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Tribes regulate their own their casinos

State body plays role, but tribal sovereignty is a bar.

By Ben Schnayerson
Staff writer

Oversight of Indian gaming can be a family affair.

Tribes with gaming establishments, such as San Manuel Bingo and Casino near San Bernardino, are regulated by their own gaming commissions often led by relatives of the tribal chairman and a National Indian Gaming Commission on which two of the three commissioners are also members of gaming tribes.

A state commission exists, but its powers are limited because of tribal sovereignty.

"You hear congressmen saying Indians regulating Indians is like Enron regulating Enron,' said Deron Marquez, chairman of the San Manuel Band of Serrano Mission Indians, whose mother, Sandra Marquez, chairs the tribe's gaming commission.

Despite potential conflicts, the tribal chairman contends that strict regulations are in place because tribes can't afford to lose their casinos' credibility.

Though she has never cited her son, Sandra Marquez said she would investigate and punish him if he did something wrong in connection with the casino. She once had to investigate her husband when she was working in the tribe's human relations department.

"It wasn't easy,' she said. But "there is no favoritism. You don't do something wrong because the family will be on you.'

There are some safety nets in place that make it hard for the San Manuels' commission to ignore corruption.

Two members of the three-person gaming commission are not from the tribe. And no one on the gaming commission can be fired by the tribe's five-member business committee, which Deron Marquez chairs. Only the full tribal council can hire and fire a gaming commissioner.

The commission checks all the slot machine chips, the tables, the weights of the bingo balls and how drinks are served. Anyone who handles money in the casino goes through a background check, which includes having fingerprints sent to the FBI.

The casino also has a high-tech "eye-in-the-sky' camera system that has caught some of its own employees stealing.

"Your employees are your biggest thieves,' Sandra Marquez said.

The gaming commission follows rules laid out by the National Indian Gaming Commission.

Fed inspections

Federal officials visit the casino four times each year to make sure the San Manuels follow the rules.

Some tribal casinos have been closed, said Tanna Chattin, former spokeswoman for the National Indian Gaming Commission.

"It is a last resort,' she said.

The California Gambling Control Commission develops regulations for Indian casinos, card clubs and racetracks, and issues gaming licenses. The state Department of Justice does much of the commission's enforcement.

Even though the state commission visits the Indian casinos, its jurisdiction is lost in a battle over sovereignty.

Every time the state commission tries to make a new rule, it needs to get approval from the 64 tribes with state compacts. Each tribe has a vote, and the state has two.

Duplicate rules

Sandra Marquez said many of the proposed rules are voted down because they just duplicate the tribes' rules, even though the state gaming compacts require the state to adopt identical laws for slot machines.

Getting new rules on the books "is going a little slower than a lot of us hoped,' said Gary Qualset, the state commission's deputy director of licensing and compliance.

The state does have the power to make a rule immediately if there is an imminent threat to public health and safety, for example. But the tribal commissions can repeal it.

In Nevada, non-Indian casinos are regulated in almost every aspect by a state commission. Taxes, crime, slot machines, background checks and every aspect of the casinos are examined by the state.

Giving the California commission power to make casino rules also impinges on the tribes' sovereignty, Deron Marquez said, and opens the doors for rules the tribes may not want.

"Now you are telling us what to have in place,' he said. "We are capable of making the laws.'

Coming Friday: Experts estimate that 1percent of the U.S. population about 3million people are pathological gamblers. They destroy their credit, jobs, marriages, families, their very lives.