Choctaw Tribal Council said it had approved sports betting at three of its casinos, which would make it the first Native American tribe in the U.S. to offer sports betting. A date for launch still hasn’t been announced.
Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s May 14 ruling that threw out a 25-year-old federal act prohibiting nationwide legal sports betting, Chaudhuri released a statement on behalf of the NIGC. He said the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act “… explicitly recognized that a principal goal of federal policy is to promote tribal economic development, tribal self-sufficiency, and strong tribal government.”
Courtesy: National Indian Gaming Commission
California remains the dominant state within the Indian gaming sector. The Sacramento region, which includes all of the Golden State and a handful of small gaming establishments in Northern Nevada, saw revenues grow 7.3 percent in 2017 – the largest increase of any of the eight regions – to just under $9 billion.
The nationwide totals covered 494 tribal casinos, 10 more than in 2016. Chaudhuri said the 2017 percentage increase was larger than many of the nation’s other economic indicators.
Indian gaming saw its only-ever revenue decrease between 2008 and 2009; figures remained flat at $26.5 million between 2009 and 2010. In the last four years, Indian gaming revenues nationwide have increased more than 12 percent.
“All of Indian Country has worked very hard to maintain a flourishing and constantly growing gaming industry,” Chaudhuri said. “The successes of Indian gaming in the 30 years since (the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act) prove that the foundational principles of federal Indian law should remain at the forefront of any future public policy discussions.”
National Indian Gaming Association Chairman Ernie Stevens, Jr., credited the “hard work, dedication, and compassion of those throughout Indian country committed to advancing economic self-determination through gaming.” Stevens added the 2017 revenue numbers demonstrate “the continued success and growth of our tribal government gaming industry.”
The NIGC does not break out gaming revenue by individual state. In April, the organization announced the formation of an eighth region, splitting the St. Paul (Minn.) Region into two separate regions with a second based in Rapid City, S.D.
Chaudhuri said that the new Rapid City region, which includes tribal casinos from North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana and Wyoming, allows a glimpse into predominately smaller, rural tribal gaming operations.
The Washington D.C. region, which includes the large Indian casinos operating in Florida, Connecticut, North Carolina and New York, had the second-highest revenue total – more than $7.2 billion – but only saw a 1 percent increase over 2016.
The Portland (Oregon) region, which also includes many tribal casinos in the state of Washington, had the second-highest percentage increase to Sacramento, up 6.5 percent over 2016.
Southern Nevada’s Avi casino, near Laughlin, is factored into the Phoenix region totals, while Oklahoma’s casinos are split between the Tula region (Eastern Oklahoma and Kansas) and Oklahoma City (Western Oklahoma and Texas).
Howard Stutz is the executive editor of CDC Gaming Reports. He can be reached at hstutz@cdcgamingreports.com. Follow @howardstutz on Twitter.
