No matter what happens in November, gambling’s expansion is unstoppable
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Back in 2000, when California voters approved casino gambling for Indian tribes, we were told that gambling here would be governed by strict limits. Only certain games would be permitted in California. Sports gambling and Vegas-style gaming would stay in Vegas. And tribal casinos wouldn’t show up in our big cities and suburbs. They’d be limited to Indian lands, in less populated regions.
This year has made it clear that we were fools to believe any of that.
Sky River’s opening is just one example of gambling’s unstoppable expansion across our state.
Tribes aren’t in fact limited to previously owned lands; they can buy new land so that they can build bigger, more accessible casinos. That’s how Agua Caliente opened its third Coachella Valley casino during the pandemic. Sky River sits on land acquired by the Wilton Rancheria tribe through a federal trust process.
Today, gambling is everywhere. California now has 81 Indian casinos, four privately operated race tracks, 20,000-plus stores selling lottery tickets and 72 state-licensed cardrooms, which are pushing for their own expansion.
Gambling money now fuels our politics, and casino ads dominate the airwaves. This fall, the Bay Area radio station, KGO-AM wiped out its news and talk shows and relaunched as a sports gambling station, the Spread.
This year, the scale of gambling’s cultural reach became apparent through over-the-top campaigns for and against two competing sports gambling measures. Proposition 26, sponsored by tribes with big casinos, seeks a tribal monopoly on sports wagers, while also permitting roulette and dice games at tribal casinos. Prop. 27, sponsored by online gambling companies, seeks similar power over sports gambling for DraftKings and Fan Duel (while also allowing those firms to save on taxes).
Both measures trail in the polls and should lose. But these propositions aren’t defeats for gambling expansion. On the contrary, the epic scale of the dueling campaigns for and against the measures has demonstrated that betting operations will bulldoze any limits on their own expansion.
Together, gambling interests spent more than $440 million on the measures — doubling the previous record for spending on ballot campaigns. Tribes and online gaming companies alike are certain to spend hundreds of millions more in future lobbying and ballot measures — whatever it takes to win.
Indeed, the campaign ads double as advertisements and normalizers of sports gambling. And while the measures’ backers claim to limit gambling’s reach to adults, their ads are inescapable. My three young sons, confronted with constant Prop. 26 and 27 ads on YouTube and other sites they visit to watch cartoons and age-appropriate videos, have been asking me all kinds of questions about gambling.
This is not your father’s gambling. Online sports wagering isn’t putting a few bucks on the outcome of a three-hour football game; it is an immersive environment in which you can bet in real-time throughout the game, compiling huge losses in seconds. Expanding this sort of betting will fuel gambling addiction in California, and increase its damage to families and personal finances. The average gambling debt for male addicts exceeds $50,000.
It’s unclear how serious the problem is in California because the state’s gambling addiction services are underfunded. There hasn’t been a thorough state survey of gambling habits here in more than a decade.
What is clear, from my own visit to Sky River, is just how seductive 21st century California gambling can be.
On a Tuesday morning, about half the tables were in use, and dozens of people sat in front of larger and colorful screens, playing slots and other games by video. The 12-restaurant food court, offering everything from dim sum, oysters and sushi to street tacos and burgers, was opening up. The bar was already buzzing with people sipping drinks as they gambled on computer terminals.
Sky River’s opening has been celebrated in the city of Elk Grove, which wants the visitors and the tax revenues; and by Wilton Rancheria, which fought for decades to restore its tribal status (achieved in 2009) and to acquire land.
With the casino in place, the tribe should have a brighter future. Sky River is the closest casino to the state Capitol, and it’s near the Bay Area. And its geographical advantage is complemented by near-perfect timing. More gambling is coming to California, so much that even the sky might not be the limit.
Joe Mathews writes the Connecting California column for Zócalo Public Square.
