Red Earth Casino Opens

The Red Earth Casino opened last week, and many people are truly excited about it – but none more than the Torres-Martinez Desert Cahuilla Indians. The tribe opened the casino with the hopes that it will help them get on the right track for getting themselves financial independent, and to help them be more prosperous in the future.

The Red Earth Casino is located near the Salton Sea, and has 349 slot machines for the playing. The casino cost $10 million, and will enable the tribe to help itself out of the economic decline that they have felt for a long time. The tribe has suffered from terrible poverty, pesticide pollution, etc., as well as having a location that puts it out in the middle of nowhere.

This is only the first half of the casino, the tribe is planning on adding a hotel, water park, shopping center, etc. as well as a second casino that would have 1,650 slot machines. With the addition of the second group of slot machines, the tribe will have reached the limit that is allowed them in their compact with the state of California. They are currently in talks with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to add another 1,651 slot machines, and they are hoping to have a decision on them by May.

They say they are actually eight years behind the other tribal neighbors of theirs, and that they only want the same number of slot machines that the other tribes got in their 1999 compacts that they signed with the state. When asked if there was any concern that the number of slot machines in the state might be reaching an overload limit, the tribe said they did not think so, and neither did the other tribes.

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