Ex-Tahoe exec to run Calif.’s largest Indian casino
By Peter Hecht, Sacramento Bee
ROHNERT PARK — Anita Silva, 82, never felt deprived by her humble upbringing in a drafty shack with no indoor plumbing on a reservation in Sonoma County. Despite economic hardships, she said simply, “I didn’t remember that there were any.”
Silva, a tribal elder for the Federated Indians of the Graton Rancheria, instead reflects on her years working in Indian health care, on her grandchildren and great-grandchildren – and on how much she loves playing the slots at Northern California tribal casinos. She still talks excitedly about the 94 bucks she won at the Dry Creek rancheria in one glorious payout two years ago.
Now, in the culmination of an improbable journey, Silva and fellow tribal members are about to get their own casino – and the proceeds from perhaps the grandest and most lucrative tribal gambling establishment in California.
On Tuesday, the 1,300-member tribe will open its Graton Resort & Casino, an $800 million development in the Sonoma County wine country. Situated next to Highway 101 in Rohnert Park, it will be the closest tribal casino to San Francisco and is expected to instantly rival Thunder Valley Casino Resort in Lincoln for supremacy in the California gambling market.
Industry analysts say the new development – with 3,000 slot machines and 144 gambling tables beneath chandeliers that glitter with 24,000 pink glass flower petals – may transform gambling in California, intensifying competition among high-end resorts and the pressure to build casinos near major highways and urban centers.
“This is the bear – no, make that the $800 million gorilla,” said Ken Adams, a Reno-based casino industry analyst. “It certainly is going to grow the total amount of gaming revenue in California. It’s going to force Cache Creek and Thunder Valley to respond competitively. … We’re off to the races.”
Cheryl Schmit, an anti-gambling advocate who is fighting a major casino development another tribe plans near Highway 99 in Madera County, said the Graton resort and its prime location may signal a gambling future far different than voters envisioned when they approved tribal casinos in California.
“Here we have this massive Las Vegas-style casino very close to an urban area at the gateway to San Francisco,” Schmit said. “Everyone is pushing forward. We’re going to wake up in a few years and California will be a full-service gaming state.”
A 2012 Standard and Poor’s market assessment said the Graton resort, to be managed by Las Vegas-based Station Casinos Inc., could generate annual gambling revenue of more than $530 million by 2016. General manager Joe Hasson, who formerly ran the Harrah’s and Harveys resorts in Stateline, said the opening is being promoted in the Bay Area market with radio and TV spots airing with “such frequency that we could elect someone governor.”
Joe Hasson, of Harrah’s (and Harvey’s (?) – I didn’t think they were owned by the same entity when he was here) is also of ‘Green Valley’ casino reality show “fame”, and is the ultimate “bean-counter” (both he and his wife are accountants). . .
I gave him a paper-back copy of “It Was Great While It Lasted: Northern Nevada’s Entertainment Heyday” (when it was published by UNR’s Black Rock Press) and a hardback version to Phil Satre, Harrah’s Chairman Emeritus, at a time when there was a lull in the entertainment here (no stage behind Harvey’s [yet] – no “big-timers” in the South Shore Room).
As that book was written by the legendary Mark Curtis, Harrah’s PR guy in Reno (the last few chapters were “ghost-written” by his son when he passed away), I’m sure he learned some things about how a casino was really done, although he most likely will be watching every penny – on behalf of Station Casinos’.
Subsequent owners of both Harrah’s and Harvey’s have all succumbed to the idea of “exporting” the casino business, mostly to Tahoe’s detriment as an original ‘source’, so the Graton Rancheria is but another ‘nail-in-the-coffin’, as the bottom line takes over the “experience”.
There are now only a few states that don’t have a gaming influence, so Tahoe has to reinvent itself quickly, especially with such a “long-in-the-tooth” product…
I highly recommend this book for anyone who wonders what it was like in those days. . .my “run” from the age of 15 (busboy at Harrah’s Lake Club on the corner) to Harrah’s Tahoe in Public Relations 10 years later was very different and very valuable to those who don’t understand the difference. . . and this book shows why. . .
Yea!!! All the more reason to vote out the existing City Council and get in some new blood that understands that we are an OUTDOOR recreational community that needs to be supported.
World, I am confused about how this article or Garrys comment has anything to do with the city council?? Am I missing something here. Though I do believe that we have been attempting to move towards marketing as a outdoor destination for at least 4 years. The casions were always just a another thing for our guest to do, they were never the main draw. Getting to Vegas has always been more glitzy, fun and flights were cheaper. IT HAS always been the LAKE and Mountains that were the draw, and always will be the draw.
relo, I disagree. At one time Tahoe was a major gaming and entertainment draw. One only has to look at our history and the celebrities that have preformed here to understand that. The article has everything to do with the continued loss of visitors to South Lake Tahoe without the proper promotion of who we are in today’s climate.
Cheryl Schmit (although anti-gaming states succinctly) “Here we have this massive Las Vegas-style casino very close to an urban area at the gateway to San Francisco,” Schmit said. “Everyone is pushing forward. We’re going to wake up in a few years and California will be a full-service gaming state.”
Our own Gary Bowen states “Tahoe has to reinvent itself quickly, especially with such a “long-in-the-tooth” product…”
That being said by others, I stand by what I said about the city council. History has shown time and again that they follow the money and it seems to be for interests other than what they were elected to do. I agree as you say, it is not a direct connection, yet the connection is all to obvious. After the same old repeated tired faces and controlling opinions for the last dozen years or so we have experienced continued failure.
So on that note, lets get some new blood in. Perhaps there will be change for the better. Perhaps not. Yet I am sure there will be some change and if it is for the worse, at least we won’t be able to blame ourselves for not caring by leaving the “ol brigade” still in charge. Obviously, the “ol brigade” is not going to change and obviously no one but them is happy with the results of their regime.