Why is gaming different at Indian casinos?
QUESTION: Now in our senior years, my wife and I spend about six months a year traveling by RV across the U.S. Thanks to what I believe was your referral, we bring along the American Casino Guide and make stops at many of the different casinos across country for food and some light gambling. Interestingly, we find that many of the Indian casinos offer different forms of gambling compared with where we live (Fresno, Calif.) the other half of the year. What is the reasoning behind this? — Boyd C.
ANSWER: In 1988, Congress passed the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act to "provide a legislative basis for the operation/regulation of Indian gaming, protect gaming as a means of generating revenue for the tribes, encourage economic development of these tribes, and protect the enterprises from negative influences (organized crime).”
What the law also does is establish three categories of gaming — Class I, Class II, and Class III — with a different regulatory scheme for each.
Class I consists of traditional American Indian games, which may be part of tribal ceremonies and celebrations, and social games for minimal prizes. The tribes themselves have exclusive control over these games and are not subject to IGRA's regulations.
What you undoubtedly observed in your travels, Boyd, are the differences between Class II and Class III games.
Class II games are games of chance commonly known as bingo, pull-tabs and non-banked card games (games that are played exclusively against other players instead of against the house or a player acting as a bank). What they do not include are slot machines or electronic facsimiles of any game of chance. Tribes themselves regulate Class II games with oversight by the National Indian Gaming Commission.
Casino-style gambling is Class III gaming. This includes games typically played at casinos: slots, video poker, table games, etc. Many conditions must be met for a tribe to offer Class III gaming. For instance, to offer Class III gaming, the tribe would have to negotiate a compact with the state and also the state's cut of the gaming revenue.
Mark Pilarski: Where did those big slot jackpots go?
Steve Bourie’s American Casino Guide remains the best all-inclusive guide of casinos nationwide for the budget-conscious gambler. Bourie updates the guide yearly (the 2016 edition is out) and indexes every casino/resort in the U.S. Toll-free phone numbers, websites and e-mail addresses are included.
The guide includes $1,000 in valuable casino coupons for free rooms, shows, buffets, slot play, table betting money, and more. In addition, it has statistics that show the actual returns on slot machines provided by each state’s gaming commission, the best-paying video poker games, which casinos offer the best table game rules and more than 100 pages of gambling tips, techniques and winning strategies.
You can purchase the 2016 edition ($18.95) at most major bookstores, amazon.com or americancasinoguide.com.
Mark Pilarski is a contributing editor for numerous gambling publications. E-mail questions to pilarski@markpilarski.com.